Against the backdrop of the economic recession in Nigeria,
different unorthodox financial schemes are gaining attraction across the
country.
One of the most popular over the last year was the Mavrodian
Mondial Moneybox, MMM, a Ponzi scheme whose decision on Monday to suspend the
accounts of its patrons in the country has thrown millions of Nigerians into
anguish.
Apart from the MMM, which the Nigerian authorities had
cautioned citizens not to patronize, there are other schemes luring desperate
or unwary Nigerians across demographic groups.
For instance, though legal, the number of Nigerians
patronising the betting or lottery games is on the increase. In particular, the
youth are deeply involved in sports betting through such platforms as Nairabet,
Merrybet and Bet9ja, among others.
It was against the backdrop of the popularity of the sport
betting games that MMM, which before suspending operation on Monday had over
three million participants in the country, made inroads into the Nigerian
investment market in 2015.
What is a Ponzi scheme?
The scheme simply means taking from Peter to pay Paul.
According to Wikipedia, a Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent
investment operation where the operator, an individual or organization, pays
returns to its investors from new capital paid to the operators by new
investors, rather tha Operators of Ponzi schemes usually entice new investors
by offering higher returns than other investments, in the form of short-term
returns that are either abnormally high or unusually consistent.
How do Ponzi schemes work?
Ponzi schemes are quite basic but can be extraordinarily
powerful. The steps are as follows:
Convince a few investors to place money into
the investment.
After the
specified time, return the investment money to the investors plus the specified
interest rate or return.
Use success of
earlier investors to convince more investors to place their money into the
system. Typically, the vast majority of the earlier investors will return.
Repeat steps 1
through 3 a number of times. During step 2 at one of the cycles, break the
pattern. Instead of returning the investment money and paying the promised
return, escape with the money and start a new life.
Below are 7 major Ponzi schemes in Nigeria in order of
popularityn from profit earned through legitimate sources.
MMM Nigeria
(nigeria-mmm.net)
Profile: MMM Nigeria is part of the MMM Global community, a
Russian Ponzi scheme dated back to 1989.
MMM stands for Mavrodi Mondial Moneybox and takes its name
from its founder, Sergei Panteleevich Mavrodi of Russia. Three years after he
founded MMM in 1989, the scheme was declared bankrupt and Mavrodi disappeared,
until his arrest in 2003. The scheme was launched in Nigeria in November 2015.
How it works: MMM gives you a technical platform which helps
millions of participants worldwide to connect those who need help to those who
are ready to provide help, for free. All transferred funds to another
participant are your help, given by your own goodwill to another one. For
instance, if you accept to provide help of N200,000, the bank account of either
one person who requested for help of that amount or a number of people whose
total request is N200,000 will be sent to you to pay the money into.
The scheme promises a 30 per cent return on investment to
members. In their transactions MMM participants operate with Bitcoin. The 130 per
cent payback is just a one-time payment after 30 days, and not every month
payment from one investment, although you can invest as many times as possible after
each 30 days’ circle
When you register on MMM and refer people to it, even if you
are not investing, you earn 10 per cent of the amount the person invests.
Relative Crash: In January 2016, the Chinese government
banned MMM on the ground that it is a pyramid scheme, (Ponzi scheme), and not
registered in the country.
Earlier this year, the scheme crashed in South Africa. MMM
Global only gave South Africans the bad news with a post on its website saying:
“We regret to inform you that we have to close down the Republic of Bitcoin. It
was an experiment, and, unfortunately, it failed. We turned out not to be able
to pay 100 percent per month.” In response to mounting criticism and official
investigations by state authorities in 2016, supporters of the South African
MMM scheme staged a protest march in Johannesburg.
The scheme started up again late November 2016. Also,
recently, the scheme collapsed in Zimbabwe. Just recently, Nigerians have been
thrown into a sudden anxiety following a decision by promoters of MMM to
suspend new payouts to subscribers. The members woke up on Tuesday morning to a
disclaimer on the scheme’s website informing them of the move. But the
promoters of the scheme said it would not go burst just yet, adding that the setback
will only last a month.
Popularity: MMM is presently in over 27 countries, estimated
to have over 100 million participants globally. In Nigeria, it is believed to
have up to 3 million participants with over 3,000 trooping into the scheme
weekly. MMM currently is the most popular online money making portal in
Nigeria. It ranks on alexa.com as the 5th most visited website in Nigeria as at
today.
Ultimate Cycler (ultimatecycler.com)
Profile: Ultimate Cycler is a peer-to-peer donation business
model created by Peter Wolfing, a United States based network marketer. It’s a
2×2 cycler scheme with a direct member-to-member payment plan. There is no
central account to pay or receive; you get all of your payout directly into
your account. There are 6 matrix levels you can earn from, but the only expense
you make is the one-time N12,500 ($25) you donate to your sponsor so as to
activate your account.
How it works: When you register, you will need to donate the
sum of N12,500 to a fellow member and the person will then confirm your
donation. The system (Admin) will put 4 other registered people under you from
spillovers who will also pay N12,500 each into your bank account, making
N50,000. You can also bring people to register under you if you cannot wait for
the system to do it for you.
Relative crash: There
is increased panic over the seeming crash of Ultimate Cycler. The panic came
following a technical downtime of the Ponzi scheme, which resulted in a crash
of the site, ultimatecycler.com.
Subsequently, founder of the scheme, Peter Wolfing, while
addressing the situation in a statement apologized for the development, saying
the crash occurred as a result of a system upgrade. He said the site would be
up as soon as possible.
