Associations and Research Organizations

• The American Finance Association is one of the most influential scholarly organizations in the finance field. The association is devoted to promoting education on and study of the economics of finance.
• Association of Finance Professionals is a global advocacy group for finance professionals. The reach of the organization is long, with over 150,000 members in several countries worldwide. The membership consists of finance professionals representing a great number of industries and countries.
• European Finance Association is an international association based in Europe. The goal of the EFA is to facilitate learning by providing a place for both academics and practitioners to share ideas, criticisms, research, and experience.
• The Commercial Finance Association exists to facilitate the discussions that lead to innovations by providing members from a diverse array of industries the opportunity to share ideas, experiences, and needs.
• Midwest Finance Association exists to develop and communicate new information in the finance industry to those financial professionals and scholars with a particular interest in the Midwest.
• International Banking, Economics, and Finance Association is an association devoted to providing a forum for scholarly discourse and research for its members. The IBEFA promotes both individual and collaborative research both within the organization and with other organizations.
• American Financial Services Association is the national trade association representing the consumer credit industry. The association advocates for the best interest of both the industry and its customers, and also promotes best practice and high ethical standards within the industry.
• Government Financial Officers Association exists to provide advocacy and education to government finance professionals. The association advocates for the best interest of government finance professionals and also spearheads research.
• Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association promotes best practice within the securities and financial markets fields, as well as pursuing research, interacting and conversing with regulators, and attempting to strike the best balance for the welfare of its member firms, their employees, and customers.
• Accounting and Finance Benchmarking Consortium is a research organization comprised of finance and accounting professionals who conduct bench-marking studies that are used to pinpoint best practices within the industries.

Publications

• American Banker is a banking magazine that provides banking professionals with in depth analysis and insight into the world’s financial markets, major companies, business strategies and innovations. The publication seeks to enable its readers to maximize shareholder value in their companies.
• Barron’s is a weekly newspaper and online magazine covering the world of finance. Each issue includes a wrap up of the previous week’s activity and articles featuring in depth analysis of recent economic trends. The online magazine provides up to the minute coverage of major events in finance.
• Business Finance is geared toward senior finance professionals. The magazine focuses on providing these professionals with in depth coverage of and insight into key strategies, trends, and technologies, with the purpose of enabling them to implement sound plans that will help carry their companies forward.
• Kiplinger focuses on providing personal finance advice and insight to finance professionals and laypersons alike. Kiplinger strikes a good balance between the depth of their treatment of subjects and accessibility, making the publication useful and relevant to a wide audience.
• Financial Times is one of the premier finance magazines in the world. The Financial Times is a trusted source of finance news featuring in depth analysis of everything from public policy, to market trends, to innovations in the field.
• Financial Review is a magazine devoted to exhaustively covering every aspect of the finance industry, from ground level personal finance, to high level international finance. The coverage is in depth and analytical, while remaining accessible to the target audience of the given piece.
• Smart Money is a publication of the Wall Street Journal that is hyper focused on the finance industry and personal finance. The magazine is devoted to bringing its readers up to date information with quality analysis and commentary on major finance industry matters.
• The Wall Street Journal is a must read for anybody in any aspect of the business world. The publication features coverage of the business world from every angle, whether from just straight objective reporting, or editorial commentary and analysis.
• The Economist is one of the most trusted names in modern coverage of economics. The magazine offers readers a plethora of perspectives on various economic developments throughout the world, and seeks to provide its readers with objective analysis from an economic perspective.
• International Treasurer has been connecting with treasurers and their banks around the world for fifteen years. The publication features content by treasurers, and for treasurers, with treasurers as sources and people experienced with treasury and journalism as writers.
• Managerial Finance provides its readers with an international forum for the publication of premier research in the fields of finance, financial management, financial strategy, global finance, corporate finance, and insurance and risk management.
• Journal of Banking and Finance provides an outlet for the large increase of scholarly research in banking and finance. Journal of Banking and Finance publishes both empirical and theoretical research with an emphasis on theoretical development and implementation.
• Journal of Economics and Finance is the official journal of the Academy of Economics and Finance. The journal publishes empirical and theoretical research with an emphasis on the relevance of findings to economic and finance policy.
• Journal of Finance and Accountancy is the finance journal of the Academic and Business Research Institute. The journal is refereed and all submissions are blind peer reviewed. JFA publishes original, unpublished research focusing on issues and solutions in business, and education.
• Journal of Applied Finance and Banking is the peer reviewed journal that publishes empirical, applied, and policy oriented research. The goal of the journal is to bridge the gap between various research communities, academic circles, and policy makers.
• The Journal of Finance is published six times per year and is the official journal of the American Finance Association. The journal publishes high level research in finance and is the most widely cited finance journal in the world and one of the most cited economics journals as well.
• Review of Finance is published by Oxford and is the official journal of the European Finance Association. The journal aims for a wide distribution and and publishes high impact research on a wide array of finance and economics subjects.
• Global Finance Journal provides a forum for the discussion of ideas and techniques used by academics and practitioners alike. The primary goal of the journal is to advance applied research in global financial management.
• Quarterly Journal of Finance is the primary journal of the Midwest Finance Association. The journal features articles on research in all areas in finance and has a broad appeal in the industry.
• Journal of Financial Econometrics features articles on research in financial econometrics, one of the fastest growing areas of econometrics study. The journal explores the relationship between finance and econometrics through the examination of empirical research and methodological research.

