Why settle at being rich when you can own the entire world?
That thought occurred to me as I read an investment offer sent by a thoughtful reader. According to the offering letter from The Quantum Group of Coppell, Texas— “a Private Investment Group with holdings in Transportation, Real Estate, Banks, Insurance, Sports Agencies and Brokerage Firms” — your humble columnist could participate in a “Unique Investment Program specifically designed to return Nine Hundred Percent (900%) for each dollar invested in 90 days.”
Yes, you read that right. 900 percent in 90 days.
As they carefully pointed out, an original investment of $10,000 would accumulate a profit of $90,000 during the investment period and $100,000 would be cheerfully returned to the investor. They could do this because, “All of our brokers, Traders, and Bankers are part of a “Special Group” that knows the “INSIDE” workings of the banking and security markets.”
Not only that, the investment was guaranteed. “All investments are Insured by a Triple A (AAA) rated Insurance Company.” The opportunity, however, would close by a specific date.
Now I ask you, is this a great country, or what? The Big Guys are going to let us little guys in on their secrets. We, too, will be able to earn 900 percent on our money, every three months, the way they do all the time. Why, with returns like that, who needs a 401k plan?
In case the extraordinary size of this opportunity has escaped you, please consider The Scott Burns Plan For How Absolutely Anyone Can Own The Entire World In Less Than Three Years.
First, you open your mailbox and withdraw the latest offer of a bank credit card with a large line of credit. This is a matter of faith, like Field of Dreams. Plant a mailbox in your front yard and wait for the credit offers. They will come. In the Burns family, the latest opportunity was the simultaneous arrival of two offers for $10,000 credit lines. Both from First USA… and at a low introductory interest rate.
Second, exercise your entire credit line and send the proceeds to the aforementioned investment firm.
Third, watch your money grow. That’s the whole plan.
You would have $100,000 in three months, guaranteed. More than enough to repay First USA.
But why bother?
You would have a cool $1 million in six months; $10 million in nine months; and $100 million in a year. You know, with an investment like this it isn’t long before you’re talking about real money. You can quit your day job.
In fact, sometime during the 6th quarter— between month 15 and 18— your investment would be enough to buy First USA, lock, stock, and barrel… if Bank One hadn’t bought it first.
But don’t sweat the small change.
In the 8th quarter— between month 21 and 24— that original stake would be enough to buy General Electric, Coca Cola, Exxon, Microsoft, Intel, or Merck… and by the end of the period you could own all six of them. Take THAT Bill Gates and Warren Buffett!
But why stop there?
In only three more months, you’d have $10 Trillion, enough to buy the 3,000 largest U.S. publicly held companies and still have $1.4 trillion in spare change.
But why stop there?
With a mere three additional months, you’d have $100 Trillion, enough to own every publicly held company in the entire world. And you’d still have enough to pay off the National Debt, as a gesture of thanks and charitable goodwill to the nation that made all this possible. Then again, none of these figures take income taxes into account so it might take an additional 3 to 6 months before you owned the world.
Which brings us back to The Quantum Group in Coppell, Texas.
With returns like this you would think that “The Quantum Group” would have pretty nice offices. You can imagine our disappointment when we drove to MacArthur Boulevard in Coppell and found that “Suite 105-141” is a franchised private mailbox store. Anything going to the Quantum Group goes into mailbox 141. Nor does anyone answer the phone number listed on the offering letter.
“Do you get much activity on box 141?” I asked the owner of this particular private mail box store.
“I’d rather not say.”, he responded.
“I get the feeling we’re not the first people to ask.”
“No, you’re not.”, he said.
“Like people in uniforms?”
“No, more like The X-Files.”, he said cryptically. The owner clearly had received more than enough visitors over box 141, the apparent world headquarters of The Quantum Group.
There are a lot of mailboxes out there, offered by a multitude of companies. To make matters still more complicated, if “Quantum” sounds reassuringly familiar to you, there is a good reason. The Dallas area telephone directory lists at least 23 firms with “Quantum” in their name, including an auto and chiropractic firm. The word “Quantum” also appears in more than 100 business listings on the world wide web in Texas alone.
Although the Coppell based Quantum Group isn’t on any of these lists, a call to the Quantum Group International, listed in Dallas, led to a disconnected phone service and the address turned out to be a vacant townhouse. Repeated calls to the Quantum Corp. in Grapevine, Texas led to a recorded message indicating the couple was not in. Calls to Austin, Fort Worth, and Houston investment oriented companies with “Quantum” in their names brought surprised responses… but failed to turn up the investment wizards we were seeking.
According to the Dallas Better Business Bureau there have been some 17 inquiries, but no complaints, about the Quantum Group in Coppell. Similarly, the local office of the FBI said “No comment” when asked if there was an ongoing investigation.
What’s the bottom line here?
If an offer sounds too good to be true, it is.
This information is distributed for education purposes, and it is not to be construed as an offer, solicitation, recommendation, or endorsement of any particular security, product, or service.
Photo by Nataliya Vaitkevich
(c) A.M. Universal, 1997