body .digg {display:none;} body.single .digg {display:block;}
Have you heard of Marl the Stock Robot? Google “Marl” and click the first ad you see. You don’t have to read the whole page because I have summed it up in the next paragraph. Please click the ad anyway. You’ll understand why in a minute.
That page tells a story about the invention of “the first commercially available stock picking robot” which is available for $28,000 per license, which includes a week of training in the programmer’s home. The script assumes you can’t afford the software and offers you a stock tips newsletter subscription for only $47.
Maybe it’s a great newsletter. I don’t care about that. I am interested in the Marl software which, at $28,000, is out of the reach of anyone earnestly reading that page but vastly under-priced if it does what they claim.
Normally you would reject this sort of offer on the “too good to be true” rule alone but I wasn’t satisfied. I went looking for the software and I didn’t find any information leading to the purchase of a Marl software license. I did find a large number of sites echoing the same story and offering the same newsletter.
The site is one of a great many taking part in an affiliate marketing scheme to sell a newsletter subscription. This is just one of countless schemes telling lies in order to sell something. This is why I told you to click the ad rather than publish a link. They are paying for those ads, baiting real suckers, lying about a non-existent robot. Your clicks cost them money.
I don’t know whether the newsletter is any good. Maybe it can teach you enough to make some lucky investments. But if you want to make real money from Marl, I suggest you set up an affiliate marketing web site to sell that newsletter and buy all the ads you can get for $47.
Update 1: This is how a person can make money on a stock tip scam and why the government puts them away:
The volume of distribution of a newsletter such as the one at issue can rapidly become large enough that its membership, acting on the tips they receive, create an artificial demand for the penny stock and consequently cause the stock price to rise. If one reacts quickly enough and buys the stock before this wave of demand comes to market, it may be possible to realize a very high margin of profit where no real value exists in the merits of the company being traded. In this scenario, the biggest winner will be the first person to know about the tip and act on it, i.e. the publisher of the newsletter. Subscribers can profit, too, but they must buy fast and sell before the artificial demand bubble pops and the price regains parity with the actual market value.
Update 2: A reader going by the name of Mistlethrush left a very important comment below. It reveals the inner workings of the Marl software!
I have filled out their “Send you two trading rules immediately” box a couple of times … and have NEVER gotten any response from these goobers. I think if nothing else they must just be harvesting email addresses of gullible fools to sell.
Wow, if you followed their advise (Marl’s) over the past week, you would’ve taken a beating. My paper trading shows huge losses. Hmm, maybe it might be profitable to short their picks. It would have made for a much happier Christmas this past week. I still plan on putting together a web-page logging my experience, but wife just had a baby
http://www.thesearfamily.com/becky2.JPG
so exhaustion has slowed me down (those 3AM feedings are loads of fun).
So there…
Your humble (and sleepy) guinea pig,
/Mistlethrush
Just wondering…. Aren’t the Google ads at the top of your page generating revenue for your site the same as any affiliate marketing scam? Seems like this MARL thing is pretty effective and if info seekers land here looking for scam reports, they may just follow your advice and click one of those ad links above. So you say, “just click the ad anyway, you’ll understand in a minute”. ….I think I understand now… thanks
Dennyv: I added doublingstocks to my AdSense filter to prevent their ads from appearing but there are just too many affiliates to block, so I gave up. Besides, I said to click the ad in the “Google Marl” search result page, not the ad on my blog. I am not supposed to ask you to click my ads.
Andy, Thank you for starting this investigation. We appreciate your questioning this version of “2 Good 2 B True”.
Mistlethrush, CONGRATULATIONS on your part of bringing a beautiful spirit here to earth. May she grow strong and live long. And may our little guinea pig have a nice set of winters naps (in between poopy diapers; I’m a father of six so I know whereof I speak).
Impressive sleuthing…thanks for checking it all out. I tried the http://www.doublingstocks.com/downloadmarl.zip link and it is dead (at least today: HTTP 404 Not Found “The webpage cannot be found”). This Jack (and The Bean Stalk) will be trying to recoup his $47 through Clickbank.
Best Regards.
Just visited Clickbank.com, it was not very clear how to request a refund, but found the following location, thought I’d share this with others to facilitate others making a refund request.
http://www.clickbank.com/csinquiry.html
Cheers!
I too traded “on paper” for the last 4 weeks using the advice from Marl. I lost it all. What a hoot! Thanks mistlethrust. et.al. Citibank here I come.
Mistlethrush: Thx for decompiling marl and revealing this scam. How resourceful of you. You’ve helped many and hopefully you can rest now knowing your good deed has been done. Enjoy Becky!
