Wednesday 12 January 2011

'Ponzi' Ponce Freeman Eventually Coughs To Con


A flamboyant foreign exchange dealer admitted today blowing £14m invested by up to 700 investors in a ‘Ponzi’ scheme, which funded his lavish lifestyle.

Terence Freeman, 62, of King’s Place, King’s Road, Horsham, West Sussex, formerly of Whitehall Lane, Buckhurst Hill, Essex, is the former boss of City-based GFX Capital Markets Ltd.

Freeman was investigated by the City of London Police’s Economic Crime Department, after initially reporting threats from investors to police, complaining his car was daubed with paint.

Throughout 2006 and 2007 Freeman – who had a luxury box at Tottenham Hotspur Football Club – also blew £14,000 a month rent on exclusive Square Mile offices in a bid to look every bit the successful businessman.

He pleaded guilty at Southwark Crown Court to being knowingly a party to the carrying on of a business, namely GFX Ltd., for a fraudulent purpose, namely the inducement of persons to invest in a ‘Safe’ exchange scheme by making false representations and statements as to the protection and profits of investments.

Thirty investors are alleged to have lost over £130,000, and one couple who hoped GFX profits would fund their dream home lost £1.4m.

Jailbird Freeman, who changed his name from Terry Sparks after his release from a four-and-a-half year sentence in 2000, was also subject to a fifteen-year company director disqualification order.

He also pleaded guilty to engaging in business while bankrupt, acting as a director when bankrupt, acting in contravention of a disqualification order and will be sentenced on February 14.

Three counts of money laundering were dropped.

Investors were promised risk-free high returns on the foreign exchange markets, but millions of pounds were soon disappearing on botched trades and running his expensive company.

Much of the rest was moved straight into a foreign account and blown on holiday homes in Cyprus and France, a top of the range land rover and lavish gifts for his new younger Eastern European bride, including a £120,000 diamond ring.

Freeman initially covered-up his crimes by moving funds around the SAXO Bank trading accounts and issuing false GFX statements telling investors they were all making healthy profits.

Freeman’s deception began to be exposed in 2008 when, expecting a US government bail out of Lehman Brothers, he kept millions of his clients money invested in dollars.

Days later the bank went under, the value of the dollar plummeted and he lost half his total investment fund.

To try and ease investor concerns, and while at the height of the financial crisis, GFX announced 12 per cent profits for the month.

Around the same time, posing as an experienced trader, he invited potential new clients to a country manor house and even as his fraud was crumbling people, continued to invest in GFX.

Detective Superintendent Bob Wishart, from the City of London Police’s Economic Crime Directorate, said: “Rub away the sheen and you find Freeman is the archetypal fraudster happy to steal money and ruin lives.

“People invested their futures with GFX only to find they had been horribly conned by this criminal.

“Even after being caught Freeman was still trying to blame anyone, but himself.

“It was only after a long and painstaking investigation that he finally admitted to the huge amount of personal and financial damage he had caused.”

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