Thanks PBoyles and Experienced it all. Actually you have both confirmed what I had feared myself. They never answered the telephone with a human (it was a legitimate Swiss number) and weird numbers came up as their phone number. The BioDefense people in the States answered the phone but are wanted everywhere over there for illegal share trafficking. They are forever putting off having the shares 'quoted' on a legitimate stock exchange. I'm in a total of £83,000 by the way. It just seems poor that international co-operation is so badI that there is no way of catching these crooks. By the way how could the police and the banks conceivably help?
Also how would you reliably double my money if not by a scam Experienced it all?
You could get the police / banks / SEC involved and report them. This "might" help the next guy but chances are you wouldn't see any of your money again. They probably covered themselves pretty well in the contract you signed (I assume there was a risk disclosure that says you could lose all of your money - standard with any equities purchase).
In my opinion, if you want to get that money back, I would recommend forgetting about what happened completely (not to say not report them etc., but don't chase that money anymore, especially do not add any new funds to try and recover those old funds - "chasing after bad money with good money")
As far as doubling your money, I would say make 10X's your money or more, but do it over 5 years. It is the exponential growth that creates wealth. You might make 5X's your money off a good stock run in a month, but then you have to invest again and you might lose 5X`s your money - lots of up and down but it is not consistent.
I would suggest putting your money into working assets that are not based on speculation. That doesn't mean that there is no speculation in the investment and any investment that has extraordinary returns will have risk, but there are several ways to curb the risk ie. hedging, options, futures, etc. Also, make sure you are in a "protected" situation when it comes to dilution, pre-money, post-money and step-up valuations. Also, make sure you understand at what level your investment stands in the capital-ratios. When you are investing in a single company in public equity, you are totally at the risk of the market, up or down. You can hedge your position with futures/options/calls/puts etc.
I have personally moved mainly into real property (holding/developing physical assets, not paper) where I think there is the best possibility for prosperity (meaning continued extraordinary profits over the long-term, not just buy/sell and search again). Right now there are so many areas to make money in property as well because the market is highly deflated but you should understand there are big differences in future values between Property Syndicates, SPV`s, doing your own developments, REITS(which like a stock, you are at the risk of the market).
There are ways to invest money smartly where it is not just a one-time gain but several profits from one investment. I am not acting like I have a super-secret but I have experience investing for other people and each person has their own resources/needs/goals and it is just a question of finding the right system and personalizing strategies to fit that system.
Rather than being at so much risk, wouldn't you rather have a machine that made $1 into $2, even if it was a bit slower? I think this should apply to all smart investors.
Of course, this is just my opinion. I have a lot of friends/colleagues that basically day trade and I compare my investing in F (Ford Motor) @ under $2 and I have made more money than probably 9 out of 10 day traders, + I can easily hedge my profits.
