Smiling (bogus) face behind the carbon fraudsters
Probes a world of scams and scandals
T.D. writes: Pentagon Asset Management approached me about selling my carbon credits. Its website address is pentagonassetmgt.com and the telephone number is 020 7859 4985. I assume this company is a scam, but perhaps you can check it out and let readers know if it is to be avoided. THANK YOU. I have checked them out. This is a scam. Avoid.
Carbon credits were a scam investment to begin with, so any firm claiming it can sell them for you is just another rip-off. One investor says Pentagon told him his credits were worth more than £8 each but – surprise, surprise – he would have to pay an up-front fee to start the sales ball rolling.
This is not the only evidence against Pentagon. For a start, while there are businesses with similar names, records at Companies House show there is no such British limited company.
Then there is the website. It claims Pentagon is almost 200 years old, with more than £26billion of client assets, offices in London, Switzerland, Guernsey and South Africa, and services covering shares, unit trusts and currencies.
Remarkably though, the firm has somehow managed not to be registered with the Financial Conduct Authority, leaving its bosses open to the risk of being jailed for providing all these services illegally.
Some of its website has simply been copied from that of the genuine Investec Wealth & Investment. It mistakenly copied over a passage that says: ‘Discover how IW&I can help you preserve capital’. A bit of a giveaway.
‘Want to know more?’ Pentagon asks. ‘Speak to one of our specialists today.’ The confident face that smiles out from Pentagon’s website really does belong to a financial adviser.
I traced him – thousands of miles away in Louisville, Kentucky, in the US. His name is Brian LaHue and he told me: ‘No, there is no connection with me. Why would it want to use a picture of me?’
Closer to home, Pentagon claims to be located at Berkeley Square in London, but says its registered office is 12 Chequers Road in Derby.
This address exists and it is the registered office of a company called Pentagon Investments Limited – but this is a legitimate business in the vehicle industry.
Joe O’Callaghan, of the Derby company, told me: ‘It has got nothing to do with us. When we found out about it we called the police straight away.
‘We passed all the details to Action Fraud, but unfortunately we have heard nothing back.’
Last Tuesday, I called Pentagon’s London phone number. The person who answered said ‘Reception’, with no company name – a clue that he takes calls for all sorts of bogus businesses. He could not help, he said, but he would get someone to phone me back.
A short time later Pentagon called me. I explained who I was and asked why the company was not authorised, why it used a fake picture on its website and why it used the address of an unconnected business in Derby. The speaker said he would put me through to his boss. There were some background noises, then the line went dead. By Thursday, Pentagon’s website had disappeared.
There is no disputing that Pentagon is a criminal enterprise run by crooks. But if Joe O’Callaghan and his colleagues in Derby already reported this, why was Pentagon still in business just a few days ago? If the authorities ignore crooks like this, then all they have to do is reopen under a new name and carry on stealing.