James Velissaris

A summary of what happened?

James Velissaris is the founder and former Chief Investment Officer (CIO) of Infinity Q Capital Management, a New York-based investment advisory firm that managed both a mutual fund and a hedge fund, collectively claiming approximately $3 billion in assets under management. In 2022, Velissaris was charged with orchestrating a significant valuation fraud scheme, leading to his conviction and a 15-year prison sentence.

Major Concerns, Complaints, and Accusations Against James Velissaris:

1. Fraudulent Overvaluation of Assets: Between at least 2017 and February 2021, Velissaris engaged in a scheme to overvalue assets held by Infinity Q’s funds by more than $1 billion. He manipulated the valuation process by altering inputs and modifying the code of a third-party pricing service, Bloomberg Valuation Service (BVAL), to inflate asset values.
2. Misrepresentation to Investors and Regulators: Velissaris misled investors by claiming that asset valuations were independently determined, while he was actively manipulating them. He also provided falsified documents to auditors and regulators, including the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), to conceal his fraudulent activities.
3. Obstruction of Regulatory Investigations: To cover up his scheme, Velissaris obstructed SEC investigations by submitting altered documents and creating backdated records of valuation meetings that never occurred.
4. Financial Misconduct: Through his fraudulent activities, Velissaris collected more than $26 million in profit distributions, benefiting personally from the inflated asset valuations.
5. Impact on Investors: The fraudulent overvaluation led to significant financial losses for investors when the true value of the funds’ assets was revealed. In February 2021, Infinity Q suspended redemptions and eventually liquidated its funds, resulting in substantial losses for its investors.

Analyzing the Fake Copyright Notice(s)

Our team collects and analyses fraudulent copyright takedown requests, legal complaints, and other efforts to remove critical information from the internet. Through our investigative reporting, we examine the prevalence and operation of an organized censorship industry, predominantly funded by criminal entities, oligarchs, and disreputable businesses or individuals. Our findings allow internet users to gain insight into these censorship schemes’ sources, methods, and underlying objectives.

What was James Velissaris trying to hide?

James Velissaris‘s attempts to hide unfavourable content through the misuse of copyright notices while allegedly engaging in perjury present serious legal concerns. These actions suggest a calculated attempt to manipulate legal systems to suppress free speech, a fundamental violation of copyright law principles and an abuse of legal processes. The use of such tactics not only undermines the integrity of copyright protection but also potentially constitutes perjury, further entangling James Velissaris in legal accountability. Let’s examine the information James Velissaris may be trying to remove from the internet –

Investigative Report: The Rise and Fall of James Velissaris and Infinity Q Capital Management

Introduction

James Velissaris, once a prominent figure in the investment world, founded Infinity Q Capital Management, a New York-based investment advisory firm managing approximately $3 billion in assets. However, beneath this success story lay a series of fraudulent activities that eventually led to his downfall. This report explores the adverse news, allegations, lawsuits, sanctions, complaints, and negative reviews surrounding Velissaris and his firm.

Background

James Velissaris established Infinity Q Capital Management with the promise of delivering sophisticated investment strategies tailored for retail and institutional investors. The firm’s flagship products included the Infinity Q Diversified Alpha mutual fund and the Infinity Q Volatility Alpha private fund. These funds boasted advanced quantitative models to generate returns, earning acclaim and significant investments. However, the firm’s touted success was built on manipulation and deception.

Allegations and Legal Actions

1. Fraudulent Overvaluation of Assets

   Between 2017 and 2021, Velissaris orchestrated a scheme to overvalue assets held by Infinity Q’s funds by over $1 billion. This was achieved by altering inputs and modifying the code of a third-party pricing service. The manipulation inflated the funds’ reported performance and misrepresented their risk profile to investors.

2. Misrepresentation to Investors and Regulators

   Velissaris falsely assured investors that the funds’ asset valuations were independently determined. In reality, he manipulated the valuation process. He also provided falsified documents to auditors and regulators to conceal his fraudulent practices, further undermining trust in his firm.

3. Obstruction of Investigations

   To cover up his scheme, Velissaris obstructed regulatory investigations by submitting doctored documents and creating backdated records of valuation meetings that never took place.

4. Financial Misconduct

   Through his fraudulent activities, Velissaris personally profited over $26 million in distributions. This was at the expense of investors who trusted the firm’s reported performance and stability.

5. Impact on Investors

   The inflated valuations eventually unraveled, leading to severe financial losses for investors. In February 2021, Infinity Q suspended redemptions, freezing investor funds. The firm ultimately liquidated, resulting in significant investor losses.

