Frank App founder Charlie Javice recently hit the headline for all the wrong reasons. The 31-year-old was arrested on Monday night and was charged by the US Securities and Exchange Commission for an alleged fraud of $175 Million. JP Morgan, the global financial leader, has accused Javice of providing misleading data on the number of users on the Frank app. In its complaint filed in New York District Court, SEC said Javice made JP Morgan Chase believe that Frank App had 4.5 million users though the actual number of users was just 3 million.
Early Career
Born in 1992, Charlie Javice was assumed as an intelligent bright professional working as Managing Director in JP Morgans after the latter decided to take over Frank. She is a dual citizen of the USA and France and lives in Miami. Javice attended the French-American School of New York and completed graduation from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. She founded a student financial assistance app Frank in 2016. She was named in 'Forbes 30 Under 30' for finance in 2019.
Allegation
In 2021 JP Morgans acquired the app after her claim that Frank had 4.25 million customers who had signed up for the account in her app. According to JP Morgan's claim, Javice paid a data scientist $18,000 to forge the user data with a list of 4 million fake student names to convince JP Morgans about the popularity of the app.
JP Morgans filed a lawsuit against Javice in 2022 saying Javice's claims about the number of users were fabricated. She was terminated from the company in November 2022. On April 4th she was charged by federal prosecutors in Manhattan with fraud affecting a financial institution, securities fraud, bank fraud, and conspiracy.
She was released on a $2 million bond today after being arrested yesterday at Newark Liberty International Airport. She is not allowed to leave New York and can not contact witnesses or Current JP Morgan or Former Frank employees.
