Better Living Global Marketing Review: 99 day ROIs
Better Living Global Marketing’s penny auction business launched in August of 2012 and are based out of Hong Kong in China.
On the Better Living Global Marketing website, the company states that it’s ‘a subsidiary of MSP Power Marketing‘.
For reasons unknown, the Better Living Global Marketing website has a boatload of information on MSP Power Marketing and it’s lubricant products, but no information on Better Living Global Marketing business itself (other than an unhelpfully long-winded marketing spiel that doesn’t really say anything).
MSP Power Marketing (and by association Better Living Global Marketing) was founded in the early 1990s by Luke Teng (right), who credits himself as the CEO of Better Living Global Marketing on the company website.
I wasn’t able to find any information indicating involvement by Teng in another MLM company at an executive level, so Better Living Global Marketing appears to be his first MLM venture.
Read on for a full review of the Better Living Global Marketing MLM business opportunity.
The Better Living Global Marketing Product Line
Better Living Global Marketing sell bids for their Bidder’s Paradise penny auction website.
Auctions feature on the Bidder’s Paradise website with a 20 second timer. Each bid placed in an auction resets the timer back to 20 seconds, with bidders able to place bids as long as the timer does not reach zero.
If an auction timer reaches zero, the auction is over with the last bidder to place a bid winning it.
Bidder’s Paradise also incorporate a “special price” function in their auctions. If an auction reaches a pre-determined special price, the auction also ends with the last bidder winning the auction.
Special prices are not disclosed to participating auction bidders, with Bidder’s Paradise only stating that they are ‘less than 50% of Hong Kong retail‘.
Bids for Bidder’s Paradise are only available in packs, which are sold in bundles of 2000 for $1160. For each pack sold Bidder’s Paradise also charge a $15 fee, bringing the total cost of a bid pack to $1175.
Purchased bids are able to be used in all Bidder’s Paradise auctions or given away to other Bidder’s Paradise accounts.
The Better Living Global Marketing Compensation Plan
The Better Living Global Marketing compensation plan revolves around the sale of Bidder’s Paradise bid packs for $1160 to either recruited affiliates or retail customers.
An annual fee (recurring) of $15 is also charged, bringing the total price of each bid pack to $1175.
Reserve Wallet
A Better Living Global Marketing affiliate’s reserve wallet is an electronic wallet from which an affiliate can only purchase Bidder’s Paradise bid packs from.
All of the commissions paid out by Better Living Global Marketing have a reserve wallet component, with any funds placed in the reserve wallet unable to be cashed out directly by an affiliate.
Better Living Global Marketing charge affiliates $11.62 a month from their reserve wallet balance.
Retail Commissions
Erroneously labelled a “retail commission” despite the fact that it pays out if a recruited affiliate purchases a bid pack, Better Living Global Marketing’s “retail commission” is paid out at 18% of the $1160 paid for a bid pack.
This equates to $208.80 per pack sold, with an additional 2% ($23.20) held by the company and placed into an affiliate’s reserve wallet.
Leadership Bonus
The Leadership Bonus makes up 3% of every bid pack sold, and is paid out using a unilevel compensation structure.
A unilevel compensation structure places an affiliate at the top of the structure with every personally recruited affiliate placed directly under them (level 1).
If any of these level 1 affiliates go on to recruit new affiliates of their own, they are then placed on level 2 of the unilevel. If any level 2 affiliates recruit new affiliates they are placed on level 3 and so on and so forth down a theoretically unlimited amount of levels.
Using the above unilevel compensation structure, Better Living Global Marketing pay out 3% of every bid pack sold by any affiliates in a unilevel team. How many levels on the unilevel are counted for the Leadership Bonus depends on an affiliate’s own membership rank:
- Manager – 3 levels
- Director – 4 levels
- Vice-President – 5 levels
The Leadership Bonus is split into two payments, with 2.7% ($31.32) of the 3% total being paid to the affiliate and the remaining 0.3% ($3.48) being put into their reserve wallet.
I did try searching high and low for information on the affiliate membership ranks and qualification criteria required wasn’t able to find anything publicly available.
Business Volume Bonus
The Business Volume Bonus is paid out using a binary compensation structure. A binary compensation structure places an affiliate at the top of the structure with two positions branching out directly under them.
These two positions are the beginning of two sides, with each position in turn branching out into a further two positions and so on and so forth.
Each of these binary positions is filled either via direct recruitment or the recruiting efforts of an affiliate’s up and downlines.
As new affiliates are recruited a binary team grows and whenever a Bidder’s Paradise bid pack is sold, it is credited to either the left or right side of the binary (depending on which affiliate sold the pack).
For each bid pack sale matched on both the left and right side of the binary, a $58.50 commission is paid out. $6.50 is also withheld by the company and placed into an affiliate’s “sustainability wallet”.
An affiliate’s sustainability wallets appear to the same as their reserve wallet, with funds available in the wallet only able to be used to purchase more bid packs.
Note that the Business Volume Bonus is capped at 8 bonuses per day per unit. Better Living Global Marketing don’t specify how the cap is worked out, but given the daily limit it appears to be some sort of queueing system.
Profit Sharing
When a Bidder’s Paradise bid pack sold or purchased by affiliates, the affiliate who referred the customer or recruited the affiliate earns a daily commission for 99 days.
This commission is paid out 6 times a week (skipping Sundays), with Better Living Global Marketing matching all Profit Sharing payouts and placing the matching funds in an affiliate’s reserve wallet.
Bid Unit Matrix
Typically if a matrix compensation model is used a company places affiliates in the matrix to fill up positions. In Better living Global Marketing, the company instead creates positions in a company-wide matrix for every Bidder’s Paradise bid pack purchased.
Better Living Global Marketing’s company-wide matrix is identical to a binary, with each position in the matrix splitting into an additional two positions (being a matrix there are no sides).
When a Bidder’s Paradise bid pack is purchased by an affiliate or sold to a customer, a position is created in the matrix. Over time positions underneath the bid pack position will fill up and for each position under the bought position (capped at a 2×12 matrix within the company-wide matrix), Better Living Global Marketing pay affiliates $3.87 per position.
Each bid pack position has a potential 8,190 matrix positions under it (within the ever-growing company-wide matrix), and thus can generate a maximum of $31,695 a month if it fills up with bought bid pack positions.
Joining Better Living Global Marketing
Affiliate membership to Better Living Global Marketing appears to be free, however an affiliate needs to buy a bid pack (unit) to get started.
Effectively affiliate membership to Better Living Global Marketing starts at $1175 (the cost of one unit).
Conclusion
The Better Living Global Marketing compensation plan material I cited for this review states that
In August 2012, after witnessing the global penny auction phenomenon, Mr. Teng launched Bidder’s Paradise, a high-end penny auction site and used Better Living Global Marketing as the marketing arm.
Reading between the lines, Luke Teng saw the “success” of Zeek Rewards (the first MLM penny auction) and wanted to replicate it.
Pay particular attention to the launch month, as Zeek Rewards was shutdown that same month and revealed to by the SEC to be a $600M Ponzi scheme. Under the guise of the Zeekler penny auction, the reality of Zeek Rewards is that it was an affiliate-funded money shuffling scheme, with new affiliate investments (bid purchases) being used to pay out ROIs owed to existing affiliate investors.
Replace Zeek Rewards with Better Living Global Marketing and Zeekler with Bidder’s Paradise, and that’s pretty much what you’ve got here.
When Zeek Rewards was shutdown and Better Living Global Marketing started up, the requests for a BehindMLM review of the company began to trickle in.
Upon first learning about the business, I went over to the website and was met with a jumble of Chinese and English. Figuring nobody would take the opportunity seriously (well, nobody who spoke English anyway), I declined to review the company and left it at that.
Sometime over the past few months however, probably as a result of the decline of the revenue-sharing MLM niche in general, Better Living Global Marketing have re-emerged and ramped up their affiliate recruitment efforts.
The Bidder’s Paradise website is still a confusing jumble of Chinese and English however US based affiliates have recorded videos of their own explaining the business, with the intent to expand its English speaking affiliate-base.
In a nutshell, affiliates join Better Living Global Marketing and invest at least $1175 into the business. For their investment, Better Living Global Marketing make the implied guarantee of a positive ROI over 99 days, in addition to the other bonuses and commissions paid out through the compensation plan.
Forced re-investment is made via the aptly named sustainability and reserve wallets. Everything else is converted to numbers on a screen, placed into a third e-wallet and is withdrawable as long as the company has money to pay affiliates out with.
As with Zeek Rewards the front-end of the business is the Bidder’s Paradise penny auction, specifically the notion that it sustains the daily ROI Better Living Global Marketing pays out its affiliates.
Zeek Rewards and every other MLM penny auction after it however has proven that the penny auction side of the MLM companies that run them are not successful.
To date, not one MLM penny auction has taken off on the merits of the penny auction itself. Those companies that have found success have done so on the merits of their compensation plan, which revolve around taking in money from new affiliates and using it to pay out existing affiliates.
Better Living Global Marketing is no different, and that’s exactly how the business is marketed.
Here’s how Better Living Global Marketing present their daily ROI, with ROI projections based on payments made throughout early 2013:
$8.75 a day ROI with affiliates urged to reinvest after the total 99 returns have been paid out.
For affiliates wondering what investment strategy to use, don’t worry Better Living Global Marketing have you covered:
Invest in at the “good option” for $1175 and receive a $1939 twelve month ROI. Or you can invest in at the “better option” for $3525 and receive a $5884 ROI. Still not enough? The “even better option” only costs $8225 and delivers a $16547 ROI.
What about the Ponzi professionals?
Ladies and gentlemen behold, the “greater option”:
Buy in for $17,625 and walk away with a 12 month $40,323 ROI.
Oh and it’s totally passive to. Just invest your money, perform some silly rudimentary tasks the company sets and watch your monopoly money balance grow:
In case you can’t quite make it out, the above table is labelled “Potential Annual Cash Flow with No Recruiting” and details projected Better Living Global Marketing ROIs with little more than an initial investment required by an affiliate.
Such spreadsheets were also common in Zeek Rewards as existing affiliate investors attempted to lure new investors into the scheme.
Despite the history of the MLM penny auction niche revealing otherwise, proponents of Better Living Global Marketing will no doubt attempt to try to convince people that the “success” of the Bidder’s Paradise auctions pays out the ROIs above.
This falls flat on two counts. The first is retail. Who in their right mind is going to drop at least $1175 for bids at Bidder’s Paradise without the attached investment scheme?
And if you’re wondering about the auction activity over at Bidder’s Paradise, affiliates are required to use bids in auctions to qualify for their daily ROI.