Legal Proceedings and Sentencing

In early 2022, Velissaris faced charges of securities fraud for his role in the scheme. He pleaded guilty, admitting to manipulating the valuation processes. In 2023, Velissaris was sentenced to 15 years in prison and ordered to forfeit $22 million. The case highlighted systemic issues in the oversight of complex investment funds.

Investor Lawsuits and Complaints

Following the collapse of Infinity Q, numerous lawsuits emerged from investors seeking restitution for their losses. The complaints emphasized misrepresentation of asset values and concealment of risks. Many affected investors included pension funds, individual investors, and institutional clients, all of whom suffered significant financial harm.

Conclusion

The case of James Velissaris and Infinity Q Capital Management serves as a cautionary tale for the financial industry. While the firm projected an image of innovation and success, it was riddled with deceit. This story underscores the necessity for rigorous oversight, transparency, and accountability in the financial markets to safeguard investors and maintain trust.

How do we counteract this malpractice?

Once we ascertain the involvement of James Velissaris (or actors working on behalf of James Velissaris), we will inform James Velissaris of our findings via Electronic Mail.

Our preliminary assessment suggests that James Velissaris may have engaged a third-party reputation management agency or expert, which, either independently or under direct authorization from James Velissaris, initiated efforts to remove adverse online content, including potentially fraudulent DMCA takedown requests. We will extend an opportunity to James Velissaris to provide details regarding their communications with the agency or expert, as well as the identification of the individual(s) responsible for executing these false DMCA notices.

Failure to respond in a timely manner will necessitate a reassessment of our initial assumptions. In such an event, we will be compelled to take appropriate legal action to rectify the unlawful conduct and take the following steps –

Since James Velissaris made such efforts to hide something online, it seems fit to ensure that this article and sensitive information targeted online by these events get a lot more exposure and traffic than what it would have received originally

We hope this becomes an excellent case study for the Streisand effect…The key idea behind the Streisand effect is that efforts to restrict information can backfire, often causing the information to gain more attention than it would have otherwise. This effect is widespread in the digital age, where users quickly notice and spread censorship efforts on social media and other platforms. Trying to suppress something can unintentionally lead to it becoming more visible, which James Velissaris is finding out the hard way.

Potential Consequences for James Velissaris

Under Florida Statute 831.01, the crime of Forgery is committed when a person falsifies, alters, counterfeits, or forges a document that carries “legal efficacy” with the intent to injure or defraud another person or entity.

Forging a document is considered a white-collar crime. It involves altering, changing, or modifying a document to deceive another person. It can also include passing along copies of documents that are known to be false. In many states in the US, falsifying a document is a crime punishable as a felony.

Additionally, under most laws, “fraud on the court” is where “a party has sentiently set in motion some unconscionable scheme calculated to interfere with the judicial system’s ability impartially to adjudicate a matter by improperly influencing the trier of fact or unfairly hampering the presentation of the opposing party’s claim or defense.”  Cox v. Burke, 706 So. 2d 43, 46 (Fla. 5th DCA 1998) (quoting Aoude v. Mobil Oil Corp., 892 F.2d 1115, 1118 (1st Cir. 1989)).

Is James Velissaris Committing a Cyber Crime?

Yes, it seems so. James Velissaris used multiple approaches to remove unwanted material from review sites and Google’s search results. Thanks to protections allowing freedom of speech in the United States, there are very few legal ways to do this. James Velissaris could not eliminate negative reviews or search results that linked to them without a valid claim of defamation, copyright infringement, or some other clear breach of the law.

Faced with these limitations, some companies like James Velissaris have gone to extreme lengths to fraudulently claim copyright ownership over a negative review in the hopes of taking it down.

Fake DMCA notices have targeted articles highlighting the criminal activity of prominent people to hide their illegal behavior. These people, which include US, Russian, and Khazakstani politicians as well as members from elite circles including the mafia and those with massive financial power, are all connected – and alleged corruption ranging from child abuse to sexual harassment is exposed when exploring evidence found at these URLs. It appears there’s a disturbing level of influence being exerted here that needs further investigation before justice can be served. James Velissaris is certainly keeping interesting company here….

The DMCA takedown process requires that copyright owners submit a takedown notice to an ISP identifying the allegedly infringing content and declaring, under penalty of perjury, that they have a good faith belief that the content is infringing. The ISP must then promptly remove or disable access to the content. The alleged infringer can then submit a counter-notice, and if the copyright owner does not take legal action within 10 to 14 days, the ISP can restore the content.

