Markets Magazine
The Con Man and His Mentor
With his Ponzi scheme unraveling, David Smith turned for help to the head of the largest forex-trading school in the U.S.
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David Smith won’t soon forget his 38th-birthday party.
Standing on the grounds of an estate in Kingston, Jamaica, in front of a throng of some 200 investors in his foreign-exchange-trading fund, Smith listened sheepishly as his mentor and hero, Jared Martinez, compared him to Moses leading his flock to the promised land. “I wanted to buy something like the staff that Moses used to carry,” said Martinez, whose remarks have been preserved on video. “David has freed so many people down here,” Martinez told the crowd, referring to Smith’s 10 percent monthly returns. “David, we’d like to say thank you for being our Jamaican Moses.”