Federal agents are investigating several people suspected of running a fraudulent investment scheme that helped pay for stock market day trading and gambling trips to Las Vegas.
The alleged scheme used a number of Twin Cities business entities and is believed to have tapped more than 200 investors nationwide for at least $10.9 million, according to a sworn statement filed this month in Minneapolis federal court to obtain three search warrants.
U.S. Postal Inspector Rob Strande, who filed the statement, said the losses have not been determined, but that they could be substantial.
Strande said in the affidavit that the suspects solicited investors by promising returns of 20 to 2,200 percent over the course of one to 18 months. Potential investors were told that their money would go to unspecified ventures -- including gold, diamonds and oil commodities -- he said.
"Any money earned from day trading and collected by new investors would then be redistributed and sent out to all of the investors as lulling payments," Strande said.
In layman's terms, he said, it was a Ponzi or pyramid scheme. He said there is evidence of securities fraud, mail fraud, bank fraud and money laundering.
The affidavit said the investigation found that Kalin Thanh Dao, 31, of Minneapolis, ran the scheme with the help of others from April 2006 to the present. Dao represented herself as CEO of several Minneapolis companies with similar names, including TD Financial Services, NLC TD Financial Services, NLC Financial Services and NLC Venture Group, it said.
(The Star Tribune has found several apparently unrelated businesses that also operate under those or similar names, but which are not under suspicion.)