Conferences

• World Financial Information Conference is hosted by FISD. The goal of this global conference is to provide a neutral forum for the sharing of information by international finance professionals. The conference boasts attendees from more than 35 countries and provides an environment conducive to debate and discussion from a diverse array of perspectives.
• 4th International Conference on Business and Economic Research is devoted to tackling major issues in international finance and economics. Papers presented include a wide range of subjects such as accounting, finance, economics, banking, marketing, and management.
• Quantitative Methods in Finance is hosted by the Quantitative Finance Research Centre, an organization devoted to creating and disseminating quantitative finance information for an international audience of finance professionals.
• Financial Markets and Portfolio Management is a conference hosted by the Swiss Society for Financial Market Research with the goal of advancing the modern finance industry by facilitating constructive conversation between scholars and practitioners.
• 3rd Annual International Conference on Accounting and Finance is a conference devoted to advancing the state of global communication and accounting practices as globalization is developing faster than ever. The conference recognizes that currently there are too many different accounting practices and methods and that ends up creating issues for companies attempting to operate across their nation’s borders.
• The First International Conference on Finance and Banking is the first major international conference being held by the Indonesian Financial Management Association. The conference is designed to fulfill the organization’s mission to promote a deeper understanding of finance and the major issues facing multinational companies and their finance professionals.
• CFO Rising: East is a conference geared specifically toward CFOs with the purpose of providing a forum for the discussion of major finance issues and possible solutions. The conference is designed to impact the primary financial decision makers in the industry for the good of their companies.
• Financial Intermediation Research Society Conference is a forum for the presentation of research, both empirical and theoretical, that impacts the financial intermediation industry.
• The West Coast Trade and Export Finance Conference deals with such sensitive and daunting issues as corporate risk, the increasing complexity of capital management in a volitile market, and the finance challenges of exporting to Asia and Latin America.
• International Workshop on Computational and Financial Econometrics is a workshop conference featuring cutting edge implementations of computational and financial econometrics. The conference features several presentations and workshops that delve deep into the complex world of econometrics.

1: The Wall Street Journal

This app allows you to browse the award winning Wall Street Journal from the convenience of your iPhone. The news is published every morning, so you get the latest news automatically every time you load up the app. The $12.99 subscription model allows for access to myriad features including market data, stock quotes, and a stock watch list.

________________________________________________

2: Iron Money

Iron Money is a money management app that helps manage finances in the increasingly complicated world of multiple bank accounts and online banking. With Iron Money, you can connect all your accounts and transactions into one easy app to help analyze your saving and spending habits.

________________________________________________

3: MarketScan

For the investor or trader, being able to scan the market for any changes, whether dramatic or subtle, is imperative to the profession. This is where MarketScan comes in. With this app, you can easily filter through the dirt and find the gold in the stock market allowing you to simply your workflow and increase productivity.

________________________________________________

4. Twitter

A social networking app may, at first glance, seem like an odd choice to include on our top ten list, but following the right users on Twitter can provide you with the most up to date information in the business world. Become a “tweeter” yourself and create networking opportunities and even establish yourself as a authority in your field by sharing expertise and experiences, live tweeting conferences you attend and interacting with others.

________________________________________________

5: Credit Card Terminal

For the small or independent business owner, taking credit cards as a form of payment becomes a necessity in this market. With this app, it’s possible to scan credit cards without the need for an expensive machine; all you need is a merchant account with a payment gateway and you’re good to go.

________________________________________________

6: LoopNet Commercial Real Estate Search

LoopNet allows you to filter out the noise and find what you’re looking for in real estate with easy to use maps and search terms. Just specify a set of parameters and the app automatically searches all commercial real estate in your area, showing them as markers on a map.

________________________________________________

7: Real-time Stock Tracker +Alert push notification

This app is a comprehensive stock powerhouse that can do anything from streaming live graphs to portfolio monitoring and more. With notifications supported for happenings in the stock market, you’ll never be too far away from your investments.

