The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) today informed victims of $145 million Ponzi scheme on how to respond to a civil enforcement action the regulator filed against the scammers earlier this year.

Customers should complete the Confidential Customer Survey or email inquiries regarding this case to DOEcustomerinquiry@cftc.gov.

The complaint was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas, charging fraud and misappropriation against defendants Marcus Todd Brisco, Yas Castellum LLC, Yas Castellum Financial LLC, Tin Quoc Tran, Francisco Story, Fredirick Safranko a/k/a Ted Safranko, SAEG Capital General Management LP, and Michael Shannon Sims.

The complaint alleges that beginning in approximately April 2020, Tran, Brisco and his companies, and Sims were involved with three interconnected commodity pool scams that fraudulently solicited and misappropriated pool participant funds. The complaint further alleges that Story, Safranko, and SAEG lied to the National Futures Association (NFA) in order to conceal one or more of the scams.

In its continuing litigation, the CFTC seeks full restitution to defrauded pool participants, disgorgement of any ill-gotten gains, civil monetary penalties, permanent trading and registration bans, and a permanent injunction against further violations of the Commodity Exchange Act (CEA) and CFTC regulations, as charged.

As alleged in the complaint, Tran operated a fraudulent scheme from approximately April 2020 to the present. He directly accepted at least $144,043,883 from approximately 913 pool participants. Some, if not all, of the funds were intended for trading either forex or margined or leveraged gold-U.S. dollar pairs. However, Tran did not send any pool participant funds to a trading firm; rather, he misappropriated some of the pool participant funds by using them to pay invoices, a loan, individuals not involved with the commodity pool, and to subsidize his unrelated businesses.

Further, as alleged in the complaint, from approximately October 2020 to May 2022, Brisco and Yas Castellum LLC misrepresented to potential pool participants Yas Castellum LLC ’s historical trading records; how they would trade pool participant funds; where they would maintain pool participant funds; and who would do the trading. Based on these material misrepresentations and omissions, at least 43 pool participants transferred no less than $470,780 to Yas Castellum LLC to participate in its purported commodity pool. Rather than trade pool participant funds, Brisco and Yas Castellum LLC, with the direction and assistance of Sims, transferred the funds to entities Tran controlled.

The complaint further alleges that Brisco closed Yas Castellum LLC and then launched Yas Castellum Financial LLC in June 2022. Brisco and this new company engaged in many of the same misrepresentations and omissions as the former company. Based on these material misrepresentations and omissions, at least 57 pool participants transferred approximately $1,585,261 to participate in Yas Castellum Financial LLC’s purported commodity pool. However, Yas Castellum Financial LLC also misappropriated pool participant funds by transferring most of the funds to a Tran-controlled entity, and by Brisco paying himself for purported trading profits that did not exist.

According to the complaint, to conceal Tran’s scheme from regulators, Story, Safranko, and SAEG knowingly submitted falsified bank statements to the NFA during an examination of SAEG.

In its continuing litigation, the CFTC seeks full restitution to defrauded pool participants, disgorgement of any ill-gotten gains, civil monetary penalties, permanent trading and registration bans, and a permanent injunction against further violations of the Commodity Exchange Act (CEA) and CFTC regulations, as charged.