FTC accuses firm, co-founders of $137M fraud

COLLEGE PARK, Md. — The founders of a company called Raging Bull tout themselves as expert stock traders who teach customers how they, too, can become millionaires. Marketing emails said they found a “hidden bull market” in the COVID-19 pandemic.

Federal regulators say the company operators have defrauded consumers out of more than $137 million over the past three years. And the coronavirus-fueled economic crisis hasn’t tempered their “reckless” efforts to dupe vulnerable investors, government lawyers wrote in a court filing Monday.

The Federal Trade Commission sued

RagingBull.com LLC and the company’s co-founders, Jeffrey Bishop and Jason Bond, in Maryland.

FTC attorneys are seeking federal court orders freezing company assets, halting the alleged fraud scheme and awarding relief to consumers, including refunds and restitution.

Bishop and Bond formed Raging Bull in 2014.

The company sells online services related to stock and options trading and claims to have thousands of subscribers, according to the lawsuit.

The FTC says bank records show the company is bilking consumers out of millions of dollars each month. Many consumers have had their refund requests denied and had trouble canceling their online services, the FTC says.

Ads for Bishop’s services call him a “genius trader who has made millions in the stock market.” The company’s website says Bond is a former gym teacher who taught himself to trade stocks and rid himself of $250,000 in debt.

The company’s marketing materials don’t tell consumers that Bishop and Bond primarily derive their incomes from Raging Bull customers’ subscription fees.

Neither Bishop nor Bond responded to an email or a phone message left with the company. The lawsuit says both men live in New Hampshire.

Kyle Dennis, of Kingsport, Tennessee, also is named as a defendant in the lawsuit, which describes him as a trading instructor for Raging Bull.