________________________________________________

8: World Currency Converter Pro

For the traveling business executive, a currency conversion app is nearly as important as a language translator app. With just a few steps, you can find the currency exchange rate for any currency in the world.

________________________________________________

9: Mortgage Calculator FREE

An essential for potential and current homeowners, this free app allows you to figure out just how much you’re really paying for your mortgage. For the prospective homeowners, the Mortgage Calculator can help you figure out what works for you.

________________________________________________

10: Yahoo! Finance

Yahoo! Finance is a long trusted name in financial news. It features real time stock coverage, letting you keep the stock market right in your pocket. This app has it all; with news coverage and real time data you’ll never feel ill prepared with this tool in your arsenal.

Thomson Reuters Marketboard

Thomson Reuters Marketboard provides comprehensive reports on companies and the latest developments in business and finance sectors. This app offers a customizable interface to track stocks and provides analysts’ research, transcripts and investigative reports as well. The Thomson Reuters Marketboard app also has a briefcase feature that saves research and news articles.

________________________________________

StockWatch

The StockWatch app allows iPad users to monitor over 50 different stock exchanges around the world. This is one of the best apps available for the iPad for tracking different stocks and indexes and monitoring a portfolio. This app provides real-time chart tracking and news feeds as well as a customizable interface for managing stocks in the portfolio.

________________________________________

Gold Tracker

Gold Tracker is a popular app amongst investors and professionals interested in tracking precious metals. This app provides live quotes for over 150 different currencies. The Gold Tracker app monitors market activity and displays precious metals in ounces, grams, pennyweights and kilograms. This app also allows users to input the purity value into the calculations as well.

________________________________________

Bloomberg for iPad

The Bloomberg app provides the latest market data, analysis and news coverage that affects the business and finance world weekly. The app covers 30 different areas of business and provides tools for monitoring world markets. This is a popular app for professionals who need to stay informed about the recent developments in their industry and at large.

________________________________________

Square Register

This app allows professionals and enterprises to process credit cards from any location. The app allows professionals to swipe Discover, MasterCard, American Express or Visa credit cards, and deposits funds into the bank account within two days.

________________________________________

QuickBooks Mobile

This app makes it easier to process invoices, estimates and perform other QuickBooks functions to manage the business while away from the office. QuickBooks Mobile is a very helpful app for traveling professionals who own a business, start-ups and small businesses.

________________________________________

Citrix Receiver

The Citrix Receiver is a great app for professionals who are interested in staying productive while away from the office. This app serves as a platform for professionals to access enterprise applications and files from remote locations.

________________________________________

E*TRADE Mobile

The E*TRADE iPad app helps investors and finance professionals trade stocks when away from home or the office. Many iPad users enjoy trading options, mutual funds and stocks in a few easy steps with the E*TRADE app. This app makes it easy to monitor all of the brokerage accounts in one window.

________________________________________

CNBC Real-Time for iPad

CNBC’s Real-Time app for the iPad is a free app that provides real-time stock quotes after hours. This app has a comprehensive platform that delivers all of the business and finance news and major developments that professionals rely on throughout the work week. Breaking news alerts and video headlines that feature over 100 guests daily serve as effective tools for keeping investors informed.

________________________________________

Fidelity Investments

This app provides real-time analysis and customizable options for researching and trading mutual funds, ETFs and stocks. Advanced charting and real-time quotes give iPad users immediate access to valuable information for making the best investment decisions. The app also provides videos, newsfeeds, alerts and enhanced cash management as well.

Pavan Sukhdev: Put A Value on Nature!

It is hard to put a price to many things society takes for granted such as air or water, but in this talk Sukhdev theorizes just that. What is the exact price of a the Amazon Rainforest? Questions like this help shed light on the economic function of the environment.

Alex Tabarrok on How Ideas Trump Crises

In this talk, Tabarrok paints an optimistic vision of the future where globalization allows billions to rise out of poverty and help propel the world economy into the future.

Adam Davidson: What we Learned From Teetering on the Fiscal Cliff

Davidson talks economics and politics, going deep in discussion about the fiscal cliff and what it meant. The fiscal cliff was solved by bipartisan parties in an effort to stave off economic collapse due to debt, similar to current day Greece, but how exactly was it resolved?

Ashraf Ghani on Rebuilding Broken States

Why are some nations not improving as fast as others and what can we do to fix it? In this fascinating TED Talk, Ashraf Ghani and Chris Anderson spark a fascinating discussion on Afghanistan’s past, present, and future: from the Red Army to modern day drone attacks by the west.

