Short answer: yes. The Federal Trade Commission shut MOBE down in June 2018, a federal court froze its assets, and the court-appointed receiver concluded the business could not be operated legally. This post is the full story — what MOBE was, how it collapsed, and what happened to the money — compiled from my original reporting as the case unfolded.

What Was MOBE?

MOBE (“My Online Business Education”) sold itself as a business education program run by founder Matt Lloyd. The pitch was simple: a “proven” 21-step system for making money online. Entry cost just $49 — but that was the top of a very expensive funnel. Members were pushed toward escalating “license rights” packages starting at $2,497 and climbing into the tens of thousands of dollars, each sold with the promise of bigger commissions and faster returns.

The model looked attractive for the same reasons every online business opportunity does: work from home, no storefront, no inventory. But the income came almost entirely from recruiting other people into the same expensive packages — not from any real product or service.

June 2018: The FTC Steps In

In June 2018 the FTC filed suit against MOBE Ltd, Matt Lloyd, and related entities, alleging the operation had taken more than $125 million from consumers. All MOBE websites were seized and business was halted overnight. Affiliates initially protested and hoped for a quick resolution at the June 26th hearing — it never came. From the FTC’s complaint:

“Once consumers are lured into joining the program for a modest entry fee of $49, Defendants apply a series of high-pressure tactics to induce consumers to buy their various membership level packages – starting at $2,497 and progressively becoming more expensive – with the false promise that consumers will reap substantial returns on these ‘investments.’”

The Shutdown Was Permanent

The court-appointed receiver, Mark Bernet, investigated whether MOBE could be reformed and operated legally. His conclusion: it could not. MOBE was completely and permanently shut down. His investigation confirmed the core allegation — virtually all of the consumers he communicated with never earned back what they paid for their MOBE memberships.

Following the Money: The $6.3 Million Reserve Raid

One of the more dramatic chapters was the fight over MOBE’s payment processing reserves. Payment processor Qualpay Inc. and Synovus Bank held over $6.3 million in MOBE reserve accounts and argued their merchant agreements let them keep it. Judge Dalton disagreed: the money belonged to MOBE, so it belonged to the receivership. The companies were ordered to turn over $6,314,342.09 by August 16, 2018. All told, the receiver recovered more than $14.3 million in the early phase of the case, with additional lawsuits against third parties on the table.

Did MOBE Victims Get Refunds?

Eventually, yes — through the FTC, not through any “claims service.” In 2020 the FTC began returning money to MOBE victims, ultimately distributing more than $23 million in refunds. Two lessons from that process are still worth repeating:

• Real refunds never require an upfront request or fee. After the shutdown, scammers targeted MOBE victims a second time with fake “refund processing” offers. The FTC identified eligible customers from MOBE’s own database.
• Report, don’t wait. Filing a complaint at ftc.gov/complaint is what builds these cases and gets people paid.

How to Spot the Next MOBE

MOBE wasn’t the first program of its kind and it won’t be the last. The warning signs are consistent:

• Income claims based on selling the same opportunity to others, rather than a real product or customer
• A cheap entry point that funnels into “levels” costing thousands
• Pressure to upgrade before you’ve earned anything
• Testimonials about lifestyle instead of verifiable business results

A legitimate business education program makes its money teaching skills that work whether or not you ever buy another thing from them.

Building Something Real Instead

If the reason you looked at MOBE in the first place was to build income on your own terms, the honest path is a real business with real customers — and capital when you need it. If you own a business and need working capital, equipment financing, or funding to grow, start at Funding-Advisor.com and I’ll tell you straight what you qualify for.

Related Reading

• Mobe Closed and Under Investigation
• Is MOBE Closed? Look at the Signs!
• MOBE Closed Down by FTC – To be Contined

Sign #1 – MOBE’s Official Website Is Not Working

You can’t go to mobe.com anymore and all their major domains are also down. All of Matt Llyod’s personal sites are also down, namely mattlloydsblog.com and askmattlloyd.com.
Their official MOBE Facebook page hasn’t had any posts on it since June 7, 2018, and they usually post something daily. In their latest post, someone commented and asked if mobe.com is down and MOBE responded saying “Yes it’s down – tech is working on it.” To have their entire company suite of products down for 3 days is highly suspicious. This could result in millions of dollars in revenue being lost. Let not forget the members of MOBE that are sending traffic or need support. This is a major sign that MOBE is Closed.

Sign #2 Top Earners Michael Williams and Michael Giannulis Left MOBE 2 Days Ago

Michael Williams and Michael Giannulis just celebrated with Matt Llyod last month on the millions they have earned from the MOBE program.

Then 2 days ago, these two sent their downline this message that was found by behindmlm.com:

This is a bitter sweet moment for BPO that we must inform you of. As of now, we are no longer affiliated with MOBE at all.

As we move forward onto bigger and better things we want to let you know where we are with MOBE.

Any members that you were working with to sell them MOBE must stop immediately.

This also means that any sales that we have made that are not paid will have to stay that way.

The FTC has brought the hammer down upon MOBE and we have to cut ties with them 100%.

If we do not we could also find ourselves stuck in a sticky situation.

We know the loss of sales hurts, it hurts all of us as a whole, but we know that BPO is going in a great direction and is making this move to protect us.

Thank you for your understand in this moment and thank you for making BPO great.

When top earners are leaving like this it is a good indicator that trouble is on the rise. Contrary to that John Chow revealed his MOBE Income last week so this tells you that what has happened to the company was sudden and unexpected occurrence for the company to go dark in a matter of days. As of June 11th 2018, the video is no longer available so I think this is an indicator that things are really going south.

As of June 11th, 2018, John Chow is now promoting Click Funnels as his next Online Business Program. This is a huge shift in the Online Business Arena. Stay tuned I will continue to update this blog as stories developed.

Sign #3 – All MOBE Events Cancelled

There was a Home Business Summit event scheduled for June 8 – 10, 2018 that was abruptly canceled. These are events that come with the digital marketing packages that you buy into so these events would not be canceled so hastily unless it was for major reasons like being shut down! Some other partners of MOBE have canceled all cross-promotion programs as well.

What’s Next?

Hopefully, you are not involved with My Online Business Empire (MOBE) but if you are it’s not the end of the world. It’s just a hard time to believe in the system. Things like this are common in big business because laws are different in each country and that’s where things can get tricky. At one point in time, Herbalife was under investigation for several years and could not operate in certain countries. Most people believed they were operating unethically. Their stock market value tanked during this time and once they were clear the stock regained its value.

Control Your Online Business

When you join a high ticket program such as MOBE where everything is done-for-you its a blessing but the curse is that a lot of things are out of your control. You can’t control the hosting, the website, the traffic, the company, their practices and so many other variables. So my advice would be to put some processes in place where you have some control over your business where you can control the website, control the traffic and choose the processes for which your business will operate.  You can do this by starting your own online business empire, and it’s not as hard as you would think.  You can use my Affiliate Business Toolkit to get started. The information is free and if you would like to copy the program there are some associated dues.

Another route you can take is becoming an affiliate for independent companies such as Amazon, Clickbank, JVZoo, BookVip,  Advertising Bait, ClickFunnels, and just about any online company you can think of. For most companies that manage their own affiliate programs, you can scroll to the bottom of the page and sign up. Other may have exclusive programs with preferred advertisers. Bottom line is that they are out there and available as an option for you when building your online business. If you are new to the online business then I recommend you take the Affiliate marketing Bootcamp to learn the in’s and out’s of online business and affiliate marketing.  Lastly, as message below suggest you can innovate out of any situation.