20 used bids qualifies affiliates for a daily ROI, with affiliates able to pre-qualify for multiple days in advance per 20 bids they use in the Bidder’s Paradise auctions.
The second count is that, if you accept this is yet another affiliate-funded ROI scheme, every bid sold brings with it a >100% liability for Better Living Global Marketing. In addition to the >100% ROI paid out directly via profit-sharing, there’s also the ongoing liability created via the company-wide matrix (at least $3.87 per month per position in the company).
Where do all these roads lead us to?
One great big Ponzi explosion. Once new affiliates stop joining and investing it’s not going to take long for the liabilities to exceed new money coming in (from affiliates).
When that happens, kaboom.
With the Better Living Global Marketing and its affiliates recommending investors buy in at $17,625 and the company making the projected guarantee of a $40,000+ ROI within 12 months, it doesn’t take a mathematical genius to forecast a collapse well before your typical 2 year Ponzi life-span.
As they say, fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me… well to be frankly honest I’ve lost count of how many of these Zeek Ponzi clones have gone bust now.
You’d think what with the staring down the barrel of clawback litigation for any affiliate that made over $1000 in Zeek Rewards people would have learned their lesson, but here we are.
Thank you for the information. An old networking buddy has been pushing this to me for months. From what I can see there isn’t even a product that is bid on. It’s all about the investment.
There is an option to auto bid for the entire month in one click. Nobody ever win the products. Auction is secondary to the investment. .
The main idea in programs like that is “recruit a downline and earn commissions from their investments and reinvestments, and use your own investment as seeding money you eventually will lose”.
The Ponzi scheme part is only a “distraction”, a method to bring in investments and to keep everyone happy watching their balances grow, so the money can be distributed upwards in the system.
Another problem is how do u get the money. From what I am told china has to bank wire money to your bank account. Can’t imagine bank wiring $10000 a month and that not being a problem or questions being asked. Stupid.
I’ll be standing by waiting to here how this crashes.
It probably operates out of the U.S., but registered a company in Hong Kong to prevent shutdown by U.S. authorities.
MSP Power Marketing Limited was registered in Hong Kong 28th August 2012, 11 days after the Zeek shutdown.
hkent.biz/1792876.html (disabled link)
Registration Number：1792876
Registration Date：28 August 2012
Company Name： MSP Power Marketing Limited
They have rules, no internet marketing, they call it a private auction, they are suckering thousands to kick in their savings as an investment. There is no way to buy retail bids, you must become an affiliate to get bids.
Their Participants think its a great “high-end” auction and are just not clever enough to realize that the company is bidding for its passive participants, definitely a member scheme that will come tumbling down unless of course the owners pull it down before it gets pinned by the authorities.
Chinese companies are notorious for setting up and running after they’ve collected enough. WCM777 and Better Living Telex will be the last few notched in this rev-share niche.
Thank you Oz for yet another detailed and well investigated work. I’ll forward this to my friends who haven’t seen the light (or are high on the cool-aid).
Thank you for this post. The mantra that I keep hearing from members (who are relentless) is “it’s different than Zeek”, but they point to Bidder’s Paradise as the reason it’s different.
As far as I know, and I have someone who tries to sell me on this thing at least once a week, NO ONE in the US has verified any of the products in the auction, nor has anyone ever won an auction.
Thank you for your post. I had the same feeling as all above posts. I am a member with 25 units. I jointed a large, powerfull team. We cashed out from our team leader weekly or montly. I am in the US and my team leader deposit money into my bank account if I could not see them in person at the weekly meeting.
I tried auction and had the same thinking as other member they just lazy dump their bids into the auction but I waited and won 2 items in a month. One Louis Vuitton bag that I couldn’t afford without Better Living $622 for the $1300 bag.
Then I won a watch $562 valued at $1200. I will buy this watch, send receipt to Better Living after taking my picture with the watch and they will pay me full amount. I can keep it or sell it or return to the store for full refund if I don’t.
If you have many accounts, many computers waited until close to auction closed get your team bid at the same time. You can earn extra income beside the wonderfull profit sharing. It is a wonderfull business. They made money and shared it with you daily.
Every bid is selling for $1.00 in China, for member about $58 cents.The company made lot of money over the bp8.com penny auction. I hope my information is helpful. To me I treated this business just like a game but I am making money and believed on this business.
Try it with what ever money you can afford. I saw some member from India put in $100,000. The next day he got back his commission as explained above.
My user name with Better Ling is Goldmine888. You can verify my auction won. I am retiring on limited income. With Better Living I can take vacation and still running my Better Living business online. Zeek Reward did not do the business right and with FTC so strickly in US. They just surendered.
I love Better Living. Long live Better Living. The people formed this company is very smart and kind. I don’t think they tried to cheat us. What business you can do with $5,000, 10,000.
I saw my student loosing money every day with their restaurant business. Hard working, no money and invested $100,000 in the failed restaurant. I am a teacher and Proctor for the Food Manager that restaurant owner needed before open an eating business. My heart goes out for them if their business failed, working long hours and broke.
I am also a news reporter in the Vietnam war. I am not a blind investor. More info (Ozedit: recruitment spam removed)
But when the money began to flow out from new investors you had a change of heart and decided Ponzi schemss are a-ok?
Just another apex investor trying to recruit new affiliates into the scheme…
Just ignore the auction. It’s only a “distraction” like Zeekler was, not a real money generator.
* Money comes IN from new investors buying “units”. That’s the ONLY source of real money coming IN.
All the other parts are simply methods to distract people, and to reward people for bringing in new investors in a downline. It’s also designed to prevent people from withdrawing too much money.
MONOPOLY MONEY
All the money you have inside the system is “monopoly money”, worthless in itself but will give you the feeling of being real money. It doesn’t really matter what TYPE of monopoly money it is, whether it’s about “units”, “bids”, “commissions” or the different eWallets.
The system is simply set up to …
A: Attract money from new investors
B: Circulate/grow monopoly money around in a system
C: Let early investors and recruiters withdraw some real money, but prevent them from withdrawing too much.
“KEEP THE INVESTORS HAPPY”
Point B, circulation of monopoly money around in the system will keep the investors happy. It will FEEL like real money being paid out and a growing investment.
Point C is directly connected to point A. If real money comes in from new investors they can also pay the old investors some real money.
If point A dries out so will point C, but it won’t affect point B. People can still reinvest and grow monopoly money even if the supply of real money dries out.
WHERE and HOW do they sell them?
The auction is internet based, and will require people to sign up as affiliates or customers in order to buy bids or use them in auctions.
To buy bids, they will at least need to register a user profile (a user name, e-mail address, password), and use an internet based payment system to pay for the bids?
To spend bids in auctions, they will at least need to log in under a username, so each bid they make can be deducted from their balance?
Are you trying to tell us that Bidders’ Paradise actually are doing some retail sale over the internet, and are able to attract a huge number of retail customers from China?
A quick look at the winners showed me that all the winners were from China (or HK), photographed in front of a “Better Living Global Marketing” sign, where they all have picked up their prizes at the same local shop in China (or HK).
Since you PRIMARILY are marketing the retail bids to Chinese customers, how do you actually do that? E.G. do you find the customers on social networks like Facebook or something?
How many Chinese retail customers do you have? Retail customers are people buying retail quantities of bids, e.g. 50, 100, 200, 500 bids per pack, to use the bids in auctions.
Uh, two things. You have to sign up as an affiliate to buy bids and they are only available in a 2000 pack for $1160 (as per the Better Living website).
Affiliates can dump bids onto other affiliate accounts, however there’s no retail to speak of. Everyone joins as a free affiliate, with affiliate fees incorporated into the bid pack purchase price.
Bidders’ Paradise can still have retail customers buying retail quantities?
KIEULOAN made that claim about bids being sold for $1 per bid in China, and that simply has to be about retail sale. So I asked him some questions about his retail customers, e.g. why they all live in China/HK.
All the daily winners are Chinese, and are photographed under the same sign outside a local shop in HK or China. That looks rather stupid for an auction that claims to be “international” and “online based”. 🙂
Try to check “Bidders’ Paradise” / “Winners” yourself?
Not sure, the BP8 website is still a mangled mess of Chinese and English:
Doesn’t say anything about purchasing bids.
I suspect the auction winners are investors who just pot luck won with massive amount of bids, or are non-BLGM affiliates who had copious amounts of bids dumped on them.
Not bulletproof accurate by any stretch of the imagination, Alexa puts Hong Kong at second for source traffic (30%) behind the US (48.4%).
Globally 22.1% of the auction traffic comes directly from the affiliate website blgm.hk which when combined with US traffic (the investors), paints a pretty clear picture of the business.
The comp plan reads like retail is an option but I don’t see anyone, Chinese or otherwise, dropping $1000+ on a bid pack without the 99 day ROI scheme attached.
I simply started to analyse it from KIEULOAN’s own viewpoint, from his own claim about bids being sold for $1 in China. So I asked him some sales related questions and presented some findings to help him identify which types of answers he should avoid.
ALL the winners have been photographed outside the same shop, under the same BLGM sign. They are ALL Chinese people, and they have all rushed down to the shop to collect their prizes the same day they have won an auction.
It’s their office in Hong Kong. The “719” sign is visible in many of the slides in the video, which matches their address given here:
blgm.hk/en/contact-us.html
Room719~720, 7/F., Block A, New Mandarin Plaza, TsimShaTsui East, Kowloon, Hong Kong.
I have won 4 items on Bidders Paradise. 2ipads and 2 iphones. I am non Chinese, If you have seen the video of the winners im not hard to miss.
I picked up all my items in San Gabriel CA. If you win a item and you dont live local they will ship the item to you.
By winning an auction to mean buying the item full price and then sending a picture of the receipt to a foreign country??
Something tells me the guy reading the email in Hong Kong isn’t interested in verifying that your receipt is authentic. Lol.
So then u get get the difference in your back office. The real test of time will be when the first thousand or so try to cash out every month. Then you will first deal with a back office error. Then an email apologizing for the inconvenience. Slowly stringing the newcomers along and giving hope.
Then boom website no longer responding. Then it’s over and u will realize u where caught up in a ponzi scheme. But reality Is you already know what you are involved in.
Are you an affiliate or a retail customer?
Retail customers are the ones spending their OWN money buying bidpacks, to use the bids in auctions. They will normally be referred to the auctions by one of the affiliates, or find the auctions themselves and be signed up under a random affiliate when they create a new user profile.
Retail customers will bring in fresh money each time they buy bids. Affiliates will only bring in an initial investment, and after that they will simply reinvest “monopoly money”.
Hey.
Great article. Had a guy approach me about this opportunity. It sounded great. I was ready to buy a few units and the guy told me to wire money to his personal account!
I asked if I could sign up via directly buying units from company. The guys gave me a reason that didnt make much sense and said that it would take over a week and it was need jut send him the money.
