According to the original litigation, Global Online Direct Inc. took in $45Million from at least 9000 investors. On October 6, 2008, the latest declaration from the Grassmueck Group, the court appointed receivership, only $1.5M is available to return to the investors from what has been recovered.

Now for the bad news, only investors that had invested at least $2000 are authorized to submit a claim. This would leave out at least 50-90% of the investors because when this program was online, the minimum investment to participate started at $150 and later raised to $500. Most people will usually go in with the minimimun to “test the waters”. Unfortunately, the majority of them will receive zilch from the recovery efforts.

This begs the question, does government intervention and meddling really for the protection and benefit of the investors? To rub it in, the biggest winners in this whole fiasco are the receivership, attorneys, accountants and various consultants hired by the government to provide “relief” to the bilked investors. How much was their windfall? Read the first “Notice of First Applications for Professional Fees and Expenses“.

Receiver :                    $124,558.00 + $ 6,158.67 in expenses
Receiver Counsel :        414,982.00 + 25,285.93 in expenses
Local Counsel :               26,754.00 + 1,876.14 in expenses
Receiver Accountant :  158,632.95 + 2,501.82 in expenses
Total:                 $724,926.95 + $30,322.56 in expenses

It appears that the investors got duped twice, once by Global Online Direct Inc. and then again by our own trusted government that are elected to serve and protect its citizens. If the distribution were to be fair and all the investors got something back, $1.5M/9000 that would be a pittance of $167.00 vs the $755,000.00 being paid to our SEC and government representatives.

One blaring question remains. Where is the rest of the missing $42,744,750.49? Our government went through great expense and can not seem to find it. It is as if the paper trail ended and the money went into thin air.

Our theory is that this money is probably safely hidden offshore somewhere just waiting for Global Online’s defendants to withdraw and spend once they come out of prison in a few years. This is a testament that to protect your hard earned money and wealth you will have to put some offshore. The scammers do it, why shouldn’t you?

What are the lessons to be learned from this experience for the small investor? If you are going to participate in risky investment programs, ones that falls in the gray area of SEC jurisdiction; make sure it is located offshore. If the SEC litigates and halts the program, you can kiss your investment good-bye. (This is not to say all offshore investments are legit either, one will have to do the same amount if not more due diligence and work within your country’s tax laws.)

Secondly, educate yourself on how to safe guard your wealth from the leeches and predators by going offshore. Global Online Direct has demonstrated clearly they know how to do this, after all $42 Million is still missing.

This whole experience has us wondering what if the SEC had practiced a bit of “laissez faire”? Would the 9000 investors have gotten more than what they are getting now, which is practically nothing? What if the intentions of Global Online Direct was really honest and attempting to make good on what they were promising? We will really never know.

One thing we do know for sure is our U.S. government doesn’t really have the best interest of small investors in mind. Just look at the current financial crisis. Literally overnight, investors were wiped out in the stocks of IndyMac (INDC), Freddie Mac (FRE), Fannie Mae (FNM), Lehman Brothers (LEHMQ), Washington Mutual (WAMUQ) and the list goes on. All from the actions of our elected officials and employees of the taxpayer at the Federal Reserve, Treasury, SEC and FDIC. If they had done their job of watching over the real crooks on Wall Street, we wouldn’t be in this mess. So much for serving and protecting the people.

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A question often asked by our readership is where we come up with some of these alternative investment ideas. Well, besides being bombarded by a ton of financial related snail mail and newsletters, we get quite a bit of investment newsletters that we are subscribed to. If we see something interesting, we will take a closer look and write about it.

Unfortunately, we also get a ton of unsolicited emails regarding investing opportunities as well. Some are either promoting their programs or asking us to review it. It’s a jungle out there in the online investment world and we are not always capable of doing an in depth due diligence on every single one of them.

Here is an example of a recent paid advertisement for NetVestFund.com that was attached to a newsletter that we are subscribed to. This is neither an endorsement nor a recommendation by OWI, just information. We have not done a complete due diligence on this company. Attached below is the actual email ad from the newsletter.

PAID NEWSLETTER ADs: (Full registered Investment company)

Investors from around the world seeking alternatives to investment in US based Equities and Real Estate, have found that http://www.netvestfund.com operates a fully regulated and transparent fund for investors. It offers opportunities with funds paying two, three, and four times as much as they are receiving from most US-based funds and financial services groups. Visit their website at http://www.netvestfund.com, and their sister site-developing daily, and investment programs at

http://www.theNVFund.com.