Richard Wilkinson: How Economic Inequality Harms Societies

Economic inequality is inherently seen as negative for many people, but why? For the first time in history, we have evidence to look back on and see what the effects of inequality truly are. Wilkinson goes over this evidence and comes to a conclusion that inequality isn’t just inherently bad; it’s economically unwise.

Shlomo Benartzi: Saving for Tomorrow, Tomorrow

In this talk, Benartzi goes over one of the principles of personal finance, savings — and why so many of us are terrible at it. Using behavioral economics to analyze how our brains plan for the future, Benartzi suggests how we can create new programs to help people save and prosper.

Daniel Goldstein: The Battle Between Your Present and Future Self

Goldstein hearkens back to the tale of Odysseus to try and explain just how our two selves reason with each other. The present mind and the future mind are in a constant battle and this talk goes over tools that can help people make smart decisions for the future.

Laurie Santos: A Monkey Economy As Irrational As Ours

Humans, while being incredibly intelligent at times, can make very stupid decisions. In this talk, Santos goes over a series of experiments that shows just how similar we are to primates when it comes to economic irrationality.

Martin Jacques: Understanding the Rise of China

The West tends to view China as a mystery. Martin Jacques goes over why that is and attempts to clarify China’s quick rise to power as well as keeping everything in a global perspective.

Niall Ferguson: The 6 Killer Apps of Prosperity

In this talk, Ferguson goes over why some countries are prosperous and some aren’t, as well as suggesting six different apps to help share prosperity around the globe.

This list consists of the thirty best business and finance blogs of 2012. These blogs are regularly updated, and cover the major issues in the industry from a variety of perspectives informed by the experiences of their successful authors.

Best Business and Finance Blogs

1. The Financial Times is one of the largest and most respected news sources in finance. The blog section of their website features an eclectic collection of writers with varying perspectives from every facet of the financial industry.

2. Clusterstock is a collaborative Business Insider blog featuring topics dealing with every major aspect of the finance industry including culture, hedge funds, wall street, regulation, and more.
Highlight: The Fabulous Life Of Eike Batista—The Brazilian Who Is Risking It All To Become Richest Man In The World

3. Zero Hedge is a blog devoted to increasing the availability and scope of information pertinent to investors of all stripes. One of the blog’s secondary goals is to act as a watchdog in the finance journalism field, bringing suppressed information to the forefront of the ongoing finance discussion.
Highlight: The Great Lie Of The Great Rotation

4. Calculated Risk is a finance blog focused heavily on economics and is widely regarded as one of the best resources for following macroeconomic trends in the United States.
Highlight: Lawler on Housing Vacancy Survey

5. Planet Money is the collaborative economics focused blog of NPR. Planet Money features well regarded contributors offering a variety of perspectives on the finance industry. The tone of the blog is light and the articles are written with both laypersons and professionals in mind.
Highlight: An International Battle Over One Of The Most Boring Things In Finance

6. The Telegraph is a United Kingdom newspaper and the website features a collection of finance blogs that make it one of the best sources for a British point of view on finance. While many of the articles do feature stories of interest to primarily British readers, there is a good selection of writers who deal with international finance from a British perspective.
Highlight: How I made a year’s net salary in a month

7. Dealbreaker is a blog devoted to covering the culture and personalities of the finance industry. The blog features news and original commentary, with the occasional entertainment piece thrown into the mix to keep things interesting.
Highlight: New York, London, Hong Kong…Moscow?

8. Baseline Scenario is focused on the international finance industry. The blog discusses the field from a global perspective and formulates concrete policy proposals designed to make international finance a better defined space. The blog’s authors are Peter Boone, Simon Johnson, and James Kwak and they have been published in every major finance magazine between the three of them.
Highlight: What Is Social Insurance?

9. CNN Money, a Service of Fortune, and Money is a collaborative blog between these three media, finance, and business industry powerhouses. The blog features some of the top writers in the industry and covers every major aspect of finance and business.
Highlight: Small craft breweries hit it big

10. Infectious Greed by Dr. Paul Kedrosky, features a tongue in cheek writing style combined with the wisdom of this contributing editor for Bloomberg. Infectious Greed is an interesting, informative look behind the curtain of the international finance game.

11. Ticker Sense is the blog of Birinyi Associates Incorporated and is focused primarily on U.S. stocks. Ticker Sense also covers the greater finance business as a whole. Birinyi is a financial research and money management firm headed by president of the company Laszlo Birinyi who struck out on his own, creating the company in 1989. His first consulting gig was with Bloomberg LP.
Highlight: Strongest January Since 1997…. More to Go?