Needless to say I back out and dissaccociated from this fella. This biz op is far from legit.
Anybody know who I can notify to shut this down ?
My wife lost money in Zeek (that means that I did too). A friend who we brought into Zeek brought us to one of the presentations for this one. I literally watched people put in upwards of 15k+ while I was there.
I was told by a friend that he knew people who have gone in with 50k. Cash money being handed over with no problem. This is going to be even uglier than Zeek.
Once again; only the people who come in early will win; the rest will be parted with their money (the old saying comes back). Way out.
These could have been shills.
Yes like part of the hype! A snow ball effect sort of speaking.
Pass the hat around like you often see in chuches, put money in the hat. If you don’t put any money in the hat while it goes around, you might find people looking at you in a funny manner.
If you let shame and peer pressure dictate your investment choices, you have more problems than falling for ponzi schemes. 😉
As this is in Hong Kong, this may be difficult, but you may be able to get it shut down in your state or territory by complaining to the state attorney general’s office. At least they’ll open a file on it. When they get 20-30 complaints, they may assign an investigator.
Some of the Ponzi schemes have “pay yourself options” = methods where people can generate membership PIN for a new member directly in their back offices, as a sub member to themselves, and get their payouts directly from that member’s investment rather than from the company itself.
It will reduce the risk of a clawback from a Receiver, because of no monetary transactions from the company to the participant. But it’s clearly a warning sign of a fraud.
Q if $0.58 cents per bid added 1 cent for every 1 bid to the current price, does it mean that the total amount of the item won on bidding website is actually saying that every single cent of the item you won is cost $0.58 cent? so you multiply the total amount to 0.58 cent?
so are you trying to say that the company is earning money on bidding fee? How come this was not mentioned to this article or review? Please explain to me why you don’t give significance on this bidding fee? and why it’s not important to mention it to your report?
The bidding fee is negligible (price paid per auction?).
So is the money paid for bids. Every dollar spent on a bid attracts a >100% liability (let’s not pretend there’s any retail here).
Q why do you answer a question with question? if a detailed review of this article does neglect one part the whole thing how can we justified the article itself?
How can you make a fair judgement or fair views if little things or not are left behind the topic? can you make a fair one if all information is lacking? i ask a simple Q why is it a Q itself?
A “bid” isn’t a monetary unit, so it won’t add anything to a price, revenue or other monetary units in itself.
It becomes confusing when you’re trying to use a formula like “1 bid = $0.58”, because that is simply not true. You will first need to check whether or not something is true before you can try to use it in a calculation.
The PRICE people will have to pay for a 2000 bidpack “unit” is $1,160 + $15, but you can’t reverse that logic and say “Since people are willing to pay $1,160 for 2000 bids, each bid must be worth $0.58”.
* 1 bid is worth zero
* 2000 bids are worth zero
* the money someone paid for the bids is worth $1,160 + $15
I have already partly answered your questions, by pointing out flawed logic. You asked a question about math, “How do we calculate the value of 1 bid?”.
The answer is plain and simple “We don’t even try to do it, because a method like that doesn’t make any logical sense”.
I haven’t answered the “fair and factual” part directly, but that part should normally be based on the ability to identify something correctly.
When the auction is open each bid entered increases the cost of the item by 1 cent. If there are 5000 bids placed over the course of the auction the successful bidder must pay .01 x 5000 total bids or $50.00 for the item.
If this successful bidder purchased bid packs to participate in the auction paying .58 for each bid, and personally bid 200 times to win his $50.00 item, then he actually spent .58 x 200 bids used + $50 for the item = ($156) to buy the item. Good for him maybe, except,
The other bidders got nothing even though they too had to spend .58 (prepaid via bid package purchases) for each bid they made.
This one winner and many losers dynamic is why I believe penny auctions are not viable businesses (E-bay would own the space if they were; they are however imminently suitable for pyramid ponzi schemes because they sound like they should be very profitable.
Those 5000 bids expended do represent $2900 of gross revenue for the company, but the losers immediately feel the pain of spending their money for nothing and overwhelmingly conclude that the odds of winning the auction are extremely low while the cost of bidding for items is very high. Retail bid buyers lose interest and follow better and surer ways of saving money.
Thus we know that the auction’s revenue will never be sufficient to pay the projected return on investment that has been promised to the investor-affiliates and can recognize that the only persons bidding are affiliate’s (or their friends), burning up prepaid bids which they bought in packages for the purpose of sharing in the income stream generated by what they assumed was a very profitable auction business.
Its not. The potential retail customers are over at E-Bay where they usually win and do not have to pay .58 to make a bid. This means that that the payouts from these penny auction/MLMs is almost entirely the same money that affiliates themselves pay into the company when they purchase the bid packs.
You have a loop. Money coming in from affiliates to pay affiliates with no retail sales in between.
The pyramid structure ensures that whatever money does come into company is paid out to the people at the top, and this leaves almost everyone else empty handed.
@george
Lol, your question was answered in kind.
Any more pissy little derail attempts will be sent to the spambin.
well said for your argumentative point of view.but you forgot something 1 bid is indeed $0.58 if your a member or an affiliate and it was mentioned to their video presentations.
Now why do you regards it a not true figures while they said to their presentation THEY ADD ONE CENT FOR EVERY 1 BID, what part of that you don’t understand??
And please don’t confuse facts if you don’t understand the Q “How do we calculate the value of 1 bid?”. your right in a sense but very suspiciously wrong if you yourself change their presentation on figures to zero and then after that you declared no logical sense on computation you can’t sway your words if you change things in your perspective advantage.
if you want to be respected to your views on topics don’t alter things just to prove and satisfy your arguments, it will be a battle of the mind and conversation on views are lost..for me that’s just a simple stupid pride to compused the conversations from reality …
if you can’t walk the honest opinion on discussions then trust is out of the Q.!
The value of one bid is “who cares”. It’s a liability against the company and is therefore always going to be irrelevant. Calculateable only by how much of a ROI Better Living Global pay out over 99 days.
At least that’s what I think you’re asking. You ramble a lot and it’s rather tiresome to read.
Indeed it isn’t. You can forget that 1 cent example from Hoss, too.
A bid isn’t a monetary unit, and it’s neither worth $0.58 or $0.01. It’s simply worth 0. It’s a logical fallacy when people believe the bids are worth some money, e.g. try to calculate how much they are worth in an auction.
That statement will also partly answer your question number 2, “How do you know the review is fair and factual?”. You simply can’t know in most cases, and it will be even more difficult if you can’t identify things correctly.
You will need to start with that = improve your own skills in how to identify things correctly. Or else you will probably miss it if you suddenly see something “fair and factual”. Or you will be spending your time looking for all sorts of wrong things you believe is the right stuff.
Does the cost of the bid item increase by .01 per entered bid or not?
No waffly answers. Yes or no?
As you can’t sell it back to them for 0.58, that’s clearly not its value. 0.58 is its COST (to members)
Perhaps you should get the terminology correct and define the question before you attempt to answer it yourself.
A clear “No, the bids do not increase the price of an item with anything”. But the auction software does.
And it isn’t even a necessary solution, they could have used any other method to adjust the price, e.g. the janitor walking in and checking the auctions every 10 minutes, adjusting the price manually up or down.
I used the “$0.01 per bid” when we analysed ZeekRewards and Zeekler, as a METHOD to analyse something rather than as a logical fact. It can be used as a method to calculate auction revenue, but it can’t be used as a logical fact.
You are right they have no intrinsic value, but in the example I gave the bids were converted to a purchase right which upon exercise was used to acquire a tangible object of value.
Therefore it would be premature to conclude that the bid had no value. Were it not for the fact that he had the right to bid many times he could not have won the auction and been able to purchase a product at a price that he deemed to be a bargain.
I wish I could say I understood what you are saying. After the first bid does it not require an overbid by a penny to win the auction? And if the high bid is not bested within 20 seconds does not the high bid win the auction? That is what the review says. Does it not?
Why is everyone so testy?
He paid .58 per bid and its illiquid. Lots of investments have a no resale market. To him its worth .58 or he would not have paid the price. There was a willing seller and he was a willing buyer. That sets the value (whether you like it or not).
You would not pay him .58 but maybe someone else would. He can not bid in the auctions without paying .58 and he can not hope to participate in the money game with out paying .58 so to him its worth .58 It is after all his money, not yours.
And if a penny is added to a penny then eventually the auction might end with an item price of $50 which would be due and payable to the company by the winning bidder for the item; and would not that $50 be revenue to the company? If this is not how a penny auction works then please explain how it really works.
I assume you know (because you say you do) that the janitor sets the price every once in a while and it is he who determines the winning price and not actual bids entered by human beings (or their robots.)
If that is how it works you should put it in your review and not speculate or insinuate that this is the way it is done here on page 3.
The auction software can be adjusted to almost any type of action. The fact that it has been adjusted to 1 cent per bid in some auctions you have seen doesn’t mean the bids are worth 1 cent.
Zeekler had several other auctions, e.g. “first bid from any new bidder will cost 10 bids, the rest will cost 1 bid”.
Dubli has “Reverse auctions”, and “unique lowest bid auctions”.
george dagal (post #28) has 2 types of questions. They are not really questions, but presentations of his own logic.
1. Question about the $0.58 per bid idea.
2. “How can I trust someone not recognizing my idea?”
The idea itself is flawed. He have not analysed it himself, he’s simply repeating what the presentation video told him, the story he has accepted himself.
I have told him that
* his idea is flawed, bids are not worth anything in terms of monetary value after they have been sold to a new investor. I’m talking specifically about the 2000 bidpack “units” here, where the main motive for buying them is the investment system.
* math doesn’t make any sense if the logic is flawed, i.e. you can’t add “bids” to a monetary amount in a calculation.
* we will not spend much time on flawed ideas, or on the math based on flawed ideas.
* if his idea of “trustworthiness” is about people using flawed ideas, he probably won’t find it here.
* if he really want to find something like that, he should probably improve his own skills in how to identify it. There’s no point in trying to show it to him if he’s unable to recognize it.
Well if one bid or ten bids or a 1000 bids do not raise the price of the object at auction by 1 cent then what the F%%%% do they do?
Your explanation is all over the map. You keep saying they don’t do this and they don’t do that, that the janitor decides and that this is flawed and that is flawed but but you never explain what you think a bid does. Seriously man, just write a simple declarative sentence on the matter.
We’re not discussing hypothetical scenarios here.
Most of the people posting comments are either participants themselves, or critics. If he is an affiliate, then he has probably watched the presentation video and the part about “How does Bidders’ Paradise earn money?”, with a 60,000+ bids example that they say generated $36000+ revenue.
