Self Made Millionaire Lied to Yahoo Finance

tay

Hall of Fame Member
May 20, 2012
11,548
1
36
27-year-old "self made millionaire" admits that his wealth was actually inherited from his parents




We came across Ivanov’s story first in an article he wrote for a well-regarded personal finance blog. He had written a couple of other guest posts on other blogs, but no major publication had covered him before. We decided to reach out to him for an interview. Our reasons were simple: his was the kind of story that we love to hear and yet so rarely get the chance to tell. He appeared to be a young person who got his finances together at an early age and built his wealth based on a set of basic principles that any financial expert would support — discipline, hard work, budgeting, goal-setting, and low-cost mutual fund investing. On top of that, through his blog, was to help others follow in his footsteps. We wanted to highlight the story behind his accomplishments, especially at a time when millennials are so often criticized for their financial shortcomings.


In several phone conversations with Ivanov, including a string of follow-up emails, he revealed in great detail how he managed to achieve $1 million in net worth in a little over a decade — from details of his investment allocations right down to his favorite personal finance books. He claimed that he began saving at age 16 and opened an IRA at age 18 with $10,000. When he later joined the U.S. Navy, he said he socked away 60% of his income, which he split between his retirement fund and discount brokerage account. He supplemented his income by earning $20,000 per year from freelance web design gigs he took on the side, he said. He had no debt because he did not go to college, he said. His knew his parents couldn’t afford it, so he decided to take advantage of free education offered by the Navy.


Many readers raised eyebrows at how Ivanov was able to save more than $400,000 over the course of 10 years by investing only in index funds. We should have asked an investment expert for their opinion on whether this was possible. We also could have asked to see financial statements that proved he had built his wealth on his own. We didn't.


Two weeks after the story was published, a former Navy colleague of Ivanov’s, who asked to remain anonymous, sent us a copy of a confession Ivanov posted on Facebook on Nov. 12. In his confession, Ivanov said he lied to Yahoo Finance about the source of his wealth. In the post, he said he “got tired of telling people lies” and he thought it was the “right thing to do.”


On Monday, Ivanov admitted to Yahoo Finance that 75%-80% of his wealth consists of an inheritance that was left to him by his parents, who died several years ago. He would not specify the exact dollar amount nor the year his parents died. But he also said that one of the two properties he owns, which he said is valued at more than $600,000, is also part of that inheritance.





We are still unable to verify Anton’s claims about his inheritance, but the premise of his blog and our profile of him were based largely on a fabrication.


It wasn’t until we confronted him about his Facebook confession that he revealed that he received kickbacks from financial service companies for referrals sent from his website. These commissions ranged from $10 to $75 each time someone signed up for their services from a link posted on Ivanov's site, although he would not give other details about them or tell us how much he earned from traffic generated by Yahoo’s story.


Yahoo Finance regrets this grave error in reporting and will take steps to ensure it does not happen again.




http://finance.yahoo.com/news/anton-ivanov-millionaire-story-truth-210757837.html