I don't know whether his strategy works or not but this is very similiar to what has happened to people who couldn't make money in the stock market.
Basically there was a guy who spent a great deal of money on trading courses, seminars, PDFs, ebooks, trading software, signal services, etc. After a few years, he still couldn't turn a profit.
So instead of giving up, he decided to make an ad on Craiglists "learn how to trade for $500" and hosted some mini-seminars at the local library.
And he finally made some money in relation to trading. He basically was a good teacher, but horrible trader and all his trades were pretty much on simulation or in hindsight. However he leased a Porsche and dressed in nice suits, wore fake Rolex, so he gave the impression that he was a millionaire which was not true at all.
Most likely all his students lost money and he was the only one who came out ahead.