The farce of free 'get rich' seminars

These seminars promise to give you the skills to make a fortune, but you get nothing of the sort.

I've lost count of emails I get inviting me to a “free seminar” that will make me rich - it must be a dozen a month. And I'm sure I'm not alone in this – huge numbers are hit by similar messages every day.

Mostly, they promise that I can earn £1,000 to £1,500 a week with just one or two hours a week “simple work”. OK, unless you're already an investment banker or a premier league footballer, that certainly beats the day job.

Even better, they say I can do this from the comfort of my own home. Besides saving on fares and travelling time, I could do it without bothering to get out of bed. This sounds like too good to be true. But it can't be – there's a website, and even better, an invite to the seminar at a central London location.

I try to check the firm out, but the only reviews are on get-rich-quick websites. Hardly reliable.

Off to the seminar

So off I go to experience the seminar. The venue is a downstairs room in one of those slightly tacky hotels which need fresh paint and furniture without tobacco stains. But I can't grumble – it's free, after all.

I fill in my details, promising that I shall not reveal anything that goes on to a living soul. Not sure about the need for a confidentiality contract, but I agree (if I don't, I'll probably be shown the door although it's quite easy to enter without signing in.)

Who else has turned up? There are around 40 people, all ages although many don't look prosperous. But that's good as we're here to learn how to make a lot of money without any effort, not what to do with existing wealth.

Almost evangelical

On comes the warm-up man. He tells us how he was penniless, deep in debt just a year or so ago but thanks to what we are going to learn, he's now debt-free and has a lovely family, an expensive car, and plenty of time to enjoy all this. I've heard all this before, in particular the line to “stop working for others and start working for yourself.”

It's almost evangelical. A few people in the audience start to testify how they want to be “debt and work-free”. One or two must be plants – they say that discovering the seminar was the start of the road to riches.

Then comes the main act, who tells us his life story. He was a university drop-out, wandering the world living on menial jobs when he started to clean floors for an American in a luxury Mexican resort. The American did little work but made a fortune as a foreign exchange trader with just an hour or so of work a day. For some unexplained reason, this American taught his cleaner how to trade.

From shoe-shiner to millionaire

But that was not enough. Then, still aged only 21, he read hundreds of books on trading (around three a day if his story stacks up) and sought out the world's top traders who taught him all their skills. He was prepared to do anything to learn at their feet – even polish their (doubtlessly expensive) leather shoes.

Now he is a millionaire many times over, but he wants to share it all with us. We too can soon become well-off traders and we don't need any capital to start. He shows the audience how, by making the right trades, you can soon build up a large amount of capital. The goal is financial freedom.

He shows examples of how a small sum (or nothing at all, as you can start on credit) becomes a fortune. But how? It all seems magic. I still haven't the faintest idea how to trade the dollar against the euro or the pound against the yen even though I should now be convinced that this is a one way route to that financial freedom that crops up every few minutes.

Turning lead into gold, with no risk!

And I should be convinced it is safe. With more difficult to understand techniques, he claims you can limit losses to a tiny percentage but allow gains to multiply. This really is the philosopher's stone – the alchemy we all need to turn lead into gold without risk.

He does say that all the examples are in the past so I don't know whether they are real – there's a small print warning at the bottom of one slide that suggests that these are “illustrations”.

But how do I become the super trader that he is? The answer is simple. I have to sign up for an “intensive trader training weekend” to be held in the same venue four weeks later where I would meet more “professional traders” and enjoy one-to-one education.

Yes, it's pricey at £2,950 but not only can I bring a friend or partner free, I can't complain about the cost because I shall be learning “from the best of the best”. And I'll soon earn all that money back, with much more on top, thanks to the trader tips I'll pick up.

I discover later that the £2,950 is just for starters. There are advanced trading techniques which cost thousands more, as well as a traders' club for even more money each year.

Sign on the dotted line

The star turn leaves. I would have loved to ask why he bothered with seminars in cheap hotels if he was a tip-top trader making millions every year as he claimed. But I did not get the opportunity.

The audience drifts away into the night, with the exception of four who wave their credit cards and sign up. Assuming none of these are planted, that's nearly £12,000 for an evening's work.

Beats the day job, any time.

Regulatory note. Seminar organisers are not allowed to tell you what to buy or sell because that requires Financial Services Authority registration as well as a need to know the client and assess suitability. But offering “education” or “training courses” does not require authorisation or any form of regulation.

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