I have identified him as an affiliate (investor), while you have identified him as an eager customer buying 2000 bids for $1,160 just to spend them in auctions and hopefully win something.
I have assumed, based on my previous experiences, knowledge, observation and gut feelings, that he probably is an affiliate. So I’m using affiliate logic rather than customer logic.
“The auction software does”.
The theory about the bids increasing the price of an item can be used as a METHOD to explain something, but you can’t repeat it as a logical fact. The idea isn’t true in itself.
It will look like the idea is true in some auctions, but it will fail in others. So it’s clearly not true. It won’t pass a logical test for true or false.
I assumed one thing and that is that he paid money for a bid pack. I know nothing and assume nothing beyond that. My comments are not dependent on whether he is an affiliate or not, but I assume that he is.
I made it very clear why I thought penny auctions were never going to be a profitable business and why they are good vehicles for pyramid schemes
Let me refresh your memory. 1. because they look like they should be highly profitable but aren’t and 2. because the legitimate big player are not in competition with them, having already figured this out.
There anything hypothetical in this statement. Do you just call thing hypothetical and flawed when you can not figure out anything else to say. It sure seems like it.
Well of course the software does. Do you think somebody is sitting in an office with a telephone and an abacus? or that E-Bay does not use auction software. Blinking A man.
I have no idea what you are talking about, but this is what I hear;
Bids are a theory that increases the price of an item which can not be repeated as a logicl test or fact which is true or false in itself.
Read that back and tell me if it makes any sense at all, because that is the way you come across. Fruit salad.
I assumed that he was an affiliate investor, that he had watched the presentation video and that he believed in the story he was told there, or that he had got a similar version from other sources.
I also assumed that his primary motive for buying a $1,160 “unit” was the investment opportunity rather than the bids themselves.
I also analysed his questions, i.e. for whether he asked genuine questions about a commonly accepted topic or simply used questions as a method to present his own ideas.
I may not be 100% correct, but people can at least see that I have tried to identify the situation as best as I could before posting anything.
My answers were not about penny auctions in general. I specified clearly that they were about something specific, about the BLG opportunity and the “units”:
I believe he actually paid for the investment. I don’t believe in the idea that his PRIMARY motive when he bought a 2000 bidpack “unit” for $1,160 was about his interest in the bids themselves (to use them in auctions and hopefully win something).
I use “hypothetical” also when an idea is unrealistic.
I can’t fix that for you. If you’re trying to make it become fruit salad it certainly will become fruit salad.
The discussion started when I tried to tell george dagal that bids are worthless in themselves. They are neither worth $0.58 per bid nor $0.01 per bid. I also told him that he could ignore your 1 cent example (if his idea is flawed, then your idea won’t pass the test either).
I simply showed him that it wasn’t about his idea, but about ANY idea where people assume the bids are worth something when they are used in auctions.
I have followed that bright line in all the posts from post #37, but I have also filled in some details and replied to some comments.
And what does that statement have to do with anything. I mean so what?
Its irrelevant even if its true. it clarifies nothing. Its just keystrokes.
Remember you were responding to my statement that “He paid .58 per bid and its illiquid. Lots of investments have a no resale market. To him its worth .58 or he would not have paid the price.”
So what difference does it make what you think his motivations were. It doesn’t change a thing.
Don’t answer. I can’t endure anymore of the endless spin cycle.
Norway I am trying to understand you, but you make no sense.
Are you and Oz related?
I can’t help you with that. We’re discussing it from two different viewpoints. I’m following a bright line from post #28, while you probably are focusing on the comments right in front of your eyes at the moment.
This website is primarily about specific business opportunities, so I have simply not followed your ideas about general penny auction discussion. If I had been very eager discussing penny auctions in general then I probably would have visited a penny auction forum.
I think it’s worth noting that Quibids is still chugging along. I agree in that I can’t see any appeal in the long-term for customers to buy bids (seems like a churn and burn business model with extremely limited repeat-business appeal), however Quibids have been in business for some time now.
It’s more the whole Ponzi points side of the MLM penny auction niche that’s unsustainable, rather then the penny auctions themselves.
It’s a bit of a catch-22 on that front, the typical MLM penny auction is so crappy because it has little to nothing to do with the Ponzi side of the business, which is where all the marketing effort goes. Done right though the penny auction business alone might be profitable, but would be killed anyway by the Ponzi points business model.
(post #35)
I have simply ignored untrue statements in their marketing video, e.g. the explanation about how the penny auction makes profit. It’s about logical tests, not about perspective.
Money comes IN from the newly recruited affiliate, paying $1,160 for 1 “unit”. The money doesn’t “follow the bids around in the system”, that idea is rather weird. Post #21 clearly shows you that in some cases the money ends up in the recruiting sponsor’s bank account.
BE ABLE TO IDENTIFY IT FIRST?
If you’re looking for “trustworthiness” or anything like that, you will first need to define what that is about, to be able to identify it when you see it. If you can’t define it you probably won’t be able to recognize it either.
How can anyone ever be able to show it to you if you’re unable to identify it yourself?
If one of the criterias for “trustworthiness” is about how well people are repeating something from a marketing video then you probably won’t find it here. I have probably watched the same marketing video, but I’m NOT repeating misleading ideas from it like they were facts.
I did understand it, and I have used similar descriptions myself e.g. when analysing ZeekRewards and other programs. But I have used it as a METHOD to describe something in specific situations, not as a “generally accepted fact” that can be repeated in every situation.
The method will be misleading if we’re talking about whether or not the bids actually are holding any monetary value after they have been sold to an investor. Bids do neither hold the value of $0.01 per bid nor the value of $0.58 per bid.
You have indeed paid $1,160 for 1 “unit”, but that doesn’t make the bids it contained worth any monetary value. The money will simply NOT follow the bids around in the system, e.g. from the sponsor’s bank account (post #21) to a receiving bank account when the bids are used.
The $1,160 in the sponsor’s bank account is clearly worth something. The monetary VALUE in the transaction has clearly ended up there. He would be very frustrated if his bank account had been deducted for $0.58 or $0.01 each time bids were used in the auctions. 🙂
If you want me to repeat flawed ideas, I can of course repeat them.
BTW, why do you introduce “respected”, “simple stupid pride” and “reality” as arguments?
* People can clearly be respected even if they have some flawed ideas.
* Experienced people will normally not “invest” too much personal prestige in a discussion, e.g. having to defend arguments simply because of “simple stupid pride”.
* “Reality” will typically be about what people BELIEVE is the reality, i.e. individual ideas rather than some generally accepted ideas.
I can clearly respect people even if they believe bids are worth something of monetary value. I can respect them if they don’t believe in that idea, too. The two other arguments can’t be concluded easily in one or two sentences.
Ideally speaking this is true. A winning bid of $10 implies that 1000 incremental penny bids were required to reach the $10 price.
Since it cost the bidders 58 cents to acquire each bid right, the total cost to the bidding population is 1000 bids x .58 or $58,000. This COST to the bidding population represents REVENUE to the company and its collected through the sale of bulk bid packages.
The $58,000 is spread over all bidders so you have to calculate the cost to an individual bidder separately based on how many times that individual bid.
For example if you were the winning bidder and only had to use one bid to win a $10 item then your cost would be $10 + .58 = $10.58
But…as Oz pointed out WITHOUT RETAIL CUSTOMERS “every dollar spent on a bid attracts a >100% liability”
Meaning that of this $58,000 in revenue that the company received from selling bid packages to affiliates, MORE THAN THAT has been “promised” to the very same affiliates. (mostly to management and your uplines)
Compounding of these liabilities ensures that early and large positions in the pyramid demand a greater and greater absolute portion of the available revenue pie, which if it does not keep growing through retail sales or the recruitment of new affilitates is completely consumed by the payouts to early entrants and the life cycle is complete.
The scheme collapses.
You should probably have asked a few questions before posting your own viewpoint, e.g. have tried to find an existing post and asked questions about the logic.
My description of “Monopoly Money” in post #10 is much more controversial than the “$0.58 per bid” theory. I’m simply describing ALL payouts to the back office as monopoly money, and that idea is much more difficult to defend (because it’s less specific).
You can use that post as an example, and “spread the word all around the internet”, “Those guys at behindmlm.com really have weird ideas, e.g. they don’t believe commissions paid to the back office is real money”.
The weakest point in that logic came when I also included the different e-Wallets, something I clearly haven’t been able to check and something I normally won’t include.
Another post of interest is post #21 / brief reply in post #27. It’s about one of the methods to make money when the program is active, used by experienced recruiters as a defense system against clawbacks from a Receiver.
I had a discussion about it in a “TelexFree” thread at the MMG forum a couple of weeks ago. The discussion there starts at post #625 (page 42) and is mixed in with other topics over a few posts (less than 2 pages).
Disabled link:
moneymakergroup.com/Telexfree-Telexfreeco-t415036.html&st=615
None of the posts I have mentioned here will meet your criterias for “trustworthiness”, but they may potentially meet some criterias for “topics of interest”.
We would probably have been unable to do anything if we had to meet all different types of criterias for “trustworthiness” all the time. Even if SOME people feel SOME criterias are really important, we can’t simply add all of them.
That idea doesn’t reflect the reality. Revenue is about monetary transactions related to trade like activity. I used “trade” to separate it from other financial transactions, e.g. banks and investments.
New investors will typically buy some initial “units” and pay for them with money. Post #21 shows that sometimes the money ends up in the sponsor’s bank account, while he’s using “monopoly money” to pay for the units.
The most significant part of the bid purchases will be paid with monopoly money of some type = any type of payout to the back office (that probably also includes the extra e-Wallets).
Ideas will need to be tested against reality, e.g. like the example I used about money following the bids around in the system, where the sponsor’s bank account had to be deducted for $0.58 each time a bid was used in an auction. That idea clearly fails to meet reality criterias.
Other ideas will also fail, but I haven’t checked each and every idea. Here’s one idea:
If 2000 bids had been worth $1,160 in monetary value they could simply have produced the double amount of bids, rather than trying to get money from buyers or investors.
Other types of ideas are about the bids being “converted” into money when people are spending them in auctions. Nobody has ever been able to describe the exact process where bids are being “converted” into money, e.g. whether it involves some chemical process or a mechanical one, but people simply KNOW it happens in one way or another.
It must be chemical. Bids are purchased with molecules, converted to other molecules (which double upon command) and are “converted” into money where people are spending them in auctions.
I think you are correct. Nobody has ever been able to describe the exact process before but I am clear on it now.
Sarcasm doesn’t work on the Internet, unless you’re The Onion. (And even then some people don’t get the joke)
You forgot the energy part? The auction program will transfer a huge amount of energy from the bidder’s computer. That will attract some cosmical energy to start the chemical process, making the “Bid” button glow for several seconds.
