Boiler room raised $74 million selling retirees SpaceX, Anduril, Anthropic, and Perplexity while reaping ‘massive hidden fees,’ SEC claims

A Long Island firm allegedly built a slick sales machine around some of the hottest names in private tech. More than 100 agents cold-called thousands of people and pitched shares in SpaceX, Anduril, Anthropic, and Perplexity, while telling them there were no hidden fees, according to the SEC.

The firm at the center was The Spaventa Group, founded by Andrew Spaventa in 2020. The SEC says more than 800 investors bought in, most of them retail customers, with more than 650 putting in $100,000 or less. More than 100 were retirees. Over four and a half years, from December 2020 through June 2025, the 11 private funds involved took in more than $74 million.

The complaint says the pricing was the real trick. Investors allegedly paid an average of 46% more than Spaventa’s own companies paid for the positions, and in some cases the markup reached 91%. The SEC says the accused companies and Spaventa collected $23 million in undisclosed fees, with more than $12 million going to commissions and at least $4 million to Spaventa himself.

The agency says the structure was designed to hide that gap. TSG and another Spaventa company allegedly bought the shares first, then resold them into the funds at higher prices, which were then passed on again to investors. The complaint gives examples: Anthropic in Fund 8, Perplexity in Funds 10 and 11, SpaceX in Fund 2, and Anduril across three funds. Other names in the filing included Stripe, Rubrik, Epic Games, and Impossible Foods.

The SEC also says the sales pitch was padded with claims about returns and past wins in companies the funds never held, including Airbnb, Palantir, and SoFi. Spaventa, 40, denied the allegations and said he would fight them. The SEC has charged him and three entities he controls with fraud and registration violations, and is seeking disgorgement, civil penalties, and a permanent bar from the securities industry.