12. Distressed Volatility is a blog that was founded at the beginning of the financial crisis following the government bailout of Bear Stearns, and that firm’s eventual sale to JP Morgan. The name was derived from the distressed and volatile state of the American economy at the time and has been devoted to covering developments in the financial industry as it has dealt with the widespread difficulties following the implosion of the money market.
Highlight: Will Illinois’ Unfunded Pension Liability End Up Repricing Its Debt?

13. Global Markets is the blog of Cliff Wachtel and features daily and weekly in depth analysis of the stock market and American business. The blog offers readers advice primarily about stock trading. Mr. Wachtel is considered one of the top financial bloggers.
Highlight: How to Trade Trends: A Simple Short Term News Trading Strategy

14. Raw Finance covers the finance industry from a common sense perspective and seeks to be relevant to everybody involved with the industry whether they are investment bankers or individual investors. The blog seeks to strip topics down to the nuts and bolts mechanics of economics, removing all the excess political baggage and sensationalism that commonly accompany such topics.
Highlight: Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Adopts “Ability-To-Repay” Rule for Mortgage Lenders

15. The Brazen Careerist blog network has been running since 2008 with the primary goal of helping people land their dream job and achieve career goals. While the blog has stayed true to its roots over the years, it has also expanded consistently over time and has grown into a website that offers many valuable services to professionals.
Highlight: 15 Books That Will Help You Prosper and Be Happy in Your Career

16. Naked Capitalism is a blog published Susan Webber, a principle consultant with Aurora Advisors Incorporated, authored under the nom de plume Yves Smith. The blog features commentary and analysis on economics, finance news, and legal and ethical issues within finance, particularly the banking industry.
Highlight: Reflections on the Current Belief That Housing Will Come Roaring Back

17. Daily Finance is a collaborative money and finance blog published by AOL’s Money and Finance news division. The blog features content geared both toward providing laypersons with financial advice, and in-depth analysis of financial news for professionals.
Highlight: Your Parents Think You Stink at Managing Your Money

18. The Wall Street Journal collaborative blog features in depth coverage and analysis of business and finance from some of the most important finance professionals, journalists and thinkers of this day and age.
Highlight: Secondary Sources: Oil Shock, Risk Fear, Budget, Economist Breakup

19. Rorty Bomb Rorty Bomb is a finance and economics blog that is part of Next New Deal, the website of the Roosevelt Institute, a prominent progressive think tank.
Highlight: How is Inequality Holding Back the Recovery?

20. Brad Delong is an economics blogger for economists. He is a professor of economics at U.C. Berkley, chair of the Political Economy major, and a former deputy assistant secretary of the U.S. Treasury under Bill Clinton. The blog’s content varies from modern economic concerns, to taking a step back and considering the thoughts of economic philosophers past.
Highlight: Grand Mal Economic Seizures

21. Seth Godin has written fourteen books, all of which have been best sellers, on everything from marketing to the end of the industrial economy. His blog deals with just as wide an array of topics as his books. He writes with an easy to read, understandable style that doesn’t need to sacrifice depth for clarity.
Highlight: Eleven things organizations can learn from airports

22. Chris Brogan is a marketing entrepreneur that shares with his readers the best and most successful ideas he has implemented, as well as sound business and financial strategies.
Highlight: Bring Immense Value to the Picnic

23. Shoe Money is the blog of Jeremy Schoemaker. The blog is focused on the online marketing industry and entrepreneurship. The author is open about the ups and downs he has experienced in his life and is happy to share his accumulated knowledge and wisdom with his readers.
Highlight: In 2012 I learned 5 Major Things About Running A Business

24. China Law Blog is a business law blog featuring content primarily concerned with doing business in, or with companies from, China. The blog seeks to keep its readers informed on the latest developments in Chinese business law and how to navigate the often perilous business landscape in that nation.
Highlight: Service Companies in China. How to Get Paid.

25. Next Big Future is a blog featuring content dealing with business and social media. The site focuses on how to best utilize social media in business for networking, communication, education, and marketing; all while keeping on top of the evolution of social media technology.
Highlight: Cable Companies Make 97% Margin On Internet Services and Have No Incentive to Offer Gigabit Internet

26. Successful Blog is the blog of Liz Strauss. The blog’s topics focus primarily on developing meaningful business relationships in a high tech and often depersonalized world. She shares strategies for leveraging technology to create more personal business relationships with both customers, other businesses, and peers.
Highlight: Revenue is the Small Business Lifesaver

27. Darmano is the blog of David Armano and it focuses reinventing public relations through the effective application of a balanced approach utilizing both logic and emotion to better serve both companies and the public.
Highlight: It’s Time to Re-Invent Public Relations

28. Drew’s Marketing Minute features an innovative approach to marketing for businesses and business professionals. He seeks to communicate his principles of creating a love between business and custom primarily through anecdotes.
Highlight: Touching my heart doesn’t necessarily touch my wallet

