The Disgrace of Karen “Supertrader” Bruton (Part 1)

Over the years, I’ve seen some of my greatest personal heroes fall prey to greed. Barry Bonds and Lance Armstrong are two who were eventually found to be using performance enhancing drugs to cheat sport and gain edge on all competitors. In the process, they also lied to the public with skill that would make a psychopath proud. Much of this is common in the world of fraud, chicanery, and the CNBC television show American Greed—all of which have made frequent appearances in this blog.

In September 2018, Hope Advisors Inc.—the financing arm of a Tennessee nonprofit that promoted economic development in third-world countries—settled fraud charges with the with the Securities and Exchange Commission for $1.5M. You may be more familiar with the name of Hope Advisors owner Karen Bruton. I blogged about this in 2016 with a three-part mini-series starting here.

The current blog mini-series was drafted in August 2016 but never completed. In Part 2 of the current mini-series, I will present a transcript of clips from the video referenced in Part 3. The video has since been taken down—presumably after Bruton’s fraud was discovered. The video featured several people speaking to a “Distinguished Alumni” award given to Bruton from Wake Forest University in 2014.