It’s rather weird that they haven’t mentioned anything about that in the marketing video, or explained it like “that part is simply science”. Experienced marketers normally KNOW people will start to ask questions and analyse it themselves if some information is missing.
And don’t try to repeat my explanation here as some type of “logical fact”. It was only a METHOD used to explain the inner workings of a penny auction program.
I won’t quote you.
Seriously?
8 instances where people thought The Onion was reporting real news:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/09/29/fooled-by-the-onion-8-most-embarrassing-fails.html
When the Onion files a report on the electro-chemical conversion of penny auction bids to money please post a link to the article.
Thanks for all your comments. Just be fair I told you my own experience. I love Better Living and wanted to spread my words in the forum. Just fair & open minded.
Also please do not give comments on a wrong number. How $.58 cents X 1000= $58,000. Math error .58 X1000 = 580.00 (Five hundred eighty).
Remember one news reporter did a false report on the Washington DC shooting spree? All of us around the country based on the fake report trying to figure it out how that killer got away? Thanks anyway for all your cautious comments.
We are Asians and we helped each other by trust. By the way the winners took their pictures under the sign Better Living, some of them in front of Louis Vuitton, Rolex,Best Buy. Do more research and ask more questions, you’ll find the true answers and you’ll come to conclusion yourself.
I am happy to be in the US where I can write, express anything freely. I jointed the forum trying to get a real good view about my business. Thank you very much for the FORUM ORGANIZER.
If there’s anything incorrect about analysis of the Ponzi Points MLM business model Better Living Global use feel free to point it out.
But enough of the crapping on about the penny auctions like they even matter. You are paid a daily ROI for 99 days out of newly recruited affiliate’s investments, based on how much you yourself initially invest and continue to re-invest.
That’s how Better Living Global works and every other Ponzi points MLM penny auction before it.
The calculated passive aggressive tone you adopt to insinuate the analysis here is neither fair, factual, trustworthy, correct or true is contritely nauseating to read through.
Logic and reason are what rule the day here, not blind trust in people because they’re Asian.
(Ozedit: I told you to stop crapping on about the penny auctions. Comparing a Ponzi points penny auction to eBay, are you kidding me?)
I apologize for the math error.
All that proves is some people pose for photos holding boxes at certain locations. It doesn’t prove anything else. That’s the true answer.
If you want to ASSUME that 1) those are real winners 2) the auctions are not rigged 3) the boxes actually contains products the boxes say they are and so on, that’s your business. 🙂
K.CHANG: Ignore all other winners. I am winners myself. Free Country, free judgment.
OZ: I do not have time to discuss with you. I answered a question in the FORUM and you don’t have to read my answer. I did not compare Ebay and bp8.hk. The Forum will not be helpful if it rules by narrow minded, jealous people like you.
HOSS: I confused about the number just like you. We never count penny. Never mind about math error. Exchange knowledge is what I am looking in this Forum. I don’t mean to correct any one. The true will be respected here. Thank you.
Yeah, you did – and I nuked it. Do not lie to me son.
So ignore the glaring Ponzi scheme and continue to harp on about the completely irrelevant penny auctions. Won’t work here.
At best, you offer anecdotal evidence, which doesn’t really prove anything. You don’t know and don’t care if the auctions are rigged for you just so you can provide testimony about it.
You tried to tell us that every bid are sold for $1 in China (in post #8).
WHERE and HOW do they sell them?
E.G. do the affiliates recruit retail customers directly, and those recruited customers are the ones paying $1 per bid?
* Or is it about random customers registering at the auction website, buying bidpacks directly from the auction?
There’s two types of models for where the customers potentially can sign up.
* at an affiliate’s website
* at the auction website / BLG’s website
There’s two types of models for how those retail customers can be organized in the system.
* sorted under affiliate = purchases will pay commissions
* sorted under the company itself = no commissions
Hey everyone, just to help clear some things out, any payouts done by the company are paid in $HK. Any purchases of units must also be done in $HK.
Therefore when a sponsor receives your $1600 he must use his own $HK9000 to purchase your unit. As those $HK are “worth” $1600 he isn’t really making any money from it. It is simply a trade because he can cash out those $HK.
Here is an example of when he absolutely doesn’t keep any of that money in his bank account.
He has no $HK in his eWallet. He asks other members to transfer him $HK and once he recieves $1600, he must pay the other members for the money they transferred.
I’m not completely for or agains this website. I’m just simply trying to see the truth and help you guys understand as well.
Unless he uses his Ponzi ROI to do so and just pockets the money given to him by his newly recruited downline.
This is a practice routinely engaged in by Ponzi participants generating a large enough daily ROI to do so, so that when the authorities come knocking there’s no paper trail to follow and affiliate-investors in his downline are screwed when it comes to clawbacks.
I know someone currently involved in this scheme, and they are definitely using their Ponzi ROI to “reinvest” (and doing so with USD).
Interestingly, when I asked if this person had any plans to get out before the SEC came knocking, I was informed that Better Living is talking about stopping active recruitment altogether to stay “under the radar”. When I asked where the continued funds would come from, I got some fuzzy answer about the “top guys” (Luke Teng?) reinvesting in some other business and members getting to keep their “retirement”. I never get concrete answers to my questions. All I know is that the people who are investing, are investing big.
I can tell you for a fact that members use their own $HK paid to them by the company to either cash out or reinvest. If Member A has $HK9000 and Member B needs $HK9000 (for self or recruitments money), Member A transfers via internet and Member B pays in cash (in whatever currency needed).
This is how the members in my location get their money in cash. This is done instead of transferring to you personal bank account from the Better Living bank account (I don’t remember the actual name of it), since the there is a 2% transfer fee.
I can testify to that. People are definitely getting their moneys worth. It seems like a great short time investment if you have the that kind of money. As with everyone else, my worries are the life span of this company.
Nice article great posts. I won’t argue the specifics if bids. In my opinion everybody involved knows that’s the bids are useless and only created to keep this ponzi from not looking like a ponzi.
What perplexes me is I know people involved in this so called biz op and they down right know its a ponzi. They have invested 10k some of them. Insane!
U know its going to collapse and your gonna probably lose your money. We have seen numerous like schemes fail. So why are peps still falling for this? Dumbasses.
I am so glad to find this website cuz I was ready to put out over $ 18,000.00.
I am passing this to the guy who introduce me to this. I kept saying to him and the leader who is in L.A. “if it is to good to be, DON’T DO IT!!!!!! PERIOD!!!!!” WOW.
I have it on 2nd hand knowledge that Luke Teng is working on phasing out recruitment in U.S. because he’s afraid of oversight. Apparently, BLGM is actively expanding to other countries, but I’m not so clear on whether they’re expanding the ponzi to other countries or just the bid scam.
Either way, it seems like Mr. Teng is specifically concerned about being shut down by US regulators. This, for some psychological reason I can’t identify, seems to put existing members’ minds at ease because to them it means that Mr. Teng is looking at the “big picture”. As if “not getting caught” was an admirable business plan.
If you operate a business that has to come up with creative ways to not get noticed, then something’s wrong with your business!
Yes, members are instructed during to specifically avoid typical ponzi phrases when talking about this mess. I don’t think any member is under the delusion that it’s not a ponzi scheme, but they certainly don’t seem to care.
The general attitude seems to be that they think they’re making money (although I suspect most of them are going to end up losing money), so who cares?
Ah, “the elephant in the room” problem. 🙂 Something nobody talks about, but everybody know is there. 🙂
Frankly, any “business” that needs to avoid “ponzi phrases” in its description is probably a Ponzi scheme. Ad Surf Daily and several similar Ponzi schemes did that.
http://amlmskeptic.blogspot.com/2012/07/scam-study-ad-surf-daily.html
The information here has been presented very well. A friend of mine joined this opp a few weeks ago, they told me that they paid right under $1200.00 and had to place so many bids by a certain time in other to earn money.
When I took a look at the program I knew instantly that it was a Ponzi scheme. I feel sorry that some people seem to never learn to see the signs, all they see is the hope to make some money..
I understand everyones point of view and respect that. All i know is the i made $11,000 USD in 3 months! I LOVE THIS MLM and BETTER LIVING!
If you truly did understand and respect everyone’s point of view, you’d have realised what you did or didn’t make is entirely irrelevant.
Shill
I live in south Cal. This is definitely a pyramid, or ponzi scheme.
This product was presented to me this past weekend and the guy that presented the business plan says this business is gaining momentum in the Hispanic community and the Asian community.
I believe this is the reason; the Asians have a gambling habit, and this online penny bidding is a gamble, since the person that presented the plan to me has made $100,000 in the past 9 months, according to him, but he has not won a single bid.
And second, Older Hispanics in California are very naive and ignorant when it comes to understanding matrices and multilevel marketing compensation plans, they go all in on emotion, so it is just a matter of time before the Feds catch up to this mlm scheme, this is just an educated opinion.
There is no meetings in English in LA or San Diego, just Spanish. I wounder why.
There are English meetings in SoCal, but they are not as widely publicized. Most of the people recruiting have been instructed not to advertise. They’re all familiar with Zeek and are trying desperately not to get caught.
There are certain Asain and hispanic communities that are very closely knit–which is why you find some industries are primarily run by people of certain language and cultural similarities.
They network amongst each other for business purposes–just like any other cultural group, so it makes sense that they would recruit amongst their professional contacts.
The bidding is more or less irrelevant to the affiliates. Most of them aren’t concerned about bidding with their units–they’re reinvesting. I’ve heard that there have been people from SoCal who have “won” bids (you purchase the product and are reimbursed for the difference…?), but I have no first hand verification.
Regardless, there’s no way Bidder’s Paradise is sustaining the returns that are being paid. From what I can tell, recruiters use the bidding structure solely as a lure to reassure investors that they are “different” from Zeek.
Last I checked, Bidders Paradise wasn’t getting enough traffic for it to matter whether or not people were winning bids, but maybe that’s changed since it’s been around awhile now.
The real problem here are the affiliates themselves and their religious zeal. Returns are so high, they’re completely unconcerned with consequences.
I know people left and right (Big time distributors in the US) that are throwing tens of thousands of dollars in to this. And turning around and selling 100’s of thousands in Units… it’s insane how many people are throwing money into this with no concern that they could shut down at any time.
This is scary.
My concern is the company will eventually be at a point where they are paying out way more than what is coming in and they will just shut down and disappear.
Other than that it seems they are pretty much bullet proof from the US, fortunately for the distributors.
I would run not walk away from this scheme
hi everyone, so I know this is not legal, or barely legal, frankly, I am tempted to invest lol key word “invest” one unit.
I dont care if they get caught or not, as long as I get my money back and profit I will be good..then invest even more…only and I mean only after making my money back.