29. The Consumerist is a blog focused on providing in depth analysis of issues in the finance field affecting the average consumer.
Highlight: 5 Home Inspection Photos That Show Why DIY Is Not Always The Best Route

30. Neville Hobson is a blogger who has positioned himself at the intersection of business, communication, and technology. The blog features articles dealing primarily with advancements in business and finance technologies.
Highlight: Closing the gap between social media use and usefulness

Image Source

While most people who study finance today have an honest career in mind, history is littered with rogues who’ve looked to make a quick illegal buck or two at someone else’s expense. However, the ten individuals who have made this list are no small-time hustlers. They’re con men that have taken the art of deceit to a completely different level.

With activities ranging from forging documents and impersonating individuals to embezzling billions of dollars, these immoral, manipulative geniuses stand out as 10 of the greatest con men of all time.

10. Gregor MacGregor (1786 – 1845)

Image Source

Gregor MacGregor was such a credible con artist that he managed to convince colonists to invest in and set sail for a nation that didn’t even exist. The Scottish soldier and adventurer-turned shameful conniver created a fictional state called Poyais. And in his incredibly elaborate plot, he claimed to have been appointed cacique (or prince) of this land that lay off the Mosquito Coast of Central America.

While this might sound silly or even slightly amusing to us today, back then, the whole escapade was no laughing matter. Many lives were lost to tropical diseases on the ships sailing to the non-existent state. Of course, MacGregor made sure he pocketed all the loan payments that were made in exchange for land on the completely undeveloped and uninhabitable terrain on the Bay of Honduras.

Even so, once he was rumbled in London, MacGregor tried the same scheme in France. He died in Caracas, Venezuela on December 4, 1845, after having been granted citizenship there in the last few years of his life.

9. Victor “Count” Lustig (1890 – 1947)

Image Source

Legendary schemer Victor Lustig was best known as the man who sold the Eiffel Tower – twice! A slick and amiable con artist, Count Lustig became fluent in multiple languages and quickly established himself with his ocean liner and “money-printing machine” scams.

In his later life, he would even have the audacity and confidence to scam the prominent gangster Al Capone, but 1925 was the year of his master plan. The Eiffel Tower plot reportedly came to him one spring day when he was reading a Parisian newspaper – in particular, an article on problems the city was encountering in the maintenance of the monument.

After arranging a “confidential” meeting with several scrap metal dealers at a prestigious hotel, Lustig convinced them that Paris could not afford the upkeep of the Eiffel Tower and needed to sell the monument for scrap metal – secretly. Eventually, he chose Andre Poisson as the buyer, collecting a massive bribe in the process. And with Poisson too embarrassed to complain to the police, Lustig tried to pull off the same scam just a month later. This time, however, his chosen victim went to the police before the deal was concluded.

Nevertheless, Lustig managed to evade arrest until May 10, 1935, when he was finally arrested following an anonymous phone call to authorities from his jealous mistress, Billy May. After somehow escaping the Federal House of Detention in New York City, Lustig was recaptured in Pittsburgh 27 days later and sent to Alcatraz Island. He later died from pneumonia at the Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Missouri, on March 11, 1947.

8. James Arthur Hogue (1959 – )

Image Source

Audacious con artist James Hogue was an impressive long-distance runner as a child. This must have come in handy, seeing as how he’s spent much of his life running from the law.

Hogue’s first known impersonation was that of a high school student called Jay Mitchell Huntsman, whom he claimed was a 16-year-old orphan from Nevada (but who was actually a dead infant). Hogue successfully enrolled in a school in Palo Alto, California in 1986, but the ploy was eventually exposed by a suspicious local reporter. Still, that arrest did not deter Hogue from a life of crime.

Princeton University was his next big effort. Here he assumed the identity of Alexi Indris-Santana, a self-taught orphan from Utah. Using his latest false identity, Hogue earned himself a place on the track team and even an invitation to the prestigious Ivy Club. But after two years he was once again exposed. As if by fate, Renee Pacheco, a student from the same Palo Alto High School Hogue had previously enrolled in, recognized the deceitful impostor. Hogue served time for defrauding the university and bagging around $30,000 in financial aid.

Yet being arrested and imprisoned did not change Hogue’s ways either. Next, he managed to worm his way into Harvard University. Posing as a security guard, he stole gemstones and replaced them with cheap fakes before being caught out yet again and charged with grand larceny totaling $50,000.

A film about Hogue’s remarkable life of crime, entitled Con Man, was released in 2003. Still, Hogue has continued to run into trouble with the law. In 2005 it was discovered that his Colorado home contained 7,000 stolen items, worth over $100,000, thieved from nearby homes where he had worked as a remodeler and repairman.

