Founder sentenced to seven years in prison for fraudulent sale to JPMorgan

Post by sailingparrot » Tue, Sep 30, 2025, 5:38 PM UTC

ajross wrote: post #64

randycupertino wrote: post #19

My favorite thing about this case is how she bragged to her lead engineer she wouldn't go to prison, "“Don’t worry — I don’t want to end up in an orange jumpsuit" when she was trying to convince the engineer to fabricate their user data. From the complaint: > In particular, CC-1 and JAVICE asked Engineer-1 to supplement a list of Frank’s website visitors with additional data fields containing synthetic data. > Engine…

> she bragged to her lead engineer she wouldn't go to prison So... obviously she was wrong. But the line between "just cutting a few corners" and prosecutable criminality isn't nearly as bright as we in the peanut gallery like to think. Lots of very successful startup launches (Uber and AirBnB are famous examples) were kinda/sorta/prettymuch illegal by the plain language of the laws they were (not) operating under. A…

Post by FireBeyond » Tue, Sep 30, 2025, 6:05 PM UTC

mothballed wrote: post #84

FireBeyond wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a really weird spin on Shkreli's antics. He would paint himself as a working man's hero, "I'm making insurers pay more so you can get your drugs cheaper", always avoiding the awkward questions of where the insurer's money came from and why premiums kept rising (note that I'm also not siding with insurers here, especially those who have implemented PBMs to leech money into their pockets). He basically treated…

Regardless on your take about his antics, it seems clear the fraud prosecution had a lot more to do with his pharma antics than the government actually caring that much about how he paid back investors at prior companies, especially since to my knowledge none of his investors were going to the government with complaints. No one gave a shit about the guy until his (seemingly legal) pharma 'gouging' practices pissed of…

Post by bix6 » Tue, Sep 30, 2025, 6:06 PM UTC

zeusk wrote: post #50

NickC25 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They also have $4.3T in AUM. $175M for them is quite literally pennies to them.

AUM is not theirs to keep; and market cap is a very deceitful metric especially for banks where liabilities dwarf the market cap.

Post by Aurornis » Tue, Sep 30, 2025, 6:33 PM UTC

ajross wrote: post #73

giancarlostoro wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess it all depends on how you're cheating. Are you defrauding others in your cheating? Or are you just bypassing bureaucracy like not having a Taxi service license?

Potato/potatoe. Existing taxi medallion holders were absolutely harmed by Uber. Existing licensed hotel operators were absolutely harmed by AirBnB. And we all celebrated that to great effect here. But it was breaking the rules. We just think THOSE rules were bad but THESE rules are good. Well, it's not our call to make, it's the prosecutors'. And you (yes, you personally) aren't nearly as insulated from this kind of…

Post by simonsarris » Tue, Sep 30, 2025, 6:36 PM UTC

jerf wrote: post #60

brandall10 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

She pushed back on any direct vetting of the list using privacy laws as a shield and JPMorgan didn't challenge it due to competitive pressure to get the deal done ASAP. Clearly, if only 10% of the list was real, it would be pretty easy to validate that with a small random sample.

The way that due diligence would have discovered this was not to take the list and start doing spot checks on it. The way due diligence should have found this is that it should have been written all over the financials. What do you mean you have 4 million customers and a support staff of 20? What do you mean you have 4 million customers but your revenue is {clearly too low}? What do you mean you have 4 million custom…