A Villager who runs a financial firm under the cloud of a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation reportedly lured clients with the promise of an insurance policy he claimed would protect their investment.
John Gissas of Retirement Evolution Group LLC of Wildwood is accused of raising money for Par Funding, whose owners made “opportunistic loans” to small business owners across America – some at interest rates as high as 400 percent, according to the SEC filing. The Village of Gilchrist resident raised more than $5.4 million from at least 62 investors for Par Funding through the offer and sale of promissory notes.
Gissas, whose office is located at Freedom Plaza on State Road 44 near Brownwood, was named in July in the SEC complaint. The SEC locked him out of the office and froze his assets. Gissas is reportedly back in business and his non-Par assets have been unfrozen. His Par assets remain frozen.
U.S. District Court Judge Rodolfo Ruiz has set the Par Funding litigation for trial Aug. 30, 2021 in Miami. The parties estimate the trial will last two to three weeks.
SEC investigators have been trying to untangle the murky Par Funding finances. For example, Par Funding has not reconciled any of its bank accounts for 2020 and many for 2019. The company apparently does not have any audited financial statements. As a result, it has been difficult to assess the company’s financial status, the quality of its merchant cash advance portfolio, and to restart operations. It appears the company did little in the way of analyzing the financial strength of the merchants to whom it loaned money. Some agreements do not include the correct name of the merchant. Collateral was often not accurately described.
Gissas, who liked to court investors over a meal at restaurants in The Villages, tried to reassure potential investors that an insurance policy would protect them if the business owners could not repay the high interest loans.
Villager Rick Woolf is a former Assistant U.S. Attorney with the Department of Justice who has been following the Gissas case and has spoken with Villagers who invested with Gissas.
“The majority of investors I have spoken with said that Gissas showed them an insurance policy insuring against the failure of the merchants to repay the high interest rate loans made to them. Most investors said this was the major factor in their decision to invest in Par Funding through Retirement Evolution Group. The SEC has determined that there never was any insurance,” Woolf said.
More information about the case can be found at https://parfundingreceivership.com
Woolf can be reached at rwoolf@woolffinancial.com or (954) 816-8699.