Panamanian-based and administered http://www.theNVFund.com offers an alternative to the historically acceptable “average HYIP fund.” With regulations in place and professional management running the fund, choices have never been clearer as to the exponential upside available to investors.

Accounts Director Steve Chez, VP of Trading Services Sheldon Mackinnon and Fund Manager Terrence House offer one stop shopping with funds generating double digit increases and investments diversified throughout the world.

Unlike other HYIP investments that offer only email addresses-and a hope and a prayer that they are legitimate, www.theNVFund.com offers full information on the principals, their track records, and the upside potential the fund represents.

http://www.TheNVfund.com is offering 3 daily programs to meet your cash generating needs

The Cash Creation Daily — The Market Edge Daily — The Flying Eagle Daily
For more information on our portfolios and our referral set-up please contact us anytime!
The NetVest Investment Fund, Inc. — The World’s Premier Investment Portal

http://www.thenvfund.com
phone 1: +1-347-482-1717
phone 2: +1-519-342-5341
fax: +1-519-488-1199
Skype ID: NetVestFund
Yahoo ID: NetVestFund

A quick glance at their website gives a sense of legitimacy with published contact details. The mailing address is in Canada, while the Articles of Incorporation is in Panama making this program offshore. There is one thing that needs a bit of clarification. This is what the home page says:

“Our Portfolios offer various rates of return that range from an average of 1% a month all the way up to 15% a month!

We have portfolios that offer compounding for the longer term investor, and we also offer portfolios that can offer a monthly income, also knows as “Cash Generating” portfolios.”

We appreciate the fact that they can generate such returns and it’s possible in the realm of FOREX trading, but are we missing something here from the charts shown on the page about the returns for their various funds?

Maybe is much ado about nothing, however, there is a 10 year performance chart but a quick WHOIS check on NetVestFund.com and TheNVFund.com shows that both sites have been registered this year in March and July respectively. Are they saying they have been around for more than 10 years?

A closer look shows that NetVestIF.com is also related to this program which was registered in June and has the same mailing address as NetVestFund in Canada.

We cannot say for certainty that this is a safe and legitimate offshore investment. The one pause we do have is the appearance of NetVestFund advertisements and paid forum sponsorship on a number of “HYIP” forums and websites that historically has a bunch of short lived scam programs advertised.

There’s enough information here that if an investor wants more due diligence, feel free to do some “Googling” and calling the company. If anyone has some positive or negative experiences with this company, please share.

[Editor's Note] We were contacted by one of the company’s principal to remove information from the article that they said was no longer valid. To our loyal subscribers, we recommend you thoroughly do your research on this company before making an investment.

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Sometimes an investor has to be in the right place at the right time to take an opportunity by the bullhorn. If you are still not convinced that offshore investing can be safe and profitable, look no further than the family of mutual funds offered by Orbis.

Based in Bermuda, their equity and absolute return funds have been doing quite well since inception. Earlier funds like the Orbis Global Equity Fund has returned a compounded 1100% since it’s start date. The performance of both Absolute Retun Funds were not too shabby either coming in at 700 and 1200% since inception.

Unfortunately, if you are looking at getting in to any of these funds, you are out of luck since they have closed them for new subscriptions since March of 2006. This is not to say an opportunity to participate will not be available in the near future.

Being a savvy investor means being prepared when the opportunity does arrive. Consider that their latest fund was started in 2006 and filled up quickly. Should they start a new fund, the doors will be open once again. It should be noted that their current funds have taken a hit this year in a turbulent market. Occasionally, closed funds often open up during a downturn. (This is not to say that it will happen here.)

While past performance can not guarantee their future results or success of new funds, their track record for the past 18 years speaks highly of their fund management.

If you are interested in being notified when the Orbis funds are reopen for new clients, follow this link and register: http://www.orbisfunds.com/FundNotification.aspx In the meantime, you will need to open up an offshore account to participate if you are not in a country that they accept clients from.

For information regarding the Orbis Funds please contact the Investor Services team at:

Orbis Investment Management Limited
LPG Building
34 Bermudiana Road
Hamilton HM 11
Bermuda

Mailing address:
P.O. Box HM571
Hamilton HMCX
Bermuda

Telephone: +1 (441) 296 3000
Facsimile: +1 (441) 296 3001
E-mail: clientservice@orbisfunds.com
Web site: www.orbisfunds.com

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It should be noted however, that there is a big difference between legal tax avoidance and illegal tax evasion. You can read more about this topic here, “Legal Tax Avoidance vs Criminal Tax Evasion”.

