Indian-American charged for defrauding investor in US

A 33-year-old Indian-American investment fund manager has been charged in the US for defrauding as many as 41 investors with USD 11. 3 million to fund his lavish lifestyle.
Neal Goyal, was charged yesterday with one count of wire fraud, according to a statement from the US Attorney's office.
He was the founder and manager of Blue Horizon Asset Management and Caldera Advisors, both of which were unregistered investment advisors.
The Chicago-based investor now faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and a USD 250,000 fine.
A day earlier, the US Securities and Exchange Commission filed a parallel civil fraud lawsuit and obtained a court order freezing the assets of Goyal and his funds.

The SEC suit alleges that Goyal stole his investors' money to fund his own lavish lifestyle, to pay business expenses, and to support a variety of personal business ventures including a bar and two children's clothing boutiques that his wife operates in Chicago.

According to the criminal case, between June 2006 and May 2014, Goyal obtained more than USD 11.3 million from investors through offering and selling limited partnerships in three Blue Horizon funds and a Caldera Equity Fund by making false representations about the intended use of the funds, the investment returns generated, and the source of the investment returns and principal paid to investors.

In fact, Goyal allegedly misappropriated the investors' funds for his own benefit and concealed the fraud scheme by creating and distributing false account statements, federal prosecutors alleged.
Beginning in early 2006, Goyal represented that funds invested in the Blue Horizon funds would be used for long and short trading in equities, options, and other securities.
But by June 2006, Goyal began sending false account statements to investors that inflated the financial results from trading purportedly being done by those funds, the charging document alleges.
By the first half of 2008, Goyal allegedly knew that he intended to misuse the funds for himself and to make Ponzi-type payments to certain investors.

By January 2009, Goyal had stopped trading for two Blue Horizon funds and had not traded at all for the third Blue Horizon fund.
In February 2009, Goyal allegedly began engaging in a similar fraud scheme with investments in the Caldera Equity Fund, federal prosecutors said.