ASX Wolf faces bankruptcy threat over $450,000 in court costs
Key Points
- ASIC has gone to federal court over debts owed by Tyson “ASX Wolf” Scholz.
- Scholz was ordered earlier this year to pay almost $450K in legal costs.
- Scholz posts online about a lifestyle of trading, fast cars and private jets.
Globe-trotting sharemarket influencer Tyson “ASX Wolf” Scholz is being threatened with bankruptcy over a $450,000 debt to the corporate regulator.
Only two months after Mr Scholz posted from France images of himself being served a glass of Bollinger champagne on a private jet, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission has filed a creditor’s petition against him.
The picture Tyson Scholz posted in August.
ASIC confirmed the action related to an earlier order that Mr Scholz pay the regulator’s court expenses of $456,296.64 for a lawsuit it successfully filed against him in December 2021.
No money had yet been paid, ASIC said.
The Federal Court bankruptcy action marks the latest in the financial turmoil for Mr Scholz, who has used the moniker “ASX Wolf” and has 118,000 followers on Instagram where he uploads images of Ferraris or himself with a laptop on a private jet with the hashtag #tradingstocks.
Also in August, he posted images of himself riding an off-road motorcycle in Dubai, saying he was “using the desert as a metaphor for trial, challenge and preparation”.
In December last year, the 38-year-old Gold Coast native was found to have been operating a financial services business without a required licence, something he had denied.
Evidence in that civil litigation showed Mr Scholz had posted on Instagram about micro-cap stocks – companies with small market capitalisations whose share price could fluctuate wildly. He would also post images of champagne, expensive cars with licence plates such as “ASX Bull” and costly boats.
These posts were free, but he also promoted $500 online training sessions that he said were designed to show people how to trade. Another business he promoted was a $1000-a-year subscription to his private “Black Wolf Pit” chat channel on Discord.
Justice Kylie Downes ruled that the ventures had interacted with each other and “had many features of a commercial enterprise, and constituted a business”.
A permanent injunction in April barred him from hosting online groups for which a membership fee could be charged and in which messages were exchanged by members about share trades without a financial services licence. In June, a court determined that he owed ASIC the $456,296.64 in costs.
Mr Scholz’s Instagram page now links to a site called Infinity Trading Academy of which he is the chief executive, although the company business name does not appear to be registered in Australia.
Attempts to obtain comment from Mr Scholz were unsuccessful. He is yet to file a defence in the bankruptcy case,
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