While taxation is one reason why many individuals may decide to go offshore, other individuals and businesses find the following advantages as important reasons why having accounts offshore as a part of their wealth protection strategy.

• Privacy
• Tax Efficiency
• Asset Protection
• Regulatory Advantages

Below is the explanation for each of the advantages of “going offshore”. (Source: www.offshore-library.com)

Privacy
To protect the free flow of your personal information and dealings. An offshore entity has no obligation to release your personal or business information, affording you with a great deal of privacy & confidentiality.

In general terms your personal information will not be divulged to any governing body or tax authority unless suitable evidence can be shown to prove that you have been involved in criminal activities, such as money laundering or drug trafficking.

Financial privacy is becoming a thing of the past. Almost every single transaction made at a bank or ATM, by law, must be recorded and filed. Consumer credit agencies maintain databases full of sensitive information that is used and shared by other organizations and agencies. Asset collectors routinely advertise their ability to locate bank accounts, brokerage accounts, and real estate and business holdings. Should asset collectors find substantial wealth, the individual or corporation becomes an easy target for a lawsuit.

Unless ethical and legal steps are taken to insure privacy, sensitive and confidential information could easily get into the wrong hands. Placing your assets, investments, savings bank and brokerage accounts offshore will keep them off the asset collector’s radar screen. Consumer credit agencies and government departments do not have access to foreign account records or transactions. Domestic property may be held in the name of a foreign corporation (IBC) or trust. This insures that asset collectors and agencies cannot locate it. By taking advantage of these methods an individual or corporation becomes a smaller target and the likelihood of being sued is reduced. Utilizing offshore tools to protect privacy could mean the difference between keeping and losing what is rightfully yours.

Tax Efficiency
As stated above, your savings, investments, assets or business profits can grow almost free of any form of taxation. This does not mean tax avoidance, it simply means whilst your assets are held offshore they will benefit from very favourable tax advantages. There will for many however, be a potential tax liability when you look to repatriate your assets to your home country. This will depend on your nationality and your country of residence at the time of repatriation.

Asset Protection
There are many methods in which to protect your assets using an offshore structure, in the form of an investment product, an IBC (International Business Company) or a offshore trust, or even a simple offshore bank account.

These will protect your assets from:

• Protection from invasive bureaucracy
• Protection against lawsuits
• Protect your assets from seizure

The simplest form of protection offshore is the nature of the offshore privacy rules. What isn’t known can’t be attacked. The basic form of offshore privacy combined with a IBC or Trust is a very secure method to legally protect your assets from prying eyes.

Lawsuits are filed every week. Ex-spouses, ex-business partners, disgruntled employees or predatory lawyers may file a suit if they believe a potential defendant is an attractive target. Losing such a lawsuit could cause a lifetime’s worth of savings, investments and real estate holdings to be lost. In light of this, placing assets offshore is a wise and effective means of protection from frivolous lawsuits.

Once your assets are held offshore they are unreachable by domestic courts. In the event of a lawsuit, a defendant may be forced to forfeit domestic assets, but offshore assets will remain untouched. Offshore courts do not recognize or carry out domestic judgments. This insures that assets sent offshore will remain confidential, secure, and permanently in the hands of their rightful owners. Moving assets offshore will create peace of mind that what’s yours will always be yours.

Regulatory Advantages
The regulations in force within most high tax countries, are there to protect investors, and rightly so. However, due to the very strict nature of these regulations, fund managers feel as if they are wearing a financial straight Jacket. It is difficult for them to compete with the returns of their offshore-based partners who enjoy less restrictive regulation. Many offshore jurisdictions have very mature regulatory systems in place, often based on those present within the US or the UK, yet they allow fund managers great freedom to add value for their investors. This is why offshore funds nearly always outperform their onshore equivalents.

Within the high regulation onshore countries, excessive rules and bureaucracy often plague domestic businesses and operations. Valuable resources are diverted away from the productive process in order to monitor compliance as a result of the restrictions imposed. Curing this problem is as simple as moving to friendlier shores. Offshore jurisdictions are intentionally business-friendly and have regulations that are straightforward, simple to understand and inexpensive to comply with. Moving a business offshore and enjoying a more pleasant business climate may require nothing more than forming an offshore corporation and transferring assets from the domestic corporation to the foreign one.

