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Great frauds in history: John MacGregor’s dodgy loans
Profiles When the Royal British Bank fell on hard times, founder John MacGregor started falsifying the accounts and paying dividends out of capital. The bank finally collapsed with liabilities of £539,131
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Great frauds in history… William Strahan’s stolen bonds
Profiles Eton-educated William Snow, AKA William Strahan, inherited a huge fortune and joined the family bank. On the face of it he was a pillar of respectable society. But he and his partners sold investors' assets to bail themselves out when they went broke.
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Great frauds in history: the Independent West Middlesex Fire and Life Assurance Company's early Ponzi scheme
Profiles The Independent West Middlesex Fire and Life Assurance Company (IWM) offered annuities and life insurance policies at rates that proved too good to be true – thousands of policyholders who had handed over large sums were left with nothing.
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Great frauds in history... John Factor’s penny-stock scams
Profiles John Factor sold worthless penny stocks through a boiler room operation, ramping the price via his financial newsletters. But he was never held to account.
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Great frauds in history: Farrow’s Bank
Features Thomas Farrow set up his eponymous bank in 1901, offering high interest rates to small savers. After falsifying the accounts and collapsing the bank, he was convicted of fraud in 1921.
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Great frauds in history: Alan Bond’s debt-fuelled empire
Profiles Alan Bond built an empire that encompassed brewing, mining, television on unsustainable amounts of debt, which led to his downfall and imprisonment.
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Great frauds in history: the Pigeon King’s Ponzi scheme
Profiles Pigeon-fancier Arlan Galbraith claimed to have created a new breed of elite racing pigeon, but his Ponzi scheme defrauded investors of over £200m.
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Great frauds in history: Martin Grass’s debt binge
Profiles AS CEO of pharmacy chain Rite Aid. Martin Grass borrowed heavily to fund a string of acquisitions, then cooked the books to manage the debt, inflating profits by $1.6bn.
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Great frauds in history: how Joyti De-Laurey became “the Picasso of con artists”
Profiles Joyti De-Laurey forged the signatures of her bosses at Goldman Sachs and started writing cheques to herself. Over many years, she netted £4.3m.
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