7. Juan Carlos Guzmán-Betancourt (1976 – )

Image Source

Juan Carlos Guzmán-Betancourt is a smooth-talking Colombian trickster who has made a career out of conning the wealthy, using his charm, an extensive list of aliases, stolen identities and credit card fraud in order to live a high life of expensive hotels and international travel.

Guzmán-Betancourt first set sail for the US in 1993, arriving in Miami under the guise of being a young teenage orphan named Guillermo Rosales. He was promptly admitted and placed with an American family but deported a month later after an investigation.

Still, undeterred, he came back to the US again and again between 1993 and 1997. He also traveled to the UK, where he was arrested in 1998 after a number of hotel burglaries, but managed to skip bail.

His standard routine has involved the impersonation of wealthy hotel guests. Guzmán-Betancourt would then convince hotel staff that he had lost his keys or security codes and steal cash and valuables from the rooms.

6. Eduardo de Valfierno (Unknown)

Image Source

Police photograph of Vincenzo Peruggia, 1909

The mysterious Eduardo de Valfierno was an Argentine crook who allegedly masterminded the snatching of the Mona Lisa from the Louvre in 1911. The conman, who posed as a marquis, developed an elaborate plot for the Louvre heist, which began with him paying French art restorer Yves Chaudron to make six fakes of the renowned painting. As the story goes, Valfierno then paid a group of men, including Louvre employee Vincenzo Peruggia, to steal the coveted work of art.

Peruggia successfully stole the painting on August 21, 1911, hiding it beneath his coat and escaping quietly. Valfierno then shipped the forgeries to several buyers, knowing the disappearance of the original would be enough to fool them.

Peruggia was eventually caught naively trying to sell the original painting two years later, and he denied knowing Valfierno, except for a one-off meeting at the Louvre. The Mona Lisa was returned to its rightful home in the Louvre in 1913. Valfierno, however, was never captured, and not too much is known about the shady Argentinean’s early or later life – all of which adds to his mystique and legend as a conman.

5. Frank William Abagnale Jr. (1948 – )

Image Source

With a bestselling book, a musical and a Steven Spielberg film all about his life, Frank Abagnale Jr. is without doubt one of the most famous con men of all time.

The New Yorker started his career as a confidence trickster at a young age, and from the ages of 16 to 21 he made conning, impersonating, stealing and escaping into an art form.

One of Abagnale Jr.’s first victims was his own father, whom the young con man cost several thousand dollars in a scam devised to fund his dates with women. Frank made a deal with gas station attendants whereby he “bought” tires, batteries and other items on the credit card given to him by his father, receiving cash from them in return.

Soon after, Abagnale Jr. impersonated an airline pilot, a college professor, a pediatrician and an attorney, and he successfully cashed $2.5m in fraudulent checks in every US state and 26 countries. Though he got caught out and served time in US, French and Swedish prisons, Abagnale Jr. was so good at what he did that the US government decided the only way to stop him was to employ him.

So, Abagnale Jr. turned away from a life of crime to work for the good guys. For over 35 years, the now 64-year-old ex-con man has worked for the likes of the FBI, combating fraud and embezzlement. In fact, over 14,000 financial institutions, corporations and law enforcement agencies have made use of his prevention programs.

4. Konrad Kujau (1938 – 2000)

Image Source

German-born con man Konrad Kujau achieved worldwide notoriety in 1983, following his prominent role in the “Hitler Diaries” scandal. Kujau, who was an avid collector of Nazi paraphernalia, was found to have completely forged the 62 volumes of diaries allegedly written by Nazi leader Adolf Hitler between 1933 and 1945 and found in an East German hayloft.

Nevertheless, Kujau’s handiwork – which included tea staining the pages as well as painstakingly copying the Fuhrer’s writing style – managed to fool a lot of people for a while. And it also earned Kujau a lot of money.

Under the direction of investigative journalist Gerd Heidemann (who was later arrested with Kujau for his role in the scandal), the German magazine Stern paid over nine million Deutsche Marks for the forged diaries. The diaries were also purchased by English newspaper The Sunday Times, after being initially authenticated by prominent Hitler historian Hugh Trevor-Roper.

Kujau’s other cons involved selling forgeries of Hitler paintings, a handwritten version of Hitler’s Mein Kampf that he claimed was the original manuscript, and even a pistol he said was the exact gun Hitler had used to kill himself.

Kujau spent three years of his four-and-a-half-year sentence in jail for his crimes, becoming a minor celebrity in his homeland and appearing on television. He passed away on September 12, 2000, aged 62.

