Lou Pearlman
Ponzi might have given his name to the pyramid scheme, but he wasn’t the first person to run one and he was far from the last, and some of the numbers involved in other schemes have been staggering. The longest-running Ponzi scheme in American history was perpetrated by Lou Pearlman.
Most famous for being the record producer behind boy bands such as NSYNC and Backstreet Boys, Pearlman swindled more than $1 billion by inviting investors and banks to put money into fictitious companies. $300 million of that money is still missing. Pearlman was sentenced to 25 years in prison from 2008 but died just eight years later.
