Tino De Angelis was a New York-based commodities trader who bought and sold vegetable oil futures around the world. In 1962 he started a huge scam, attempting to corner the market for soybean oil, used in salad dressing. In the aftermath of the Great Salad Oil Swindle, investors (51 banks) learned that he had bilked them out of about $175 million in total ($1.2 billion in year 2000 dollars). The scam is named after Angelis company Allied Crude Vegetable Oil Refining Corporation. State nickname: Empire State Other U.S. States Capital Albany Largest city New York Governor George Pataki (R) Official languages None (English is de facto) Area 141,205 km² (27th)  - Land 122,409 km²  - Water 18,795 km² (13. ... A vegetable oil or vegoil is an oil extracted from oilseeds or another plant source. ... A confidence trick, confidence game, or con for short, (also known as a scam) is an attempt to intentionally mislead a person or persons (known as the mark) usually with the goal of financial or other gain. ... In business, cornering the market is an illegal attempt to buy up enough of a particular commodity to allow the price to be manipulated. ... Binomial name Glycine max Soybeans (US) or Soya beans (UK) (Glycine max) are a high-protein legume (family Fabaceae) grown as food for both humans and livestock. ... —Cleopatra, in Shakespeares Antony and Cleopatra, 1606 A salad is a food item generally served either prior to or after the main dish as a separate course, as a main course in itself, or as a side dish accompanying the main dish. ...

Tino De Angelis grew up in the Bronx, the son of Italian immigrants. He worked in a meat and fish market, and while still a teenager was soon managing some 200 employees. Bitten by greed, he soon found that the new school lunch program would buy practically anything, and started a business selling spoiled meat to them at fixed prices. Next he started another business shipping massive quantities of substandard shortening and other vegetable oil products to Europe, whose infrastructure was still struggling in the aftermath of World War II. De Angelis slowly became a major player in the commodities markets, both in what was then a brisk trade in vegetable oil and vegetable oil futures, as well as cotton and soybeans. Shortening is a fat used in food preparation, especially baked goods, and is so called because it inhibits the formation of long gluten strands in wheat-based doughs, giving them a short texture (as in shortbread). ... A vegetable oil or vegoil is an oil extracted from oilseeds or another plant source. ... Mushroom cloud from the nuclear explosion over Nagasaki rising 18 km (over 11 miles) into the air, August 9, 1945 after the Allied atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. ...

Starting in 1962, De Angelis decided that his network was strong enough that he could make a serious attempt to corner the market on soybean oil. He rented a huge tank farm in New Jersey, and started to buy oil to store in the tanks. On the basis of this huge value of stored oil, he took out massive loans from various Wall Street banks, and used the cash to buy all of the futures on the oil. This way he would not only own a large quantity of soon-to-be expensive oil, but also cheap futures that would soon be worth a considerable value when the prices went up. State nickname: The Garden State Other U.S. States Capital Trenton Largest city Newark Governor Richard Codey (D) Official languages None defined Area 22,608 km² (47th)  - Land 19,231 km²  - Water 3,378 km² (14. ... View up Wall Street from Pearl Street Wall Street is the name of a narrow thoroughfare in lower Manhattan running east from Broadway downhill to the East River. ... The essential function of a bank is to provide services related to the storing of deposits and the extending of credit. ...

In fact, he wasn't actually buying any oil at all. The tanks were increasingly filled with water, with a small, and constant, amount of oil floating on top. When inspectors visited and dipped the tanks, they found the oil and everything seemed fine. The loans, or warehouse receipts, were mostly acquired from a subsidiary of American Express. Amex, in turn, sold the warehouse receipts, thus "guaranteeing" that the oil was really in the tankers. Eventually something tipped off the inspectors, likely his massive buying of futures in the product he was preparing to sell, and they returned and found the water. American Express (NYSE: AXP) is a diversified global financial services company headquartered in the United States. ...

The result was a massive crash of the futures market, wiping out in minutes the entire value of the loans. On November 19, 1963, De Angelis's Allied Crude Vegetable Oil Refining Corp. filed for bankruptcy, at which point investors learned hundreds of millions were unaccounted for. The brokerages who handled De Angelis's futures trades were now tainted, and the next day the NYSE, worried about potential SEC involvement, suspended Williston and Beane and Ira Haupt and Co. from trading. Word started spreading as traders investigated the suspension, and desperately tried to get their holdings out of the companies. The entire debacle was overshadowed by the assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy on the 22nd. November 19 is the 323rd day of the year (324th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 1963 was a common year starting on Tuesday (link will take you to calendar). ... Bankruptcy is a legally declared inability or impairment of ability of an individual or organization to pay their creditors. ... New York Stock Exchange (June 2003) The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) is one of the largest stock exchanges in the world. ... SEC is a TLA which can refer to: In general context, an abbreviation for second. ... Jack Ruby murdered the alleged assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, in a very public manner. ... Order: 35th President Vice President: Lyndon B. Johnson Term of office: January 20, 1961 – November 22, 1963 Preceded by: Dwight D. Eisenhower Succeeded by: Lyndon B. Johnson Date of birth: May 29, 1917 Place of birth: Brookline, Massachusetts Date of death: November 22, 1963 Place of death: Dallas, Texas First... November 22 is the 326th day (327th on leap years) of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ...

Eventually the problem worked itself out, and Amex was forced to take a massive loss when they made good on their warehouse contracts. The two trading firms were eventually snapped up by larger players, and De Angelis ended up with a seven year jail term.

De Angelis was released and soon involved in another scam in order to rise back to the top, this time a Ponzi scheme involving Midwest cattle. This attempt collapsed before it really got started. A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation that involves paying returns to investors out of the money raised from subsequent investors, rather than from profits generated by any real business. ...

The swindle was documented in detail by Norman C. Miller in The Great Salad Oil Swindle (Baltimore, MD: Penguin Books, 1965). The book is based on Miller's coverage of the story in the Wall Street Journal which won a Pulitzer Prize in 1964. The Great Salad Oil Swindle (Baltimore, MD: Penguin Books, 1965) is a book by Wall Street Journal reporter Norman C. Miller about Tino De Angelis, a New York-based commodities trader who bought and sold vegetable oil futures around the world. ... The Wall Street Journal is an influential international daily newspaper published in New York City, New York with an average daily circulation of 1,800,607 (2002). ...