3. Charles Ponzi (1882 – 1949)

Image Source

Charles Ponzi is such a renowned con man that there’s even a deceitful financial scheme named in his honor; the Ponzi scheme.

The smartly dressed Italian immigrant’s most famous scam is the pyramid investment scheme he started in Boston in the early 1920s. Ponzi enticed investors with promises of massive returns on international reply coupons he had bought cheaply. These coupons could be purchased in one country and then redeemed in another for postage stamps, generating a significant profit on the difference in price between the two countries.

Ponzi quickly became a millionaire, raking in an estimated $15million in just eight months. His great con grew in size, and he used new investor cash to pay off other previous investors. However, investigators soon became suspicious of this self-made millionaire, and Ponzi eventually surrendered to the authorities – but not before half a dozen banks had crumbled and thousands of investors had lost their money.

In 1925, Ponzi headed for Florida to raise money selling swampland under the name Charpon Land Syndicate. Re-arrested, he posted bail and headed to Tampa before finally being captured in New Orleans. He was released from prison in 1934 and ended up back in Italy. Later, he worked for an Italian airline in Brazil and as a translator.

Ponzi’s eyesight then began to fail, and a major stroke in early 1948 left him partially paralyzed. He died in Rio de Janeiro on January 18, 1949, aged 66.

2. Bernard Lawrence “Bernie” Madoff (1938 – )

Image Source

Bernard Madoff should need little introduction. The former non-executive chairman of the NASDAQ stock market was found guilty of masterminding the biggest Ponzi scheme in US financial history. Madoff pocketed billions of dollars of investors’ money through his fraudulent firm, Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC.

Madoff claimed to have begun his scheme in the early 1990s, but investigators have suggested that the scam went back as far as the 1970s. Madoff was finally caught out on December 11, 2008. He pleaded guilty to 11 counts of fraud in March 2009 and was sentenced to 150 years (the maximum sentence) in June of the same year.

Madoff is currently incarcerated in the Federal Correctional Institution Butner Medium, near Butner, North Carolina. Since his imprisonment, he is reported to have suffered ill health, including hypertension, and there have been reports of altercations with other prisoners. One of his sons, Mark, sadly committed suicide on December 11, 2010, exactly two years on from his father’s arrest. His suicide was thought to be largely due to his massive debts.

With Madoff now in his seventies, it’s probably safe to assume that this giant of the world of financial fraud will never fully serve his lengthy sentence.

1. Ferdinand Waldo Demara, Jr. (1921 – 1982)

Image Source

World-renowned as “the Great Impostor” (thanks largely to the movie about his life starring Tony Curtis), Ferdinand Waldo Demara Jr. was the original master of disguise.

A stealer of people’s identities, Demara Jr.’s impersonations included a monk, a surgeon, a lawyer, a civil engineer and a prison warden. And he casually described his motivation for doing all of this as “rascality, pure rascality.”

Demara first ran away from home at the age of 16 to join Cistercian monks in Rhode Island, where he stayed for several years before joining the U.S. Army in 1941. He went AWOL from the army in 1942 before joining two monasteries and the U.S. Navy. Then, after faking his own suicide (because he couldn’t get the position he wanted), he was eventually caught out and imprisoned for 18 months for desertion.

Ironically, many of Demara’s unsuspecting bosses would likely have been satisfied with him as an employee, as the skilled impostor was believed to possess a photographic memory and an extraordinary IQ. He was apparently able to memorize necessary information and techniques from textbooks with relative ease.

Demara’s most infamous impersonation was that of a doctor during the Korean War. While on-board a Royal Canadian Navy Destroyer during the conflict, he successfully saved the lives of several soldiers injured in battle – including one requiring major chest surgery. He did so by delving into his medical textbook and using his photographic memory and undoubted intelligence. But this would prove to be his undoing, as news quickly spread of his heroics and the resulting media attention eventually unmasked him as a faker.

Bonus: George C. Parker (1870 – 1936)

Image Source

If anyone loved seeing travelers arrive in New York City in the late 19th and early 20th century, it was fearless con man George C. Parker. That’s because Parker preyed on gullible tourists, making a living out of conning them through the false sale of NYC public landmarks for big money. The epic swindler successfully “sold” the likes of the Statue of Liberty, Madison Square Garden and The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Parker also made a habit of selling the Brooklyn Bridge (reportedly twice a week for 30 years), persuading naive buyers that they could make a killing by controlling the iconic suspension bridge. Police even had to stop many of the swindled tourists who thought they had purchased the bridge from erecting toll barriers to profit from their purchase.

Parker was convicted of fraud on three occasions and died in prison in 1936. Parker’s exploits have become so infamous that they have since passed into popular culture, with the phrase “and if you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you” becoming a popular way of identifying a gullible person.