Okay so I guess Im finally forced to make this post. Unwillingly - But I feel like its the right thing to do to protect others in the community. If you are too lazy to read the whole story, just make sure you never lend money or let these guys play at your games:

Christophe Grenouilloux
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php...7122&ref=br_rs

Antho CM
https://www.facebook.com/GUS.IVEY

All Ive asked these guys to do is to send me a plan when they will payback even if it was 100usd per month. But now that both of them have ignored my messages for almost a year, there is no more excuses left.
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The Story - trying to keep it short

Last year I started staking Chris whom I had known for a few years, but only met him once irl when we played some APT events in Jeju, Korea back in 2013.
We used to chat online a bit every now and then and he told me how he was busto and needed a stake. I gave him 2k usd to play mtts for a year and we were suppose to split profits 50:50 and I was also going to get my 2k back in the end of the year as well. (I have the deal in full details saved on my comp.) I also offered to help him to improve with his game but that wasnt part of the deal. I also felt confident that he is going to beat at least 10-20d games.

I trusted him since we had mutual friends and known each other for so long. Nobody had told anything bad about him either. (Which is part of the reason I now wanna warn others.) Later last Summer he introduced me to this guy Antho CM - whom I never met irl and was another busto French grinder living in Thailand(alarm bells??? ) that he vouched for to be good in PLO and needing a stake to get back on his feet. I told Antho to send me his HM2 stats which seemed alright so we agreed that he will start from small stakes with 1.5k bankroll. Playing PLO 50 and if he was to go on a downswing drop to PLO 25 at 1k.

He ended up losing that 500 but he told me he didnt wanna drop stakes. I told him he has to. A while later he told me had busted it all.(I have no idea playing what.) But he told me he will payback the 1.5k usd in full. I told him just 1k is enough since losing that first 500 was according to our deal suppose to be my loss. He told me he couldnt payback yet coz he was busto so I told him not to worry til end of the year. Well in December he told he was still busto so I told him he can pay me 100 per month for the next 10 months. We agreed on that. Until this date I didnt receive a single penny. That was also the last message from him.

Chris started the stake by doing well and ran it up to at least 5k. Then he went on a downer and the next thing I know he doesnt reply to messages. This was around same time as Antho was losing. Im not sure where the balance was exactly at this time but if he followed our BRM agreements it shoulda been impossible for a winning player to ever go busto. A bit before him disappearing he told me he moved back to France, but I currently have no idea about his whereabouts.
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I know the sums arent that big, but who knows how many other people these guys owe. Also I have no idea whats the relationship between these 2 guys is like, scamming buddies? I also have no idea where they are located at the moment. What I do know however is that staking these guys was poor judgement from my end. I been staking and buying pieces from around a dozen people and now I been scammed a total of 3 times... My scam-o-detectors must be really off. At least this time I have contracts and chat logs saved on my computer, maybe in theory I could use those in the future to sue these guys? Not sure in which country though. Any advice on the situation and info on these guys will be appreaciated.

The main goal of this post is to prevent others from getting scammed in the future!

No problem dude, you just gotta have faith that the money will come back.

Btw I am busto online roulette player and need a stake, are you interested? I will pay you back one million percent for sure!

GL

Was hoping it was a bit more of a sophisticated scam, involving marked cards or hidden camera's and maybe some free drugs/ladies over a prolonged time to earn your trust first.

Main advice would be, don't just go around staking people to be nice or to want to be liked.
If your not professional about it and planning on building a big stable don't even bother, unless its like your best friend ever you want to help out and 100% trust.

It seems to me there was no reason to really trust and stake these guys in the first place.

Anyway thanks for outing, Iv seen Chris in Chiang Mai before, and who knows this post might be helpful warning.

You stake someone for 50PLO, you don't ask them to move down to earn back losses, its a stake.
You stake someone and they lose, you don't ask for your money back! its not a loan.

Never ever deal with the current frenchies in Thailand, most of them are selling grass as weed to live in 100$/m apts.

OMFG, how can you be so stupid...

He's been famous for years for being a huge scammer. He owes dozens of thousands of euros/$$$.

You should be more careful about who you stake because you could have avoided it easily.

