A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation where the operator generates returns for older investors through revenue paid by new investors, rather than from legitimate business activities or profit of financial trading. Operators of Ponzi schemes can be either individuals or corporations, and grab the attention of new investors by offering short-term returns that are either abnormally high or unusually consistent.
Companies that engage in Ponzi schemes focus all of their energy into attracting new clients to make investments. Ponzi schemes rely on a constant flow of new investments to continue to provide returns to older investors. When this flow runs out, the scheme falls apart.
Charles Ponzi, (born Carlo Pietro Giovanni Guglielmo Tebaldo Ponzi) (March 3, 1882 – January 18, 1949), was an Italian swindler and con artist in the U.S. and Canada. His aliases include Charles Ponci, Carlo, and Charles P. Bianchi. Born and raised in Italy, he became known in the early 1920s as a swindler in North America for his money-making scheme. He promised clients a 50% profit within 45 days, or 100% profit within 90 days, by buying discounted postal reply coupons in other countries and redeeming them at face value in the United States as a form of arbitrage. In reality, Ponzi was paying earlier investors using the investments of later investors. While this swindle predated Ponzi by several years, it became so identified with him that it now bears his name. His scheme ran for over a year before it collapsed, costing his “investors” $20 million.
High-yield investment programs (HYIPs) are unregistered investments created and touted by unlicensed individuals. Typically offered through slick (and sometimes not-so-slick) websites, HYIPs dangle the contradictory promises of safety coupled with high, unsustainable rates of return—20, 30, 100 or more percent per day—through vague or murky trading strategies. According to law enforcement cases, many operate as Ponzi schemes, using payments from today’s recruits to pay "interest payments" to yesterday’s investors or "referral" fees to those who recruit new members. The Federal Bureau of Investigation reported that the number of new investigations in this area during fiscal year 2009 increased 105 percent over fiscal year 2008.
HYIPs use an array of websites and social media (including YouTube, Twitter and Facebook ) to lure investors, fabricating a "buzz" and creating the illusion of social consensus, which is a common persuasion tactic fraudsters use to suggest that "everyone is investing in HYIPs, so they must be legitimate." Some of these sites purport to monitor and rank the "best" programs. Others tout "winning" HYIP investment strategies or provide a forum for trading tips on how to profit from HYIPs, even those suspected to be scams. Still others—such as the "Pathway to Prosperity" scheme in which investors on six continents allegedly lost $70 million—expressly caution investors against HYIP scams, using a form of reverse psychology to create the false impression that this HYIP is somehow different.
Bitcoin is a form of digital currency, created and held electronically. No one controls it. Bitcoins aren’t printed, like dollars or euros – they’re produced by people, and increasingly businesses, running computers all around the world, using software that solves mathematical problems.
It’s the first example of a growing category of money known as cryptocurrency.
Bitcoin is a relatively new form of currency that is just beginning to hit the mainstream, but many people still don’t understand why they should make the effort to use it. Bitcoin is fast, Bitcoin is cheap … read more
What is HYIP ?
HYIP stands for High Yield Investment Program.
If you’ve searched around the Internet for different ways to make money online, there’s no doubt that you’ve come across the term “HYIP“. You might have just skipped it and paid it no mind, but if you’re reading this article right now, you must have questioned what the term encompasses. HYIP stands for “High Yield Investment Programs”, which covers all programs, offline and online, that are used to invest money to receive a higher yield than you would normally get at a bank.
Continuing with us