The guys were bullshit. How the fuck, do you invest or buy 40 units and recover it back in 3 months? all these people are lying, they have to be.
There are meetings in spanish, english, korean, vietnamese, where I went… however after reading all these comments I think I will just invest in something else. Who has honestly recovered their money here?
Typically, there’s 4 different methods to generate money, but all of them will be vulnerable to a collapse or shutdown. I’m talking GENERALLY about “programs like this”, not specifically about this program.
1. The passive investor idea. Earn a daily or weekly ROI solely on your own investment, withdraw money ASAP.
2. The compounder idea. Earn money from your own investment and reinvestment, e.g. double your investment in 90 days by reinvesting 100%, then follow an 80/20 plan (80% reinvestment, 20% withdrawal).
3. The recruiter idea. Put in a relatively low amount yourself, but recruit other investors and encourage them to invest higher amounts. You will earn most of your money from commissions derived from your own downline.
4. The pay yourself idea. Some programs have the possibility to generate new memberships under yourself, directly from the back office. You will need to save up some payouts to the back office first.
Whenever you recruit a new member, “help them register” directly from your own back office = generate PINs and units for the new member, and use your own virtual currency to pay for it. Let the new member pay directly to you rather than to the company (you have already paid the company).
I will not recommend any of the 4 methods, but passive investors and compounders will typically be among the net losers if they don’t join very early.
You’re joining this very LATE. They will use the money coming in from you to pay some of the old investors. You’re in for the experience rather than the money, e.g. you like to support other people financially?
I tried to withdraw my ewallet but not deposited in my bank its been 4 months already I have no idea where I can reached them if its email phone.
Does any one here knows what’s there email address or phone number?
Sure, jump on a plane to Hong Kong.
Good luck.
Here you go, ms confused:
Really? Your the first I heard of. Please tell me what your upline in suggesting to do. You can’t be the only one with this problem.
Yeah. I hope this problem will be address soon because my friends invest lots of money here. Like buying more than 20 units and there hoping that they gonna get money here.
@ oz
Hey I don’t need your opinion…
Yet you expect us to listen to yours?
Better Living is such a blatant and obvious low grade, back alley scam, that I previously refused to even comment on it….that is until I was called this week by three different people asking me to evaluate the program and share my opinion (the basic come on line)…
OMG, this stinker is so low and so fraudulent a program that it will probably run through that Southern California Orange County group of knuckle-heads like wild fire….watch out for your family and friends.
@confused
It wasn’t an opinion. Be sure to send us a postcard from Hong Kong.
Has anyone actually made money , actual money in there U.S bank account? Can’t seem to find any real people that say they have.
SEC, FTC, CPB. When will this ponzi better living global marking be shut down..
Sec, FTC etc… Could care less… They can’t access any funds so its not worth their time.
Look at Zeek! Maybe it was a scam… But the SEC saw an almost billion dollar company and wanted to cash out! Believe it or not its the truth!
No buts. Zeek Rewards was most definitely a scam so please take your silly anti-government conspiracy theories elsewhere.
ms confused: Check with your upline about cashing in. You can also sell the unit your upline or downline instantly for cash instead of waiting for the wire transfer which take 7 business days.
Right now the company is experiencing tremendous growth and are always in need of units. Hang in there… You are in the right place.
To all: This business is not for the faint of heart. It takes balls the size of a moose. People are making extreme amount of money. I witnessed people coming in at 100 – 400 units at a time.
I also witnessed an old retired lady cashing in $30000 in only “retirement bonus” money alone, which is a small change compared to her other earnings. And she’s only in it for 11 months.
Tell that to her about it not working. Timing is the key. I suggest you jump in NOW. If you wait 6 months later you’ll be crying on this site again.
If you don’t see it you will never see it….because the wall is already up way too high.
Oz not sure why you got so defensive. We know the SEC and feds were watching Zeek for quite some time. Because they were in the states do you not believe it was easier for them to get shut down?
Could our US govt take down better living? And if so how? I’m not in BL. I was not in Zeek. But know a lot of people that are throwing tens of thousands into BL and I’m afraid for them…
And yes no buts about it… Zeek was a total ponzi!
It was a scam.
Zeek Rewards was a scam long before the SEC got involved.
An MLM company’s business model and compensation plan make it a Ponzi scheme, not “the feds”.
Ponzi schemes work on the distribution of new investor funds. Go after the money.
Being located in the US most certainly makes it more cost-effective, but that doesn’t mean offshore based Ponzi schemes are free to run amok.
Do you really think if Zeek Rewards had a PO Box corporate address in Hong Kong they’d still be in business today?
I can’t answer when, if or how Better Living Global will get taken down. If the volume of activity surrounding the scheme is accurate though and it spirals out of control like Zeek did though, I imagine we’ll be reading about another Liberty Reserve style shutdown over the next year or so.
Hong Kong based scams are usually small-scale and target the Chinese mainland. To the best of my knowledge we haven’t seen a major one play out with a large global investor base.
Have a think about why the Ponzi scheme Go Fun Rewards banned US participants when they fled back to Hong Kong.
I’m very curios to get into the business, but not sure if that company is legally work in USA, is somebody there to advise me about it?
Rodrigo, your best bet is to walk into your nearest lawyer’s office and ask them about the legality of participating in Ponzi schemes in the US.
A practical analysis should be enough on the due diligence side of things but if you’re still after a legal opinion, speak to a lawyer.
so basically this is just another version of the Zeek scam? i wonder how much longer it will last. good luck folks.
Not necessarily. Hong Kong in recently years had become a new “offshore registrar” for shady companies. Apparently it is almost as easy to get registration papers there as in Cyprus, Seychelles, and those offshore tax havens.
I had previously looked into IBCTravel, which was a TVI Express clone started by ex-TVItes. Though based in Kazhakstan, it’s registered out of Hong Kong.
http://kschang.hubpages.com/hub/Is-IBCTravelscom-a-real-way-to-travel-and-earn-money-or-is-it-just-a-clone-of-an-existing-scam
Scams aimed at Chinese mainland are generally based in Chinese mainland, easier to distribute products there. Better Living, with website in English and Chinese, is aimed at the Chinese diaspora (all the Chinese that left for foreign lands, including Hong Kong itself)
I know someone who claims that they have.
Hey, ridiculous ponzi pitch person: All of what you said proves it’s a ponzi scheme. Once recruitment stops, the whole pyramid implodes.
I gave this exact advice to a friend who elected not to listen and invested anyway. *sigh*
BLGM is trying to scrub its online marketing presence. They’re taking down presentations posted online, removing You Tube videos, etc.The only way they are different than Zeek is by trying not to get noticed.
Also, it looks like they are targeting a lot ESL affiliates in SoCal–and not just Chinese, but other Asian and Hispanic communities. Anyone know what the SoCal connection is? There must be some OC guy upline connected directly to HK.
many people seem to be worried about how the members get the “real money” and the actual products won in the auctions.
i do get why people would get concerned if there are no physical evidence that you can actually see, and especially if you live on the other side of the world from hk, and no trusting connections there.
from the quantity and the length of the posts here, maybe they are waiting for a superhero to come along and give them the right answers so they finally have the courage to get on the boat.
first of all, the pictures on the penny site are real, ok? i have been there to receive my own product that i won. someone have already posted the address right at the top of the posts, the office is at Tsim Sha Tsui.
the reason that most of the people there are Chinese is because the majority of members are from hk. you can definitely win products at the auctions as well, it is harder to win now due to the number of members increasing sharply.
someone mentioned that a person who bought a lot of accounts needed to bid at the auction site everyday or something along the lines. you need to bid at least 20 bids per day for you to receive the global dividend, it is to encourage the members to bid on the auction site regularly.
they do also have a physical office in china, not the hk branch, fyi. the hotline is (Ozedit: number removed).
Seriously, some dude’s gunna play the “our auctions are legit” card on Better Living Global after Zeek Rewards? Damn.
Nobody is worried about anything, affiliates get money from new affiliates. Duh.
Wooh the pictures are real. You heard it here first folks. Better Living Global Marketing isn’t just recycling new affiliate money to existing investors because the “penny auction pictures are real”.
Why would someone need to “buy a lot of accounts”? Yeah, nothing suss there.
Why waste your time? Just recruit new affiliate investors – that’s where the company generates its revenue.
Up-thread someone from California said that he was sent the Apple items he won. Hmmm…
In a recent presentation in the Philippines we were told that since we didn’t live in HongKong, we’d have to buy the item where we live and send the receipt as well as a picture of yourself holding the item and only then will we be reimbursed for the price difference (cost of your purchase less the amount you won at auction).
I didn’t want to interrupt the guy’s spiel but I know I should have asked for proof of payment and how long it takes to get reimbursed. I smell a rat. The entire three-hour presentation was suspect.
I am a member of Better Living and as far as I am concerned it’s the best thing I have invested in. Everyone I know has been making money.It is a great concept.
For those of you who don’t believe in it that is your choice…especially for the one who wrote this article,,,as far as I am concerned..you are not only ignorant …but an idiot as well…there is not one person who joined I know who has lost money….
I guess it’s easy to to take shots at a company looking from the outside and not really knowing what’s going on…(Ozedit: derail attempt removed)…oh well…good luck to you.
I love it when people who fail to understand the basic mathetmatic flaws of a Ponzi scheme come on here ranting about the money they’ve made in said schemes.
It’s even funnier when they call out other people as ignorant idiots.
I have 2 simple questions, relatively easy to answer.
You can only count “money OUT minus money IN” when you’re talking about winnings or loss. Money you have invested or reinvested in “units” doesn’t count. Sometimes people don’t separate their own “perceived reality” from the reality itself.
It’s a big difference if you know a very few people and most of them joined early, or if you know many who have joined just recently. So please be a little more specific?
Everybody knows its a ponzi! Lets stop trying to say its not. Thus if your making money it can be helping you. But still a ponzi.
I have a few friends tht are involved with about 40 units. So far from what I am told the only money they have made is the member to new member bank wire to purchase units. So if your not bringing bodies into this company you aren’t making any money. (Ponzi).
There is not product or auction , that is the ruse that people use to make it sound legit. Another woman I know did successfully with draw money from her back office and wire it to her U.S. bank account and supposedly it took over 2 weeks to get the money. I have my doubts.
So here’s the deal with this company. Don’t bring people in dont make money. Just like the pyramid schemes you used see taking place in your local bar or friends house.
Btw if your making money good for you. I don’t judge or care what goes on in anyone’s world. Just here to give some real life info about this company. So please stop the praising and BS about the integrity of this company and how legit it is. We all know already.
Real question is how long will it last and can you lure in enough people to get your seed money out. Good luck.
