Mega-Fraudster Kazutsugi Nami At Least Has Some Clean Pants To Go To Court In

Kazutsugi Nami is the latest to join the Ponzi hall of fame, allegedly committing a $2.5bn fraud in Japan. That means he’s burnt through more people’s cash than this guy, this guy, these guys and even this guy, but still not as much as this guy – I should really start constructing some sort of league table for all these book-fiddlers and pyramid-builders.

75-year-old Nami is the head of L&G, a company that makes bedding and healthcare products, and him and his executives (21 of whom have also been arrested) promised returns of 9% every three months for every 1m yen invested. “Inventor Thomas Edison failed 10,000 times and was accused of being a con man”, was one of his favourite lines to attract wary investors, which is a rather ballsy strategy if you ask me. But to continue Nami’s simile, some must have thought that he’d produce a lightbulb eventually, and at least 37,000 people hopped on board. 

Of course, as the previous quote proves, some bozos will sign up to anything no matter how dubious it sounds, but others will need some convincing. And what’s more convincing that celebrities? Madoff knew it, ensnaring Kevin Bacon in his web of lies and schmoozing at the US Open to lend legitimacy to his operation; Nami put on massive events with big pop stars, thus telling the world that he must be kosher if he could conduct such lavishness. In the very funny words of one conned businesswoman: ”I couldn’t help but trust Nami after seeing with my very own eyes how closely he chatted with the stars.”

Also reeling in the suckers was Enten, Nami’s virtual currency named by blending “yen” with the word for “heaven”, and described with typical snake-oil banter as “money that doesn’t decrease even when you spend it”. You got a wodge of it depending on the size of your investment, and it could be used online to buy mostly L&G-made commodities; Nami said that the currency would become legal tender at some point, adding: “I will start shining and become world famous. I will certainly move the world”. Unfortunately, when the wheels started to fall of the scheme, Nami tried to pay investors just in Enten, which was useless unless you wanted to subsist off bedding and luxury furniture. The company filed for bankruptcy back in 2007, but is suspected of being effectively bankrupt since 2000.

After a couple of weeks of circulating, the police finally swooped on Nami in rather cinematic circumstances yesterday. Having told reporters that he would be having breakfast at his favourite restaurant the following morning, Nami arrived with a suitcase full of spare underwear and clothes in preparation for his fate. He then sat down for makunouchi bento and some beer, with tens of reporters papping him from outside, before going quietly when the fuzz turned up. Nothing says “I’m screwed” like drinking beer at 5.30am with a suitcase full of pants.

Nami gets indicted tomorrow, presumably in a crisply laundered shirt.

Posted by Ben Beaumont-Thomas in Hot Money | February 6, 2009 12:14PM |