A big golf-clap, /kudos, /headbow to Mistlethrush. Just did a simple search on Marl code actual – and boom. First hit.
Also wanted to say BIG thank you to Mistlethrush. Saw this come up on my AdSense for my blog, and don’t like having any ads that are suspect. I try to help out new traders and investors with good education and information, and hate to think that I’d have any ads that would steer a new person wrong.
Just now screened it out on the ad filter. Thanks again Mistlethrush.
Ya, I signed up for both the newsletter and the “robot” program. After some research into the picks, I have found that is definitely a pump and dump scam.
I ran the Marl program ($90) and noticed something interesting. If the internet connection goes down, the program still ‘downloads’ info and makes a pick. It’s basically some silly program that downloads a ticker symbol from his master and then pretends to scroll through all sorts of stocks. Sometimes it even ‘picks’ a stock that isn’t even on its list. ‘
If you have bought the program, try this. Plug into the wall and start the program (it won’t run if there is no internet). As soon as it has started, unplug the cable. A miracle will then occur and hundreds of stocks will then be scanned without the need if the internet that marl is ‘downloading’ from.
Needless to say, I got a refund. haha! So I didn’t wast money after all.
I am an experienced .NET software developer as well as an options trader. If anybody can email the software to me at shodson@gmail.com and I can reverse-engineer it and backup the claims made by Mistlethrush though I am dubious since the link he posted doesn’t work.
I have not subscribed to the newsletter and suspect this is a pump-and-dump network as many believe. I’ve heard of guys that run hedge funds solely based on stocks touted in spam: they sell or short the stocks a few days after the stocks are pumped up because that’s when the mass buying has ended and the manipulators wanting to sell step in and start selling. Maybe you could use this software as a signal to prepare to dump the stocks recommended after they make their race up.
Scott: My statistics package tells me that a lot of people clicked the link to download the software prior to the file being removed. Surely one of them can send the file.
Mistlethrush: can you provide the file or its size or MD5 hash?
anyone who wants a free copy of EVERYTHING “marl” to check out for themselves can get it here:
http://tstechnologies.net/
enjoy…(if there is anything actually enjoyable about it)
Wow, that’s a large file for such simple functionality. I could write the same advertised program functionality in less than 100k. Maybe you guys should check for malware.
You have to hope that there crappy scam program doesn’t infect your computer with spyware. Just what you need some POS program stealing the passwords to your trading accounts or worse…
btw……
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!
also have to wonder about the integrity of Joseph Farah of WorldNetDaily.com for running these scam ads for months (as well as many other scam ads). Little piss ant news organization running little piss ant scam ads…lol.
marl can suck my balls. if it was real why would these guys let everyone know. if i made a stock trading robot that actually worked like they say, id be laying on the beach right now wiping my ass with hundreds and throwing 20′s at strippers
Thanks all, glad I did some investigation and found this blog B4 jumping in the scam. Well I did lose some time but did enjoy all comments on the blog. I 2 ran multiple searches via goog and from the touting of Bizweek at the bottom of the pumpers page. I kept coming up with a blank. I will just continue to look for technical signals then read up on the fundamentals of whatever company I am investigating. Then apply the ole Pivot Point analysis for support and resistance levels along with other tools from the tool box.
2 All that contributed I wish U a prosperous New Year
Holmes
Oh, and Andy U have done many a favor by starting the investigation of this so called Stock Picking Bot. Many Thxs 2 U
H
So am I to believe all investment tools/softwares are scams? What is the difference between “Marl” and “Investool”? Is there a diffence other than one is for “penny stocks” and the other for “regular stock”?
Thanks for feedback!
Frank
Thank you for all the input here. I got my refund today after subscribed yesterday.
Also thank you to Andy for opening this forum so victims like me can relax and move on.
I was skeptical not to download the software. For those already have, make sure there are no viruses or bugs on your computer.
Lastly, I suppose most/all of us are stock traders/investors. Have a prosperous 2008!!
i fell for both the newsletter and testing of the program i am embarrassed to say. i got notice of my refund today from clickbank. glad to have found this site. i also sent a letter to worldnetdaily.com telling them what i thought about them advertising a scam on their website to their customers. they have not replied.
I too fell for the newsletter and testing of the program. I should know better but saw the ad on a reputable website (www.tsptalk.com). I’ve requested refunds from Clickbank today, 01/04. We’ll see how long it takes to get my $144 back.
So how does he profit than? Could it be that he profits from clients that actually invest in promoted stocks, buy selling those already he already purchased for lower price.
A subscription offer (with its price is peanuts compared to customers invested money in stocks) appears to be used to hook you up until you get beaten with money losses.