Let's have a look at some of those scams:
- french stakings
- foreigners stakings
- cambodia staking
- thailand mafia staking (that's why he had to leave thailand if i am right, at some point)
- several other stories

This guy is plague.... Everybody knows that in Chiang Mai

Lolwut? No, of course within the stake there can be set agreements about moving down if you get into a certain amount of make up.

Yes if you stake someone and they lose, you don't ask for the money back, but if they break the agreements of the stake then they should be liable, by your logic someone staked for 10plo could just decide to shot 200plo because hey, he's staked right? Dm if he loses.

Yea probs correct here


Gl op

100% Agree with you guys that hero misplayed his hand here - TWICE.

What comes to staking in general Ive done it with similar terms succesfully but if the odds of getting scammed are around 30%(Small sample size obv) thats gonna eat your profits. Its pretty hard to do staking in larger scale and know everybody well unless thats your main focus/job. Which is the reason Ive given up on staking nowadays. (Doesnt seem to be my area of expertise lol)

EXACTLY the reason why I made this post. So others wouldnt fall for similar scams. So please let us know if you know of other similar cases.
It pisses me off that only after getting scammed 2 of our mutual friends told me that Chris cant be trusted. And he actually owed the other mutual friend money as well :O I wish there was a topic of him and guys like him on 2p2 earlier.


What comes to Antho tho, he actually sent me a message today for the first time this year so at least posting here had some effect. He wanted to say that scamming me wasnt his intention and that he will eventually payback... We will see about that, guess my odds are now slightly better? I will post here if that actually happens.

OP Hope you get your money back but agree as So Many players are scammers etc and owe money why havnt or is their A site you can check for this to be known BEFORE any one lends.

Lots of luck to all the big shots here who say they would break body parts shoot kneecaps etc. *** if a guy can run around in Thailand and Cambodia ripping off People and Businesses what ***** chance is there really. And then we have LEON.

You can't really trust anyone 100% and even your best friend(s) can easily be left behind if there's enough profit in doing so... and money is one of the best incentives in the world :P

So, loaning/staking to friends is a good way to lose them.

Thought that this is kind of common knowledge by now but just wanted to let those that don't already know this.. know.
Keep friends and business seperated

Christoph is somewhat well known in the Cambodia poker scene too, especially in Sihanoukville.. Played with him a ton at Queenco, Lion City and Fortuna casino... A mutual friend of me and Chris (another known scammer, AJ Brock) owed me a little money and gave it to Chris to give to me as he was just about to go to Lion City casino where I was playing... Chris never turned up and I haven't heard from him since, this was well over a year ago... Pretty sure there were some posts in the Cambo thread about him... I'm definitely not the only one in Sihanoukville/Cambodia that he owes money to...

Curious to know who 'Antho' is... The name doesn't ring a bell and it looks like his facebook has been deleted.

Nothing on Google... 2+2 only has this thread... why not warn people if he's so famous

I met both guys. Chris is a well known scammer in the French poker player community, he has scammed over 100k USD in total over many staking on French forums.
I believe Antho still live in Chiang Mai, Thailand but I could be wrong, if I remember well I've seen him a couple months ago in a bar there.
Both are **** persons and to avoid at all cost ...

Thanks for the info OP. I live in Thailand. I think you can kiss your money good bye, as you are well aware, but thanks for taking the time to warn others.

Good work OP

How is it good, how good is it? Have the opportunity to consider going once.

He's a famous scammer yet if you google his name or search 2p2 there's nothing about him. How was OP supposed to know he's a scammer ?

OP that sucks. Don't listen to the people blaming you. Yes you should be more careful and use this as a not too expensive lesson for the future, but it's not like you could have known this guy was "a famous scammer"

In the future, when staking, only send the minimum required for them to play games, if they lose 10bi or whatever, reload them (and ask for HH's etc...). Also get them to send profits ASAP.

Like someone said here, unless you're planning to stake people as a general business, it's best to avoid doing it, and if you do, you really need receipts about everything, not just HM2 results. It sounds like you were a bit loose with your criteria on staking people. Live and learn.

Wow, that's a lot of money. Why didn't anyone report him to the police or lawsuit or something?

some news?

None unfortunately. Antho did not get back to me since the last messag.
And I have yet to hear from Chris. I forgot to mention earlier that I know her sisters address in France. Tried reaching her but no dice there.