14:00

No problem, as long as they could

14:02

cover the down payment, he'd send the

14:04

money for the rest by March. But

14:07

March came and went.

14:10

And no word from Joe. Dean

14:14

and Ben kept trying to call him, but he

14:16

wouldn't answer. Eventually his

14:18

answering machine was turned off. Then

14:21

his phone was disconnected. Dean

14:24

and Ben were in a complete panic. If

14:26

Joe didn't send them the money soon, they'd

14:29

have to go to their parents and ask

14:31

for help. Thankfully, Joe finally

14:33

got back to them at the beginning

14:35

of April. But the news wasn't

14:38

good. He couldn't help

14:40

them out after all. The money

14:43

was gone. According

14:46

to Joe, his trading account had ballooned up

14:48

to $14 million. But

14:52

someone who had lost out on a

14:54

lot of money got angry and squeezed

14:56

him out of his positions. The

14:58

account was practically down to

15:01

zero. Whether Joe was

15:03

telling the truth or not, the money really

15:05

was gone. But

15:08

he assured everyone that it was

15:10

just a temporary setback. He

15:13

promised he'd make it all back

15:15

and then some. That

15:17

was all they needed to hear. Joe had

15:19

never led them astray before, and why should

15:21

they doubt him now? But

15:24

the compliance authorities at the

15:26

Chicago Mercantile Exchange weren't as

15:28

trusting, and they rightfully had

15:31

some questions. At

15:33

least one of Joe's investors

15:35

wanted to understand where the

15:38

money had gone. That

15:40

led to an internal investigation,

15:43

and it revealed some very

15:45

interesting things about It

15:49

turns out that Joe hadn't

15:51

graduated from USC early. In

15:54

fact, he hadn't even graduated at

15:56

all. He had dropped out

15:58

halfway through his sophomore year.