To demonstrate a predicted large price increase from one day to the next, do this: take screen captures the first day of various highly volatile penny stocks; the next day find one that had a large increase and match up the videos. It may take a few days to generate a good match, but who said creating a slick scam didn’t require a little patience?
Excellent post. Glad that there is always a counterforce to amoralistic opportunists and scammers.
Here is some new proof that Doublingstocks is a paid stock promotion scam. The robot is just a conduit to send stock tickers they are promoting.
http://www.oneworldincome.com/2008/01/06/doublingstockscom-a-stock-promotion-scam/
I wonder if they have been flagged by clickbank – I fell for this on 1/04/08 and today I have yet to see a charge to my credit card although I did get a confirmation from email from clickbank. I put in a request for refund anyway so we’ll see what happens
Another clue is in the source code of their home page, you’ll find which basically instructs the search engines not to store a copy of the website, i.e. cache on Google. Probably an attempt to hide evidence if necessary.
I called the 800-390-6035 Clickbank number and was granted a refund immediately. They told me my $47 would be back in my PayPal account within 24 hrs. Thank god Clickbank is reputable. And thank you Andy for posting the blog.
I did a reverse IP lookup and it appears that there are 15 domains hosted on Alex aka Tom Hunter’s IP. See links below.
Samantha Cornforth,,, his girlfriend, wife?
AFFILIATEDCASH .COM
BRINGPOPCORN .COM
DAILYRAKE .COM
DAILYRAKE .NET
DOUBLINGSTOCKS .COM
EQUITYPROMOTER .COM
JUSTGAMERZ .COM
ONLYGAMERZ .COM
POKERBOBBY .COM
SAMANTHACORNFORTH .COM
THEAFFILIATEACADEMY .COM
THISRICH .NET
UNLOCKTEXTS .COM
WEALTHYMARKETER .COM
WEALTHYMARKETER .NET
My refund was in my PayPal account this morning.
i did purchase the newsletter for $47 bucks cause i don’t have a lot of money and would like to do a little day trading on the side. they sent me my first stock pick monday morning and said the stock would open at .10 and was undervalued and had traded as high as 2.00. by monday afternoon it was a .18 and today(tuesday) it was at .26. they made a great point in the newsletter about more expensive stocks. first off if you buy them at something like $50.00 dollars a share you probably have enough money and don’t care that it won’t double quick. and if you invest something like $100,000 or a million in those types of stock and they only gain 5 or 10% once again you don’t care because that’s a lot of money. you mentioned that newsletter cause a surge in gains. who cares if it does and the small guy can profit, like i mentioned before, i’m from seattle and all the big stocks in this area that people got rich from were mostly from stock optioned employees or other people riding a dot.com wave which is basically the same. so i don’t neither disagree or agree with you but I think anytime the small guy can get a piece of the pie its good.
Have any of you Einsteins noticed that they are supposedly based in Seattle WA but give a UK telephone number…..?
doubling stocks would not return my e-mails, so i googled and eventually found this blog…apparently they are e-mailing their newsletter at different times for the same stock to get a bunch of people to buy to artificially increase the price then they can sell and make a profit and leave the rest of us a loser…call clickbank at 800-390-6035 and they will refund your money immediateley…
People, get real and think about this SCAM!
They claim thier Robot will yeild 34.7% per week. $347 on a $1,000.
OK, after 52 weeks their original $1,000 would have compounded to, are you ready for this…..$5,334,761,123.
The calculation is real simple, just enter your $1,000 ento Excel and multiply times 1.347. Do this 52 times and you get $53 Trillion!!!!!!!!!!!
It only takes 24 weeks to grow to a million.
And yet they run around trying to get $47 for their newsletter. Yea right!
Remember, A Fool and his money are soon parted.
Glad I googled and found your blog. Good to be cautious.
Ok I Am a Gary Halbert fan (different subject) so when I got an email from doubling stocks I kept thinking I’d read the email before. Go to http://www.thegaryhalbertletter.com/newsletters/zjll_most_valuable_skill.htm what you will find is darn near identical add copy from the email you get from the website. and no I did not sign up for the newletter.
Where were you people before I plopped down my $47 and followed a recommendation for SKVI. Sadly,I am down over 50% on my buy. Anyone thinking about this…DO NOT BE TEMPTED. I have requested a response from”michael” on many occasions since buying on his “undervalued” recommendation 12-13-07 stating that the target price was .68. I bought at .26 and it crashed to .16 by the next morning. Michael sent an email blast just now congratulating those that followed yesterday’s recommendation. This was his first recommendation in 4 weeks. Thank you for the Clickbank phone number.. but my $450 is gone forever.