Is all of this legal?
Do you trust your current bank or investment provider? Chances are that they too have an offshore operation; most of the world’s major banks and investment companies have an offshore present. Do you honestly believe that a triple A credited rated investment company or bank would operate in an illegal activity?

Companies such as Merrill Lynch, HSBC, ING Barings, UBS, Barclays, Deustche bank, ABN Amro all have offshore operations. It is not the offshore industry itself that is illegal, it is only the devious activities of certain individuals who may give the offshore industry a poor reputation. It is also true that the due diligence, and money laundering checks performed by offshore companies is increasing, especially after the 911 terrorist attacks. Which will ensure that it becomes difficult for criminals to abuse the offshore industry

In fact the offshore industry is probably one of the fastest growing sectors within the financial services industry. Many of the worlds most talented fund managers and analysts are leaving their well paid positions as onshore fund managers, to set up their own offshore funds, due to the greater flexibility and choice they can offer to their clients.

As a result of all of this, the offshore market place is no longer the exclusive territory of the rich and famous. Nowadays due to the reduced costs and entry levels, almost anyone can own a offshore fund, investment, bank account or company. Most people are still unaware of the opportunities open to them within the offshore marketplace, which is mainly due to the lack of information available.

For more information on the above topic and other financial matters, visit and the Financial Bookshop which contains over 4000 financial books and CD ROMS.

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Contrary to what your government and misguided media would like you to believe, investing offshore is not illegal as long as you are following the rules and pay your taxes. They would like for you to believe that offshore investing is not safe and that you are tax evading. This is far from the truth and subscribing to this myth will cost you great profit potential.

If you have never considered investing offshore here is one good reason why you might want to reassess your strategy. Examine the three offshore funds offered by the Tramita Financial Group and ask yourself if being invested in the major U.S. indexes paid off in the past 5 years.

Did your investments give you annual returns of 99.7%, 86.42% and 86.31% in 2007? Well, the Tramita Global, Tramita Real Estate and Tramita China funds did for its investors. These same funds have returned an amazing 1,492.90%, 2,342.40% and 1,171.00% respectively since their inception.

The oldest of the Tramita family of funds is a little over six years old while the latest was started five years ago in June of 2003. A minimum investment in each fund totaling $9000 six years ago would have filled your bank account with $182,108 dollars as of January 2008.

It does not look like they are slowing down this year. Year to date performance indicates another good year for all three funds. Tramita Global returning 19.49% YTD at the end of May, Tramita Real Estate showing 49.3% and Tramita China in at 34.38%.

Here is some additional information about Tramita from their website:

“Tramita Management Limited (“Tramita Funds”) is a highly diversified asset management and investment firm that specializes in unique alternative financial investment solutions for the global market. With an established, 5 year record of accomplishment the Tramita Funds Team has accomplished impressive historical returns. Our highly experienced, managers are not restricted with business management duties and are supported by a professional and extremely competent management team that has been together for 7 years.

Tramita is different. We are here to serve your interests. Unlike most investment firms that are publicly traded or privately owned where the goals of the individual investor are lost among the millions, Tramita is client-owned. Helping investors achieve their goals is the only reason we exist. We have no conflicting interests and no one but you to answer to. All decisions —big and small— are made with you in mind. Typically, no more than 65 primary positions at any one time are held in our funds. Our funds have bought, and will often buy, shares that other may not like and sell them at a profit. Tramita Funds will hold shares selling at low prices relative to their intrinsic value. The process of deciding which shares to hold is highly structured and dependent on intensive proprietary investment research.

Investment opportunities are initially identified through various methods, including computerized screening. Our database contains fundamental company data and share prices dating back 25 years. Information on more than 3,500 companies is used in conjunction with a valuation model to estimate the intrinsic value and the expected performance over the next three four years. The companies that stand out as potential opportunities are then subject to further intensive research.” – Tramita Financial Group

To find out more about the Tramita Funds, visit www.tramita.com and read the FAQs.

Customer Contacts :
Tramita Financial Group
Calle Cami Ral 161, Suite 103
Mataro, Spain
E-mail : support@tramita.com
Toll Free : +1 (866) 858-1105
From outside the United States : +1 (917) 463-4787
Fax/USA : +1 (866) 523-0248
Fax/Spain : +34 (91) 791-5500

Note: Do your due diligence. Tramita does not permit investments by UK persons in its offshore funds. All portfolio management for the Tramita funds is conducted by a team based in Dominica. It is responsible for all trading and administration, and for investment research. The portfolio management team is further supported by investment research provided by Tramita offices in Spain and Canada.

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