If you responded to an investment idea like this . . .
          You could get scammed!

A patent can be a difficult asset to assign an accurate value to even for a legitimate business

Patenters.Com does not exist. The company is a complete fabrication, posted to alert investors to potential online frauds brought to you by the Securities and Exchange Commission, the North American Securities Administrators Association, and the Federal Trade Commission.

Before investing in any opportunity, it is important to confirm that a company is genuine and its claims are legitimate. In general, the federal securities laws require all but the smallest public companies to file reports with the SEC. If you can't find any current financial filings for a company, you'll want to be very skeptical of its claims. For more information, please read our publication Information Matters.

Patenters.Com boasts that it has some pretty remarkable patents. Any one of those patents, if they existed, would have the potential to make the company a lot of money. When you have a patent number, it is easy to visit the website of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, and look up the patent to make sure that the patent exists and that the company actually holds the patent. This will give you the first indication as to whether the company's claims of holding a patent are legitimate. If you look up the patents that Patenters.Com claims to hold, you'll quickly discover that they don't exist.

It can be difficult to assign an accurate value to a patent even for a legitimate business, which Patenters.Com isn't, of course. This makes it easy for a less than reputable business to give a patent an inflated value, hoping that the valuation will not be challenged. That's why it's a good idea to carefully check out any company where patents are the main or sole asset.

If a company does not have many assets, yet anticipates earning high profits, you'll want to be especially skeptical. Before investing, you'll want to find some independent confirmation that the company is capable of performing as claimed. It is best not to rely solely on the company's representations, or on information you read on bulletin boards and chat room discussions. And always check to find out if the people behind the company have any history of disciplinary actions, or any history at all!

Always remember, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

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