Wikipedia
Telexfree (stylized as TelexFREE) is a trade name owned by Telexfree Inc, that became best known for its operations in Brazil held by Ympactus Comercial Ltda after it was involved in an ongoing investigation and trial for allegedly operating a Ponzi scheme, and later for having its operations suspended in USA by SEC under the charges of operating a billion dollar Ponzi and Pyramid schemes.
Telexfree Inc. owns the rights to the Telexfree brand worldwide. The company was created by Carlos Roberto Costa, Carlos Nataniel Wanzeler and James Matthew Merrill after the change of its former corporate name Common Cents Communications Inc., which was incorporated in Massachusetts. According to the Company Registration Office of Massachusetts, Telexfree Inc. started to use this corporate name on February 15, 2012.
Telexfree Inc. is a sister company of many other companies that operates TelexFree Marketing Plan, which belongs to the same founders and also share the same website. It includes a Brazilian company named "Ympactus Comercial Ltda", which was suspended in that country on June 13, 2013, by order of the court of Acre State.
Telexfree's Brazilian operations were regarded as one of the largest financial frauds in Brazil's history, according to Brazil's Ministry of Justice and the Federal Public Ministry. The number of investors (labelled as "promoters" by Telexfree) has not yet been determined; by the end of August 2013, just after companies' suspension, Company Director Carlos Roberto Costa said that the company had 1,049,619 active promoters in Brazil. The company is currently under investigation by Brazilian authorities, which led the Court to freeze the company's and its owners' assets in Brazil and maintain, despite numerous appeals, the suspension of its operations in Brazil. Telexfree Brazil (Ympactus Comercial Ltda) denies the accusations, saying that it operates under the multi-level marketing structure, commercializing VoIP services. The final trial and judgement will likely be held in 2014, and the company assets will probably remain frozen before that, according to the Public Ministry of Acre State.
Telexfree and BBOM, both companies suspected of operating Ponzi schemes and suspended by the Brazilian government, were featured among the top 10 most searched terms on Google during the year of 2013 in Brazil. Telexfree was ranked 2nd place, just after " BBB 13".
On April 13, 2014 Telexfree LLC filed a petition for relief under the U.S. bankruptcy code.
On April 2014, an investigation in the United States confirmed that Telexfree worked under a Ponzi scheme and handled more than $1 billion worldwide. The conclusion was made by SEC-MA, the agency that regulates the financial transactions in the company's home state of Massachusetts. SEC, in its Federal jurisdiction, also published a complaint against Telexfree INC, Telexfree LLC, the owners James Merril and Carlos Wanzeler, marketing director Steve Labriola, as well as telexfree promoters Joseph Craft, Sanderley Rodrigues de Vasconcelos, Santiago de la Rosa, Randy N. Crosby and Faith R. Sloan.