I as the seller would first cash-in the check of the buyer, and only after that send the difference to him. So, where is the fraud-potential here?
He probably meant the 87-92 years when the market went nowhere. After that it was the tech boom and the end of the century craziness, not related to the 80s drive of the market by bonds....
Ok, but then that risk of check bouncing is given with any check. And nowadays each shop has a cam...
Currently still on the run, Josh Garza, who ran a Bitcoin mining company ponzi, making about 10 million in the process: http://www.reformer.com/latestnews/ci_29641080/brattleboro-businessman-could-be-hook-10-million ""There was no computer equipment to back up the vast majority of Hashlets that the two companies sold," state court documents. "As a result, most of the purported 'returns' that were paid to investors were not actually proceeds earned from virtual currency mining. Instead, most of the those claimed returns were the slow payback, over time, of money investors collectively had paid to purchase Hashlets." "Garza, 30, still lives in Brattleboro, but earlier this year there were reports that he had fled to a country in the Middle East to avoid prosecution."
Check out the Trading Loonies blog if you are interested in the more current ones. These guys are good: https://tradingloonies.wordpress.com/
While not quite a fraudster (really an extortionist) it's hard to beat the mystery of "DB Cooper". He extorted $200,000 in 1971 (equal to roughly $1.1Million now) and vanished without a trace by parachuting out of a plane. To this day the case has never been solved and Mr Cooper has never been really identified or located. Kind of gives new meaning to "golden parachute".