Yes, people who “invest” in ponzi schemes often do make money. Sometimes they make a lot. Not really the point.
My parents just came to me about their “investment” and how theyre going to purchase units for each of us kids for our inheritance. I’m very worried.
This isnt their first trip down ponzu-scheme lane. They’ve been burned terribly!! Why they’re doing this again baffles me. Can someone tell me what tax/legal implications this could have on them?
That doesn’t need to be negative in itself, it depends on the number of units and how they pay for them. The internal transactions are simply about “monopoly money”, they are not about real money.
It can simply be about one of the methods for reinvesting “Ponzi points”, using multiple user accounts rather than 1 single account. They’re most likely planning to register you as part of their own downline, to earn commissions from their own reinvestments.
If it is about reinvestment, you can simply accept it. It’s a method to earn “recruitment commission” from their own reinvestments, a relatively rational idea. It won’t cost them anything in real money.
If it’s about putting more money in “from the outside”, then it’s another story. That will eventually cost them real money.
As far as I can see, it’s most likely about reinvestment of “monopoly money” (payouts to the back office, other internal transactions). It FEELS like real money inside the scheme, e.g. they can use them for reinvestments and to pay for membership and other internal stuff, but they can’t use it to pay for anything else, e.g. pay other bills.
Net winners can risk clawbacks (paying back their net winnings), if the scheme is shut down by authorities. Net winnings = money paid OUT (withdrawn) minus money paid IN (not internal transactions).
The IRS has some information about how to deduct money lost in frauds, how to post clawbacks, similar type of info. But I don’t think you should start from that point (reading tax rules often feels more confusing than useful).
I tried to analyse it as best as I could. I BELIEVE it’s about internal reinvestments = you can feel relatively relaxed about it.
I have used a special method here when I analysed it, trying to identify THEIR idea rather than your idea, trying to find rational explanations rather than irrational ones. I have simply started from the opposite viewpoint, trying to see it as a solution to something (for them) rather than seeing it as a problem.
I’m a former sales man, and I have exactly that type of “ethical standard”, i.e. I will try to identify “acceptable solutions” based on how people have described something and what I know about the topic.
I believe you have better chances if you identify their idea as rational in itself. They have made an initial investment in something that pretends to be a lucrative investment, in a number of $1,175 “units” that will generate ROI for 99 days, where most of the ROI has to be reinvested in more “units”.
Typical initial investments are 1 unit, 3 units (2 of them in downline), 7 units (2+4 of them in downline), 15 units (2+4+8 of them in downline), or higher numbers of units. The idea of having the units organized as a downline is to earn commission (get a discount) on your own reinvestments.
The idea of adding family members to a downline is most likely motivated by something in the compensation plan, some types of commissions they can earn EXTRA if they introduce “other investors”. I identified that to be the primary idea here, and I identified it to be about reinvestments rather than about putting more money in.
The idea of adding other people (other than family) to a downline is about other types of motives, but the primary motive is about making a profit.
If you bid you get paid. The upline say that Mr Teng Is a wonderful christian man and a millionaire who doesn’t need money And that he would never ever defraud us.
I only know Mr teng by word of mouth But since he is a Chinese Christian that’s good enough for me.
Wrong. If you invest you get paid. You have to put money into the scheme before you can take out other people’s money.
Thanks for the late evening laugh. Cheers.
There truly is one born every minute
Did you ask about it, did it come up as a topic during a normal conversation, did he insist on telling you about it?
I may have a better type of question for you to ask your sponsor, e.g. about how the auction profit is generated.
Mr. Teng has already defrauded you in some parts, e.g. “How does the penny auction generate profit?” (in one of the marketing videos).
In the example shown there, they calculated how 60,000+ bids would convert into $36,000 in gross profit for the auction.
I tested the logic against a real example, where a prospected new affiliate was asked to pay the money directly to the sponsor’s private bank account.
* The money is clearly paid from the newly recruited affiliate’s account into the sponsor’s private bank account. The MONEY ends up there.
* The sponsor is using payouts to the back office to pay for the “unit” and for the membership.
* The newly recruited affiliate will get 1 “unit” (2000 bids).
How can those bids generate any profit when they’re being used in auctions?
Profit is about MONEY, and the money paid in by the newly recruited affiliate ended up in the sponsor’s private bank account.
Spending 1000 bids in an auction will reduce someone’s “bid balance” by 1000 bids, but it will not bring any MONEY into the auction. If the auction is generating any type of “profit”, the profit will be in “bids” rather than in MONEY.
If you don’t understand the question or the logic, just forget it. Your own conclusions are probably much better for you if you can’t understand simple business logics.
Interesting comments.
The money in the MLM system is worth nothing unless you have someone willing to buy it from you with paper money of some kind. which they do.
The company is robbing peter to pay Paul just like… (Ozedit: This is not the place to rant about “the fed” and stockmarkets)
Not quite. In many cases, MLM is about taking money from OTHER PEOPLE WHO WANT TO MAKE MONEY, and telling them that’s the way to make money… by convincing OTHER people it’s a great idea (like you did to them). That… is fraud.
I purchased 15 Units May 12, 2013. I get paid Daily Dividends and take my money out weekly. My plan is not to sell Units and repay myself my initial cost as fast as the money comes in.
I have received half my money back in 4 months. After 8 months I will have received all my initial cost back. After that I can’t lose any money if it crashes. Each person must decide if the risk is worth the reward.
I know there is risk, but so far it is paying me better any thing else I could find. I would suggest not to put more money in it than you can afford to lose.
It’s not “paying” you.
It’s giving you your own money back.
Until you get your original stake back, you’re not being “paid” anything.
It’s paying you your own money back. That’s not profit. That’s bogosity. After that, it’s paying you OTHER PEOPLE’S MONEY.
This is satire, right?
I just got paid today.All the money I put I got it all back now this thing is paying off.
if you all say it is no good then you are all crazy.
@D.Sprague
You mean giving you new affiliate investor money. There is nothing “good” about Ponzi schemes.
It’s not about being crazy, it’s about attraction. If you’re able to analyse it for what it really is, it becomes less attractive. You can see that some of my comments in this thread have caused “cognitive dissonance” in some readers, e.g. when I ask typical business question.
I’m simply not attracted to businesses that revolves around “belief systems”, where faith in something is an essential factor to keep people psychological stable, where people are getting “emotionally disturbed” when they suddenly have to face the reality (e.g. simple logical business questions).
Ask yourself which one of us who are most crazy, but try to see it from a neutral and realistic viewpoint rather than from your own. You’re attracted to something I’m not very attracted to, where you need to convince yourself that others are crazy if they don’t share a similar belief system.
I will identify that belief system to be about the “Bigger Fool Theory”. People will make money if enough other fools will join the system after them, and sometimes it will work and sometimes not. But the idea itself doesn’t work as a “system” you can rely on.
The problem is that all of the people withdrawing money aren’t just acting on faith, they literally do NOT care about where the money is actually coming from.
A lot of my fiends have invested in this 🙁
It sickens me so much to read and hear about some people fall for ponzis and scams such as BL. I met recruiters will lie to death just to get unsuspecting and naïve victims to participate in their schemes.
I saw some friends who lost their hard earned money. I warned them but chose to ignore me.
Have read this thread but am still waiting on someone to say they have been burned by BL.
That’s how Ponzi schemes go. The “mainstream” ones pay out at over the initial 2 year honeymoon phase and then things get rough.
You aren’t burned till you are, and then it’s too late.
As long as enough new investors are putting money IN, and enough old investorss are reinvesting and “compounding”, no one will feel burned. But that will only mean that MORE people eventually will be burned, so it isn’t very positive.
Whether or not people have been burned (financially) until now isn’t really important. You know they WILL be burned financially (if you have relatively rational ideas about reality, rather than believing in some cult ideas).
Some have already got burned mentally, they will get “disturbed” and “upset” by simple logical questions about realities. So YES, people have clearly been burned.
Did that answer your question?
Sometimes it takes several years. Remember how long the SEC took with Madoff, and he was handed to them on a silver platter.
People have SHOWED it to you rather than telling it directly. You just need to look at some of the comments posted earlier, and you will need to be able to “read between the lines” in some of the posts.
You will find people who are “frustrated” when their own “belief system” don’t reflect the reality, when they find out that they have cheated themselves.
MANY or MOST seems to clearly have been burned in one way or another. But people don’t like to talk about things like that, so you can’t expect anyone to tell it to you directly. They must first be able to admit it to themselves, and for some people that process can take years.
I joined Better Living without full understanding. I was inspired by the money my frriend was making.
I bought 6 units to start with. In a month, I was able to buy more units and ended up having 10. I studied the mechanism of the business and all I can say, I am so excited and I love it.
To those who are so negative, you have the option not to join. I guess you are just jealous you do not have the courage to take the risk……
“Jealousy” says the investor who put up his money without even understanding what he was putting it into.
Yeah… jealous, that’s totally it. Whatever helps you sleep at night while you rip off those who invest after you.
Ah, the everlasting “sour grapes” argument. Your thoughts are so limited by your greed, you cannot POSSIBLY understand why people would criticize your favorite scheme… except “jealousy”, which is the only think you can come up with.
How about airing out your brain for a while? It’s getting moldy in there.
http://amlmskeptic.blogspot.com/2012/06/bad-argumentsour-grapes-argument-and.html
Here ya go, SHININGSTALLION, a brand new word and concept for you.
just started today hoping for the best ; scary; i bought 15 units but u have to gamble ,,,,,
You sound like a person who needs to understand why God made prohylactics.
prophylactics ??
Yes sorry for the misspelling.
Dear all,
In conclusion after reading all comments It is a Ponzi and MLM marketing. As far as I know it is not legal in Hong Kong. But still people are doing this in Hong Kong!!!!!!
Hello,
This message appears on the bp8.hk (Bidder’s Paradise) site this morning:
The beginning of the end.
This program is amazing my life is change i am from usa
Where can we see our back office now? If we can’t open the site 🙁
By the looks of it your life is about to change again…for the worse.
Or most possible the beginning of the reality that BL is a difference in the MLM field
…. postponed to until 11:59:59, October 18, 2013, Hong Kong time.
That does sound very promising.
This is the only business in the world which has changed our life,please do whatever it take to save the situation,even if it mean appealing to usa gov.to help or other gov.
FINALLY. I’m sick of getting in debates about this. Just let it be over already.
Stop debating it then.
Save what? All you have is their word that it’s a hack attack.
The same excuse had been used by various Ponzi schemes in the world, from Profitable Sunrise to Zeek Rewards. The later even has an almost identical business model.
The only thing that’ll save your money is for the scheme to be shut down IMMEDIATELY to prevent your money from going out to those who don’t deserve it.