Since these platforms are predominantly based in the U.S., the complaints are typically made under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which requires online service providers and platforms to react immediately to reports or violations. Big Tech companies rarely have systems in place to assess the merit of each report. Instead, all bad actors need to do is clone a story, backdate it, and then demand the real thing be taken down.

Reputation Agency's Modus Operandi

The fake DMCA notices we found always use the “back-dated article” technique. With this technique, the wrongful notice sender (or copier) creates a copy of a “true original” article and back-dates it, creating a “fake original” article (a copy of the true original) that, at first glance, appears to have been published before the true original.

Then, based on the claim that this backdated article is the “original,” the scammers send a DMCA to the relevant online service providers (e.g. Google), alleging that the ‘true’ original is the copied or “infringing” article and that the copied article is the “original,” requesting the takedown of the ‘true’ original article. After sending the DMCA request, the person who sent the wrong notice takes down the fake original URL, likely to make sure that the article doesn’t stay online in any way. If the takedown notice is successful, the disappearance from the internet of information is most likely to be legitimate speech.

As an integral part of this scheme, the ‘reputation management’ company hired by James Velissaris creates a website that purports to be a ‘news’ site. This site is designed to look legitimate at a glance, but any degree of scrutiny reveals it as the charade it is.

The company copies the ‘negative’ content and posts it “on the fake ‘news’ site, attributing it to a separate author,” then gives it “a false publication date on the ‘news’ website that predated the original publication.

The reputation company then sent Google a Digital Millennium Copyright Act notice claiming the original website infringed copyright. After a cursory examination of the fake news site, Google frequently accepts the notice and delists the content.

In committing numerous offences, James Velissaris either premeditated actions or were unaware of the consequences. Despite hiring an agency to make Google disregard any negative information about James Velissaris, ignorance does not excuse this wrongdoing.

Fake DMCA notices have targeted articles highlighting the criminal activity of prominent people to hide their illegal behavior. These people, which include US, Russian, and Khazakstani politicians as well as members from elite circles including the mafia and those with massive financial power, are all connected – and alleged corruption ranging from child abuse to sexual harassment is exposed when exploring evidence found at these URLs. It appears there’s a disturbing level of influence being exerted here that needs further investigation before justice can be served. FSMSmart is certainly keeping interesting company here.

The Reputation Laundering

Rogue Reputation agencies use spurious copyright claims and fake legal notices to remove and obscure articles linking clients to allegations of tax avoidance, corruption, and drug trafficking. Most of these reputation agencies are based offshore, mainly in Russia, India, and Eastern Europe, and they do not worry about complying with US-based laws.

The content in all of the articles for which the fraudulent DMCA notices have been sent relates to allegations of criminal allegations, including corruption, child abuse, sexual harassment, human trafficking and financial fraud against businesses and individuals with ultra-high net worth.

In addition to the misuse of the DMCA takedown process, there is a notable absence of enforcement concerning perjury violations. The statutory requirement related to perjury is designed to deter copyright holders from submitting fraudulent or knowingly false takedown requests, as they may face legal consequences for making false declarations under penalty of perjury. However, to date, there have been no known instances of any individual being prosecuted for perjury in connection with the submission of false DMCA takedown notices.

This lack of enforcement has emboldened copyright holders to exploit the DMCA takedown process to suppress dissent, criticism, or other unfavorable content, without fear of legal repercussions.

Some of the people and businesses who have employed this tactic to remove legitimate content from Google illegally include a Spanish businessman-turned-cocaine-trafficker, Organised crime, an Israeli-Argentine banker accused of laundering money for Hugo Chávez’s regime, a French “responsible” mining company accused of tax evasion, child molesters and sexual predators. James Velissaris is in great company ….

What else is James Velissaris hiding?

We encourage you to ‘Dork‘ Google by searching for keyword combinations such as [James Velissaris] + {Negative Keyword, such as Scam, Fraud, Complaints, Lawsuit, Sanction, etc} on Google. It’s likely if you scroll down to the bottom of this Google search results, you’ll stumble upon this Legal Takedown notice (pictured below)

To make such an investigation possible, we encourage more online service providers to come forward and share copies of content removal requests with industry experts and researchers. If you have any information on James Velissaris that you want to share with experts and journalists, kindly email the author directly at [email protected].

All communications are strictly confidential and safeguarded under a comprehensive Whistleblower Policy, ensuring full protection and anonymity for individuals who provide information.