I have only lost $47 as i can’t find my details that clickbank wants on the form
Sad to say that I am a subscriber and have been since October. And I can verify that doublingstocks.com is a SCAM.
The so-called newsletter will reach your inbox approx 30 minutes after the US markets open. Their so-called ‘pick’ has already made its move. What PISSES me off the most, is that they will send a congratulatory email, congratulating on our (their) success on the picks LAST WEEK, when it actual fact their pick just arrived yesterday, AFTER the bloody stock has moved!!
Since October, all picks, should anyone have traded it from the moment it pops into the inbox, would have made SIGNIFICANT losses, by at least 50%, some as high as 70%.
Someone has already mentioned, if you can actually ‘short’ their picks, you would be able to make bundles!!
As a conclusion, DON’T WASTE YOUR TIME, ’cause I’m sure it’s worth more than the $49 bucks that they are scamming for.
Have Good & Blessed trading year!
I’m working on a plan to help people avoid this fraud once and for all! Detestable people who propagate such schemes should be executed for their hurt many more people than a murderer ever does. Time to take out the trash!
The real information is disclosed in there Earnings Disclaimer at the bottom of the webpage:
Here is a copy as of today:
Doublingstocks was not compensated for highlighting GBMR to our members Doublingstocks was not compensated for highlighting BSGC to our members Doublingstocks was compensated two thousand five hundred dollars for highlighting LLSR to our members Doublingstocks was compensated five thousand dollars dollars for highlighting DHNA to our members Doublingstocks was not compensated for highlighting IOGH to our members Doublingstocks was compensated five thousand dollars dollars for highlighting BQTG to our members from blue wave advisor Doublingstocks was compensated five thousand dollars for highlighting EKII to our members Doublingstocks was compensated five thousand dollars for highlighting PLTG to our members Doublingstocks was compensated five thousand dollars for highlighting WYDY to our members Doublingstocks was compensated five thousand dollars for highlighting ENEC to our members Doublingstocks was compensated five thousand dollars for highlighting SBRX to our members Doublingstocks was compensated five thousand dollars for highlighting NCII to our members Doublingstocks was compensated five thousand dollars for highlighting AVPJ to our members Doublingstocks was compensated five thousand dollars for highlighting IWWI to our members Doublingstocks was compensated five thousand dollars for highlighting SSTP to our members Doublingstocks was not compensated for highlighting VYGO to our members Doublingstocks was compensated seventy five thousand dollars for highlighting NLIA to our members Doublingstocks was not compensated for highlighting TRGD to our members Doublingstocks was not compensated for highlighting HSXI to our members Doublingstocks was compensated fifty thousand dollars for highlighting HENC to our members Doublingstocks was not compensated for highlighting SGUS to our members Doublingstocks was not compensated for highlighting SKVI to our members Doublingstocks was compensated one hundred and twenty five thousand dollars for highlighting IDGJ to our members This disclaimer may change from time to time without any further notice.
What about people who fall for it? Pay the $47, trade a couple of times, feels the pain, and gets the money back? Can they be prosecuted? They are not the ones scamming, or sending out anything, just fell for it!!
Appreciate your comments
Paul..
Just called Clickbank at 1-800-390-6035. All they wanted was my last name and my zip code… and they will have my card refunded in 3-5 days.
At least you didn’t lose $450 like me. I hope others find this blog before they invest $1 in this scam.
Good luck.
Sue
i would likt to know is there a legitiamate program out there like this that does work or help make a little money
A good friend of mine sent out an email promoting this
yesterday. A few hours later, he sent out a retraction
email saying that he goofed. In that email, he referenced
this site.
Evidently, these guys have some other businesses which
they are advertising. It sure would make one think twice
before buying anything from these people.
It is amazing what some people will do to make money.
It is sad really as there are many legitimate ways to make
good money long term on the internet.
I noticed that they removed the download link that was
posted here. Anyone know where they moved it too.
I would like to get the software examine and post the
results on the internet.
To Success,
Joseph
Unfortunately, I lost 1K US with DoublingStocks. The owners simply send an email for a stock they ALREADY have position in. The newsletter is sent out, stock volume and share price increase. Doubling stocks owners sell their position by 12pm EST and the next day the stock falls hard. Newsletter subscribers are given a target price, which is unrealistic, so they hold on to the stock; It falls, never coming close to their target price. SCAM; stay away!
If this was an actual business, they wouldn’t be advertizing on blogs and free classified sites. Their business model and marketing plan would be a bit more advanced.
Franklinomics
Thanks for creating this blog