Citadel: Questions for potential investors.

Someone I respect with far greater business sense than I have forwards this list of questions for potential investors. He wrote this a couple of months ago, but with all the free publicity Drudge is giving this "investment," it seems timely:

re: KERODINA

Potential investors: I see from his website http://www.kerodinapress.com he’s hawking the 2012 Potomac Lifestyle Charity Guide http://www.kerodinapress.com/2012.htm and charging hefty advertising rates http://www.kerodinapress.com/potomac_charity.htm. Ask him which charities. And what their cut is. Ask who will give him references. Somebody with an established and credible operation. Ask him if his Charity Guide is recognized: http://www.potomaccfc.org/Forms/2011%20CharityList_Potomac_FINAL.pdf. Then ask him what happened to the 2011 Charity Guide http://www.potomacdoctor.com/. Ask him for a list of satisfied customers. Ask him why Kerodina Press doesn’t show up on a Better Business Bureau search using his zip code. http://www.bbb.org/us/Find-Business-Reviews/name/Kerodina/20877/ Go ahead and fill out the form if you’d like them to look into this.

If he’s going to expect trust for this new venture, why would he object if investors asked for specifics about old ones? If they were successful, that would bolster his credibility for being able to pull something off and his trustworthiness for doing what he says he will.

Why would you invest a dime without verifying his business reputation with those who have dealt with him and with those who can assure you he gets a clean bill of health? Wouldn’t you do this with anyone asking you to invest a substantial sum of money, especially if there were legitimate questions and concerns about his past actions and current motives?

Let's see, Citadel is up to what, 80 or so people voting on K's site poll about it now--and he says get one of 3,000 lots before you're shut out? How many of those 80 have $ to pony up? And for those who do, no, you don't get a say into the finances or get to review anything auditable. Rail against the SEC as the corrupt fed racket that it is, but at least it provides for reviewability.

Potential investors need to do some due diligence here, but all we have available to us requires doing a bit of searching. Are there other investment “opportunities” he offers that we can look at?

I see from his website he’s hawking the 2012 Potomac Lifestyle Charity Guide and charging hefty advertising rates. Ask him which charities will benefit. And what their cut is. Ask who will give him references. Like somebody with an established and credible operation. Ask him if his Charity Guide is recognized by anyone. Then ask him what happened to the 2011 Charity Guide.

Ask him for a list of satisfied customers. Ask him why Kerodina Press doesn’t show up on a Better Business Bureau search using his zip code. Go ahead and fill out their form if you’d like them to look into his charity guide.

Then look at the complications arising from other business ventures and relationships. Look at his perceived reputation with questioned business practices, including a spaghetti network of domains that seem to do nothing but exist or overlap. Look at his ongoing lawsuits, and his threatening to sue if anyone uses a picture of a model from one of his other businesses. Look at how some writer forums point out his charging to read manuscripts in his publishing business is not something reputable agents do. Look at his insistence that he got a raw deal when convicted, his taking over and commercialization of the Three Percent “brand” which he had nothing to do with creating, his attacks on the guy who did, and then ask yourself if this is someone who has earned blind allegiance and hard-earned money without complete transparency.

Ask him about his enemies list, and how all his relationships with anyone who can think for themselves seem to blow up into ugliness. Then look at some of the creeps he surrounds himself with, like thug “Bill Nye” who wishes people dead from cancer, acts like he’s superior to “frat boys” and thinks posing to show everyone his Popeye forearms makes up for his shriveled soul.

If K is going to expect trust for this new venture, why would he object if investors asked for specifics about old ones? If they were successful, that would bolster his credibility for being able to pull something off and his trustworthiness for doing what he says he will.

And by the say, what’s with all the aliases? Sam Kerodin, Christian Kerodin, Sam Kerillion, Christian Hyman, Sam Hellesponte? Who typically employs multiple “AKA’s”?

Why would you invest a dime without verifying his business reputation with those who have dealt with him and with those who can assure you he gets a clean bill of health? Wouldn’t a prudent person do this with ANYONE asking you to invest a substantial sum of money, especially if there were legitimate questions and concerns about his past actions and current motives?

Instead his position is if you don’t like his non-prospectus, keep your mouth shut and just leave him and his supporters alone, or he implies he’ll sue? Why is that not a surprise?

If this exercise pans out in his favor, he ought to thank us for giving people a metric by which to assess his past performance as a standard of reliability. In the mean time, if anyone knows any financial/securities specialists, lawyers, etc., you might want to ask them what they think about this whole business venture and what issues they think need to be addressed before they’d invest their own money in it.

Who would want to go live in a community run by this guy? Not that there’s a chance in hell he’ll ever even have a viable firearms business (and wait till he threatens to sue a gun magazine for a product review he doesn’t like), let alone his Citadel.

Caveat emptor.