However, the site which went down on December 1 still
displayed an error message “Be right back. We are currently updating the site
to give you a more pleasurable experience and will be back online shortly”. The
founder also posted a video on the site urging participants to exercise
patience. The site is still down, members can only view their inbox but cannot
make any transactions or register new people.
Popularity: This is the second most popular online money
making Ponzi scheme in Nigeria, currently it is ranked in alexa.com as the 15th
most visited site in Nigeria. The scheme currently operates in Nigeria and USA.
There is no exact estimate of its population, however, it was said to be
registering up to 2,000 members weekly in Nigeria until the site went down.
Zar fund
(zarfund.com)
Profile: Zarfund is a complete teamwork based person to
person funding and donation sharing platform. It helps to bring a new way of
raising funds for various causes and charity programmes. The scheme was founded
by Hannes Jordaan, an online entrepreneur living in South Africa.
How it works: At first, ZarFund members voluntarily pay
their referral in form of donation to participate in this programme, i.e
invited persons actually pay to their referral and the programme is full of
referring sytem filled with 6-level stage per month.
Since all the transaction system (donating and receiving) is
done via Bitcoin – a digital cryptocurrency, you must own a Bitcoin wallet
(like Blockchain) where you can receive and collect your funds. Zarfund matrix
program model is forced to 2×6 structure, which works only with Bitcoins.
Popularity: Zar fund is the 3rd most popular Ponzi scheme in
Nigeria, and ranked as the 37th most visited website in Nigeria in
mid-December.
Givers Forum (giversforum.net)
Profile: It is one of the top online money making Ponzi
schemes in Nigeria, just like MMM Nigeria, Ultimate Cycler, i-charity, Crowd
Rising, etc. GIVERS FORUM is a community of givers, people who provide each
other financial help on the principle of percentage growth. In GIVERS FORUM,
you do not have to make contracts or pledge your property, there are no lenders
and no debtors. Everything is very simple: one participant asks for help,
another one helps.
How it works: Anyone can become a member by registering FREE
on their site www.giversforum.com. After successfully registering, you log into
your account known as Personal Office with the login details you registered
with.
You declare the willingness to donate (“Provide Help”),
after which your account will be rewarded with the same amount you pledged.
Your money will start growing from the moment of offering the contribution at
the rate of 10% per week with other bonuses (Calculation of reward occurs every
day) This sum shows how much you can request for yourself after a week of
making the pledge and paying out to the receiving participant.
Say you have announced willingness to assist with N100,000.
You will be rewarded in your Private Office with N100,000. And it will
immediately start growing! A week later, this N100,000 will become N110,000 and
in a month, it becomes N140,000. Accordingly, you will be able to request
assistance for N110,000 in the first week, N120,000 in the 2nd week, N130,000
in the 3rd week and N140,000 in the 4th week. All, after your pledge might have
been transferred and confirmed.
Request for providing help comes to you in your personal
office. If you do not do it within 48 hours during the week and 96 hours on
weekends, you will be removed from the system.
Popularity: The domain “giversforum.net” was registered on
October 17 and was already the 47th most visited site in Nigeria by
mid-December, and the 4th most popular Ponzi scheme in Nigeria.
Icharity
(icharity.club)
Profile: International Charity Club (iCharity Club) is an
international network of donors. iCharity.Club is a peer-to-peer donation
platform for members to help other members in a systematic way. By using this
platform, members can give and receive donations from each other. It is open to
everybody, anyone in the world can join this programme.
How it works: You register, donate to your upliner and
become a Grade 1 Member in the system. The system will then find 5 Free Members
and they in turn donate to you. That is how you earn money when you are a
member of iCharity Nigeria, you do not have to sell any product to anybody or
do any form of networking or tell people about it, you simply earn. Starting
from Grade One where you earn ₦37,000 to Grade Two where you earn ₦370,000 and
Grade Three where you earn ₦3,700,000. You register as a free member then
upgrade to a grade one member and receive the same amount donated 5 times. The
same happens when you reach other grades in the system.
Popularity: This is the 5th most popular Ponzi scheme in
Nigeria. It ranked on alexa.com as 71st most visited website in Nigeria as sat
mid-December.
Crowd Rising
(crowdrising.net):
Profile: CrowdRising is not a company or a business or a
corporation. The CrowdRising System is not owned by any one individual. It is a
semi-automated system created by 5 individuals, who are funding and founding
members, referred to as the 5 Horsemen. The platform is made available
world-wide, free of charge. There are no admin fees, no monthly fees, in fact,
there are NO fees.
How it works: CrowdRising is a person-to-person direct
funding platform. The system was designed in such a way that it can be used by
fundraisers, such as for charities, schools, clubs, churches, non-profits,
family, and personal financial needs etc. The donations are not collected by
the administrator, nor are they automated by the system, rather donations are
sent directly and personally from one member to another, from one member’s
payment processor to another member’s payment processor.
Popularity: This is relatively new in the online Ponzi
scheme market in Nigeria, and ranked as the 143rd most visited site in Nigeria
in mid-December.
Get Help Worldwide
(gethelpworldwide.com):
Profile: Get help worldwide is one of the trending mutual
fund peer-to-peer donation portal in Nigeria today. The scheme has only been in
existence since August and is already having a major share in the mutual fund
community.
How it works: It is simply an online community where people
are helping each other financially, directly with no third parties Involved,
whatever Help you give to someone financially grows by 30 per cent if in local
currency or 50 per cent if in Bitcoin in 30 days.
Popularity: This is not yet popular in the Nigerian Ponzi
scheme market. It ranked as the 201st most visited website in Nigeria by
mid-December.
Written by Ebuka Onyeji
No comments:
Post a Comment