The British Columbia Securities Commission has barred two Lower Mainland residents from buying or selling securities after discovering they were running a Ponzi scheme.

Kerry O'Neill of Richmond faces a lifetime ban, and Renee Marie Helmig, also known as Nisha Helmig, of North Vancouver was hit with a 10-year ban after they persuaded more than 900 people across North America to invest an estimated $10 million in their used clothing and furniture business. They promised returns of up to 300 per cent after just three months, and when they couldn't deliver they began to pay out the early investors with money raised from the new ones, the commission said.

In a settlement agreement made public on Friday, O'Neill admitted to being the principal of an investment scheme called the Pay it Forward Program. He admitted he told investors that their funds would be used to buy and sell distressed merchandise, and they could expect between 100 per cent and 300 per cent return within 90 days.

O’Neill admitted that he committed securities fraud when he used just under $1.1 million of investors’ money to purchase merchandise, approximately $6.4 million to pay amounts due to other investors, $56,000 for his personal expenses and $213,000 for other investment opportunities. O’Neill used the remainder of the investors’ funds for expenses related to the distressed merchandise business.

Lang Evans, the director of enforcement for the securities commission, said the investment program began as a legitimate business.

"It started innocently enough back in 2006," Evans said. "It was basically a flea market, taking things for a negligible price, cleaning them up and reselling them. But then they tried to do it on a grand scale, but it wasn't sustainable."

The only way to deliver, Evans said, was to pay early investors with the money raised from new ones, and that's when it turned into a classic Ponzi scheme.

In all, the pair raised close to $10 million from more than 900 investors in a scenario Evans said was destined to fail.

"You buy some time paying investors with other people's money, but at the end of the day there's no exit strategy."

However, O'Neill is no Bernie Madoff, the American financier who bilked his clients out of billions in a Ponzi scheme. At the end, O'Neill was as broke as his investors, Evans said.

Under the settlements, the commission acknowledged there is no reasonable prospect of O’Neill or Helmig paying fines of $500,000 or $100,000 respectively, which would otherwise have been assessed in the matter.

There was no word on whether criminal charges might be laid.