Puerto Rican Investor Sues Company Over Alleged Pyramid Scheme in USVI

A lawsuit recently filed in the Virgin Islands District Court is accusing a local company of being nothing but a front for a pyramid scheme. The complaint, filed on Monday by Alex Gibson, a resident of Puerto Rico, alleges that B. Matthew McClafferty owes him over $100,000 plus interest on an initial payment of $50,000 made in 2022.

Mr. McClafferty is the founder of Mac Private Equity Inc., which bills itself as an “American offshore fund located in the U.S. Virgin Islands with a primary focus on businesses or concepts that involve blockchain technologies.” On its website, the fund claims to be “a registered Economic Development Company (EDC) operating in the U.S. Virgin Islands,” which the lawsuit said it achieves through a locally-registered entity, MPE Clearing & Holdings, Inc. Mr. Gibson’s suit names McClafferty and both of his companies as defendants, but argues that neither company operates as a real business entity, instead serving “merely as a façade for the operation of McClafferty, the dominant stockholder of the Companies.” Notably, the EDC’s website does not include MPE among its list of beneficiary companies.