13. Centennial Technologies
Year: 1996
Approx. Amount: $40 Million*
Company / Person Involved: Emanuel Pinez
Instead of the $2 million worth of PC memory cards that were meant to be sent to its customers, Centennial Technologies faked the shipping order and receipts and sent fruit baskets in the memory cards’ stead. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Centennial Technologies ©Zb89V / Shutterstock.com
The earning that Centennial Technologies reported between Q2 of 1994 and Q4 of 1996, was exaggerated a little bit by the company’s CEO Emanuel Pinez, if, that is, $40 million is a little bit. Instead of a loss of $28 million Pinez and his team reported a gain of $12 million. When the dust had cleared, 20,000+ investors lost almost everything, and Pinez was found guilty of insider trading and 4 other counts of securities fraud.