"The 2020 Ponzi Scheme"
I note with great sadness the current Ponzi & pyramid scheme by the now infamous company (I refrain from naming them in fear of libel). One would have thought that something so poorly designed would have been snuffed out in just a few moments, but that wasn’t the case, the intellectual authors, who are clearly not very bright, managed not only to fool a few persons but some 17,000.
While I cannot consider myself to be a Finance whiz kid, I have a strong background in Economics, Banking & Finance due to my graduate studies and work experience. I have also had the pleasure of working with the best financial minds in the country, none of whom can guarantee you a fraction of what this scheme offer. I personally wouldn’t even dream of making promises with such exorbitant ROI nor do I know of any legitimate financial institution, domestic or global that can. I say without fear of contradiction, the ROI this Ponzi scheme is offering is unsustainable and neigh improbable even in the best of times. Further, even with my background, myself, and many others in the financial sector are incapable of Forex trading, I am curious as to how many others make money given the alarmingly complex and uncertain nature of Forex.
The US Stock Market has an annual ROI of 7-8% for several hundreds of years. I am uncertain of the Guyanese ROI but it is likely to be similar. On average, in Guyana, the market ROI is 5-6%, the brightest financial minds work tirelessly to provide that ROI. How is it likely that a foreign national with little understanding of our economy can give you double digits ROI, much less 40%?
If they were offering 10%, the financially literature mind should have been suspicious, how can they possibly give 40% ROI legitimately? Warren Buffet, who is commonly regarded as the greatest investor cannot guarantee anyone those numbers or anything close.
The Commercial Banks in their due diligence refused to afford them a bank account, the Central Bank refused to entertain them, the Securities Council refused their request for a license. If after all of this, you still refuse to entertain that which is patently obvious, should one sympathize with your loss? The most likely outcome of this scam is that most people will lose their monies if not all. The Hon. AG Anil Nandlall said the government priority is to help the victims of the scam, but in many instances, there isn’t much money to recover, that money is likely gone a long time ago.
The fact that such an egregiously, flawed pyramid & Ponzi scheme was allowed to fleece some 17,000 people, which includes UG lectures, represents the greatest indictment to Guyana’s financial literacy.
