South Africa’s Billion Dollar AIDS Scam

Authorities are looking into South Africa’s equivalent of Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme, in which purchase orders for AIDS drugs were faked…

Hundreds of investors have been fleeced of up to 10 billion rand ($1.2 billion) in what could be South Africa’s biggest corporate fraud, a private investigator and lawyer said on Thursday.

Barry Tannenbaum, a South African businessman living in Australia, lured investors with the promise of 200 percent annual returns linked to pharmaceutical imports, and forged AIDS drug orders to reassure funders when money started to dry up.

The scheme is still unravelling but lawyers and investigators believe hundreds of investors including top businessmen from South Africa, the United States, Germany and Australia, were involved, losing up to 10 billion rand.

From Reuters