Complaint Review: John Anthony Perez - Gilbert, AZ

Prior Convictions

CR-2004010155         

Date of offense: 1/23/2004

Theft (Plead guilty to Class 6 felony) / Probation Violation  

Ordered to pay restitution of $7,000.00

3 years of probation

4 months of jail time

CR-2004011771

Theft of means of transportation (Plead guilty to Class 3 felony)

4 years of probation

6 months of jail time

Date of offense: 3/15/2004

Modus Operandi: Master Manipulator

Being conned by a master manipulator is never a pleasant experience. John A. Perez is a grifter – a con man who tricks people into giving him money by fraudulent means. John Perez’s first hooks are to quote scripture, talk about Jesus Christ, and talk about owning and donating to charities – not because he believes in charity work, but because it enhances his image.

Since he is truly devious, his attempt to appear generous and Christlike is intended not only to impress people but to gain other people’s trust so that he can exploit them later. He asks what you do for a living and how much money you make. He uses that information to quote his fee for teaching how to trade options in the stock market. Paying John Perez to learn options is how you enter his Ponzi scheme. He teaches nothing of value, and you receive no benefit. John’s Ponzi scheme promises high returns, but the reality is that everyone loses money.

John Perez only teaches male Christians and uses churches to target victims. He frequently sends out prayers mingled with scripture references in text messages giving glory unto God and petitioning Him for bountiful blessings. He refers to everyone as “brother” and dons a large wooden cross on a necklace. Since Christians trust other Christians who are church-going and appear to be very humble, they are his target victims. Being a believer in Christ is just a cover up for his dark tendencies. Posing as a devout Christian just adds to his deception.

John also deceives people by telling them lies, so you can trust him. He lies about being so successful at trading stocks and options, that at age 19, he went to work on Wall Street earning $1.6M his first year, $3M his second year, and so on. There is no record of an individual named John A. Perez (age 52) of ever having a stockbroker’s license or CRD/SEC# according to the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) website https://brokercheck.finra.org/

The Chinese have a term for this type of scam; Sha Zhu Pan, which means pig-butchering.

Packaging: John Perez presents himself as a good person and pretends to be wealthy and successful. He likes to discuss the market and options trading and sends screenshots of candlesticks charts of stocks showing how he was able to predict the rise or fall of certain stocks.  

Raising: Greets you every morning via text with a long prayer asking God for help in the market, then closes with an amen, and emojis of closed hands. He coaches you on how to invest in options and tells you which options to buy and when to get in.

Killing: A victim may see some gains initially, but then take a huge loss in one day. John will string you along until your option is about to expire, and then tells you to invest even more money to “dollar cost average” and buy enough options to get the price lower – all the while the theta is eating away at your option until it eventually expires worthless. Then, John will convince you to enter his carpool, so he can make the trades for you. He will send you screenshots of a fake account, leading you to believe that you have made money investing with him. 

Killed: When you ask for a withdrawal or to cash out of the carpool, you stop receiving the morning texts. The only texts you receive are excuses of why John cannot get the money. If you ask for login info to see the carpool, he gets offended. If you call him a scammer, he denies it. Eventually, he blocks you and communication ceases.

John Perez knowingly defrauds people through lies, misrepresentation, and deception. He tells people that they can make 10x or more in the stock market trading options using his method or “hack”, which he charges thousands of dollars to reveal.

His “strategy” is based on what is known as buy and sell orders, or the “longs and shorts” as he calls them. John Perez says that by looking at the blocks of orders from brokers and wirehouses, he can predict the future price of a stock.

This is false and extremely misleading. The orders that John refers to can be seen as part of what’s known as Level II analysis. These blocks of orders are what large brokers, like Goldman Sachs, are wanting to pay for a particular stock. The price a broker wants to pay may be higher or lower than the current price, but the dollar amounts are proposed prices that can be withdrawn at any time.

This is not a winning stock market strategy. No experienced trader would solely rely on this information to buy and sell options. This is a scheme dreamed up by John Perez to defraud victims, who not only pay John thousands of dollars to show them something that has no bearing on predicting stock prices but also to cause victims to lose tens of thousands of dollars because he demands that people rely on this Level II information while under his tutelage for trading options.

Why does John Perez want people to lose money? The answer is quite simple: After a victim has lost large sums of money using his technique, and is now down and out, John re-victimizes them by offering, with what little money they have left, the opportunity to make trades with John in his personal account, which he calls the “carpool”.

Stated another way, victims physically (or by bank transfer) give more money to John so that he can make the trades for them using his fake personal broker account which, according to John, has an account balance in the millions of dollars. John says he will comingle your money with his and makes the trades with your money and his money, thus “carpooling”.  

According to John, since he is trading with tens of millions of dollars, when the price of an option goes down, he can simply buy more options at the cheaper price thus lowering the cost of the option so much so, that if the price of the option goes up just a little, he can still make a profit because his cost is now lower.

Everyone who trades with John using his strategy loses money, and if they keep trading over time, they will eventually lose all their money. This is so John can easily make his pitch to a victim who has just lost a lot of money to possibly get their money back, and make even more money in John’s “carpool”. John Perez tells people that by riding in his carpool you can’t lose because according to John, he never loses.   

The problem is, there is no carpool. It is a complete fabrication and a means to misrepresent and deceive a victim into thinking that the money will be invested along with John’s money. In reality, John does not have any money and does not invest a victim’s money in his carpool. John’s real intent is to permanently deprive a victim of their money for a second time, and use the money for his living expenses and car rentals.  

When a victim asks to withdraw some or all the money, their number is blocked and communication with John ceases.

 Common Lies and Misrepresentations Used by John to Convince and Defraud Victims

·         He has been successfully trading for over 30 years

·         He was a stockbroker on Wall Street

·         He bought his first home in La Jolla, CA for $5M at age 21, which he still owns

·         He is currently developing a multi-billion-dollar Formula 1 racetrack in Scottsdale

·         He invented a waterproof TV and sold the patent to Dell for millions

·         He was a semi-pro surfer

·         He has taught Seth Rogen and other celebrities how to trade options

·         He has a home in Monaco

·         He has a home in Newport Beach

·         He owns a 10,000 sq. ft. home in Paradise Valley

·         He owns 256 collector cars

·         He owns a Lamborghini

·         He owns several Ferraris

·         He has a private jet

·         He owns a yacht

·         He personally knows Elon Musk and Mark Cuban

·         He frequently rents nice vehicles, which he claims he owns

Upon meeting someone for the first time, John will almost always blather about how successful he is thanks to God and the stock market. The purpose of these lies is to beguile you into thinking that you can be successful like him by paying him to teach you the secrets of options trading.