CFTC v. 4 Florida Men (ponzi schemes, 2020)

Judgment entered

✓ Checked against the primary document on October 4, 2026. The library's summary, tags and figures for this record were compared with the regulator's own document by an AI model (Claude) following written instructions, with sampled and disputed records read a second time. No lawyer has reviewed them. A checked record can still contain errors, and checked does not mean endorsed. See how we check records or report a correction.

Report an error in this record (cftc-4-florida-men-ponzi-schemes-2020) by email

In September 2020 the CFTC sued ten defendants in Florida and New Jersey over a forex scheme run through the Highrise Advantage master pool and feeder pools. Four feeder operators and their companies agreed to consent orders in July 2023, and on 28 November 2023 the Middle District of Florida entered a default judgment against Avinash Singh and Highrise Advantage for US$25,558,594 in restitution and a US$76,675,782 penalty.

The record

What was ordered

Civil penalty

$80.5m

Disgorgement

—

Prejudgment interest

—

Total relief

$80.5m

Alleged gain

—

A dash means the release did not state a figure we could extract, not that the figure is zero. Penalty and disgorgement are stored separately so aggregates across the library do not double-count the same dollars.

What is alleged to have happened

The CFTC announced the complaint on September 16, 2020 (release 8246-20) in the Middle District of Florida, alleging fraudulent solicitation from about February 2013. The complaint asked for restitution, penalties and bans; what the court later ordered is set out below.

The record named the defendants only as "4 Florida Men" and listed a ban that had only been sought; the ten defendants are now named and the ban cleared.

This library tags the matter as ponzi schemes because the document describes it as a scheme paying earlier investors with later investors' money. The tagging is ours, not the regulator's: agencies charge statutory provisions, not technique names.

Outcome. On 5 July 2023 the court entered consent orders against the operators of four feeder pools (Sahdeo with SR&B, Cologero with Green Knight, Rosseau with Bull Run, and Hemraj Singh with King Royalty). The orders set restitution amounts and civil penalties totalling US$3,825,000, and impose permanent trading and registration bans. On 28 November 2023 the court entered a default judgment against Avinash Singh and Highrise Advantage for US$25,558,594 in restitution and a US$76,675,782 penalty, with a permanent injunction. The CFTC says the order finds Singh solicited and misappropriated pool funds and states that it fully resolves the litigation.

The penalty recorded here is the sum of the default-judgment penalty and the four consent penalties; restitution orders are described in the text only. The sources do not show how much of the ordered restitution has been collected.

What technique is this, and how does it work?

This action is tagged with one technique in our taxonomy. The tagging is ours: regulators charge statutory provisions, not technique names, so the mapping is an editorial judgement described in our editorial policy.

• Ponzi schemes — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.

Timeline

1. 2020-09-16 CFTC release published
2. 2023-07-05 Consent orders against four feeder-pool operators and their companies (CFTC release 8742-23)
3. 2023-11-28 Default judgment against Avinash Singh and Highrise Advantage
4. 2023-12-20 CFTC announces the default judgment and says it fully resolves the case (release 8840-23)

Primary documents

Everything on this page derives from the documents below. Where our summary and the primary document disagree, the primary document is right.

• CFTC release
• CFTC order or complaint
• CFTC order or complaint
• CFTC order or complaint
• CFTC release 8840-23
• CFTC release 8742-23 (feeder-fund consent orders)
• Default judgment, 28 November 2023

The linked release is a work of the United States government and is not subject to copyright. Our summary and narrative above are our own writing.

Related actions

Other actions in the library sharing at least one technique tag with this one.

Record added September 10, 2026. submit a correction.