Maybe you learn proper English.
Maybe, you SHOULD learn proper English??
What will happen with people’s money, will somebody come and tells us what next. What’s the best way to go about this?
The webside us been down for more than 3days, what we here from the leaders “don’t panic everything is ok” we trust them hopefully they know what they are talking about.
Unfortunately, Peter, it’s more likely you are about to get a very important lesson on the realities of online fraud than it is that BLGM returns.
If BLGM is anything like the hundreds of thousands of fake MLMs infesting the internet (and there’s no reason to believe it isn’t) it will simply disappear completely , along with the members’ money, within in a matter of weeks.
I’m getting a lot of requests asking about what’s going on with Better Living, so let me clarify that I know as much as what is known publicly. That is the backoffice went down 3 days ago and the company has uploaded the following message to its affiliate website (no idea when):
This comment is date-stamped so treat it as six hours from now.
Due to the affiliate rules the company enforces there’s no public chatter about what is currently going on with BLGM.
From experience radom DDOS attacks and then a change of hosts usually indicates a scheme being abruptly notified by their host to leave. I’m noting Better Living’s auction and main website aren’t down, so it just appears to be the backend. This might indicate a payment processor problem.
When Ponzi schemes start using DDOS excuses, claims of accounts being hacked usually appear shortly thereafter so be on the look out for that.
If I hear anything further I’ll update.
Finally, just a reminder that BehindMLM is not Better Living Global Marketing tech support. Queries about specific accounts and how to access invested funds will be marked as spam.
As an affiliate with BLGM, accessing the website was unbelievably slow on Friday, so are you going to say that was because the server suspended BLGM befor it was suspended/terminated?
@Tim
Could be anything, being moved to a smaller server, indeed a DDOS attack, only part of the server network getting cut off etc…, You never really know with Ponzi schemes.
The DDOS attack / accounts got hacked excuses however are standard “we’re running out of ROI money” though.
Latest update on the BLGM website:
Seems odd they didn’t suspend the 29th. Meanwhile they’ve changed the ETA to 8 hours. The original 6 hour notice was published at least six and a half hours ago now.
A skeptic might say that your payment processor has declined to do further processing of BLGM transactions because of the nature of its business. That would be the cause of the effects you are seeing.
Oz, the problem with the notion that perhaps BLGM is running out of money would not be consistent with looking at other so called Ponzi schemes like ZeekRewards, remember when zeekrewards went out they had over 300 million in reserves.
On the contrary, Tim.
Zeek had how many members and had been in existence how long ??
* While $300 million might sound like a lot of money, compared to how much Zeek members were “owed” $300 million is a drop in the ocean
* no one has yet done an audit showing exactly how much Zeek had in “reserve”
* Zeek is being described as a $600 million fraudulent scheme, I would be very surprised if half of that $600 million was available or “in reserve”
* As Oz so clearly points out above, with the rates of return being offered by BLGM, it would be a miracle if it attracted sufficient “new money” to be able to survive 12 months.
Littleroundman, if you understood correctly the zeekrewards model, you would know that zeeks outstanding amount owed was cashed out on each successive day, and if you did not cash out on that day but reinvested, your amount was not an immediate liability. And as for the 300 million in reserves, I got that from the receivers accounting.
Oz, the reason for not suspending the payout for the 29th was because there is no payouts on Sundays.
Zeek had around $225 million in reserves, but not very available. It had trouble cashing in checks since the end of May 2012, it had reserves as guarantees against potential charge backs, and it probably had money tied up in several other ways. People experienced payment problems in the last 2 weeks of July, so the money wasn’t “easily available”.
$225 million in reserves = 5-7 days of payouts, if each and every investor had started to withdraw 100% (based on 3 billion VIP points * 1.5% per day = $45 million per day). But Zeek already HAD payment problems even BEFORE the shutdown, it would have been unable to handle a “run”.
If BLGM is in a similar situation, your “units” will be worth $1,160 * 7.5% = $87 each (but they’re not worth anything, I only used them as an example).
Maybe you no understand Chinglish humor. Haha.
OZ,
BLGM was supposed to have a major conference HK this week. Will Mr teng pull Scott Rothstein move?
300 million that can’t be moved, held up at eWallet companies as security deposit, undeposited checks, “lost” funds in various accounts, and only decreasing every day / week… And they’re burning through 700 million a month…
It took the receiver a whole month to find that 300 mil across a dozen different banks, processors, eWallet companies, and so on. That’s not reserve funds.
@Tim
Please don’t quote BS. Zeek Rewards were $2 million or so (been a while since I looked at it) short of collapse before the SEC shut them down.
They were going to go under when withdrawals were projected to exceed incoming investments in September anyway. And that’s with the points re-investment…
Ponzi schemes always hit that critical mass sooner or later. Better Living Global is no different.
Latest update stalls for more time:
Changing servers isn’t a complicated task…
What is the “price increase” that is mentioned? Also note that the price increase is postponed to until 11:59:59, October 18, 2013, Hong Kong time.
Conference still on
Oz, it takes time to link everyone’s back office to the linked site, then test it and make sure it goes smoothly, oz your reaching now…
I’m still getting pitched this stupid program! Hard not to debate when people I like are trying to sucker me into something that’s both illegal and failing.
Good grief.
I guess communication with its members must be really bad if people are turning to a critic’s site for tech support with their Ponzi scheme website.
Woohoo….we’re back up
Interesting discussions, some lucid, others quite informing.
BLGM is what no one on this forum completely and honestly understands. Numerous comments. Some, out of emotion because of involvement or affiliation, others out of informed knowledge or from past experiences.
Fact; people are/will make money, some may loose money, is that different from any human endeavor? People loose money everyday in legal and transparent businesses. In fact, people loose their lives as babies are born daily.
Enough of the illogical logics. Tnx
@Hoss
Looking at the auctions it seems the price inflation that comes with the penny auction Ponzi points model is in full swing.
No doubt it’s an attempt to suck more money from affiliates and address price inflation in the auctions.
@MC
BLGM is simple a re-imagining of the Ponzi points compensation model, as introduced by Zeek Rewards and Paul Burks. Anyone who claims otherwise is either lying to themselves or being flat-out deceitful.
The “you all just don’t understand” argument won’t work here.
The analysis contained in the BehindMLM Better Living Global Marketing review contains neither. It is based purely on the BLGM compensation plan and business model.
None of those “facts” have anything to do with Better Living being a blatant Ponzi points clone scheme.
“Enough of the illogical logics. Tnx”.
@Oz – Can you decipher the message on bp8.hk? Looks like they used Google translate, and I can’t make heads or tails of it.
The English translation is quite accurate, actually. Seems they are claiming some participants are using “unnatural” (bidbots?) to rig auctions and they’re gonna “shoot first and sort them out later”.
None of those “facts” have anything to do with Better Living being a blatant Ponzi points clone scheme.
Social Security, Medicare, Life are ponzies. So what?
@Stop Ponzis
Taken from the Bidder’s Paradise website:
This isn’t the use of bots, it’s the dumping of excess bids on dummy accounts to collect Ponzi points, and then spending those points on auctions to maximise affiliate ROIs.
You can’t run a legit penny auction with the Ponzi points model as bid inflation goes through the roof over time. When you have a bunch of dummy customer accounts accumulating thousands of bids the bids become worthless and people bid well over retail for items.
I noted this yesterday before the announcement went up, when I saw items going for sale for well over a thousand dollars. This is Zeek Rewards and Zeekler repeating itself all over again, only Better Living are trying to pass it off as “getting advantages” from the auctions.
@Warren
The only “facts” needed are the Better Living Global Marketing compensation plan, which reveals that the scheme is indeed a bog-standard Ponzi points operation.
not MLM companies and are thus irrelevant. You’ll have to put down your copy “Ponzi excuses 101” if you wish to participate here.
BLGM BETTING ON THE GREATER FOOL THEORY… 17 OCT. IT SHALL
IMPLODE.
I got triple of the money that after 20 days I join this MLM. I didn’t really care that $8 a day when I join this MLM because that is a joke.
Their “bidding” thing really attract me because they will refund you the difference. I won 10 items in first two weeks. Now I still have two months to go, but I don’t really care. I already cash out 3x of the money that put in.
So long as you get your money… f’em, right?
Gotta love the Ponzi mentality.
Not Ponzi, its Bidding. I think you want to say love the “Bidding” mentality. They refund the difference. How good is that!!
And how can they afford to do so? Hmmm?
@MVC
There’s no “bidding” without the Ponzi. As Kasey points out, where do you think your bids and refunds come from?
New affiliate investors…
(This is the part where you try to convince everyone there’s retail bid activity and we do the whole Zeek Rewards dance again)
Ponzi, pyramid scam or fraud..whatever you called it…every business you start is a gamble and a risk.
I invested in legit business for 20k or 100k but it never guarantees you can make it work….especially when the healthcare is at its fragile stage and Medicare doesn’t pay. Even paying taxes is a business scheme. Now a days company evolves in network marketing and leveraging….business are doing well thru referrals directly or indirectly thru networking.
Maybe right now we don’t see it because we are making money with BLGM but it feels good that whatever scheme you call it we are making the money daily that is cashable just like you are running a business.
I respect everybody’s opinion and concern. I did not really invested money into this because it was given to me as a gift. I was here since last month and I see the money coming in and even if I had my doubts at first….I do believe in striking the iron while it’s hot.
This is not for everybody and not everybody will make it just like in any business you start. Everything takes hardwork and dedication. If everybody who joined blGM are happy and satisfied with what they make…let them be…we don’t need to call names.
Better living is giving a better life to those who had joined and kept the ball rolling by re investing. I’m sure before it collapse…everybody who invested got back more than what they put in. So if you don’t like it…then don’t join…but if you are willing to take the risk like everybody else…that is your choice!
Don’t invest money on what you can’t afford to lose. It just like going to the casino and losing lots of money…at least with BLGM you see your money grow and you get to enjoy the action while bidding. This is based on my own opinion and my experience. Do what you think is wise!
Better Living Global marketing is neither a gamble or a risk, it’s a Ponzi scheme.
That’s how Ponzi schemes work. Pump your money in early, cash out and who cares what happens after that. The mess left behind when the scheme inevitably collapses is someone else’s problem… right?
And when Better Living Global Marketing collapses, unless you’re at the top of the investment chain, all your monopoly money points vanishes overnight.
No wonder it doesn’t bother you though, you appear to have spent someone else’s money getting in, no doubt on the promise of paying them back with your stolen Ponzi returns.
You really think someone would gift you something when they think it’s not working? Maybe it was just a gift but it means a Lott to anyone who receives a gift.
I have the right to my opinion just like you have too and I respect that…you don’t need to bashed me on my own point of view? Like I said don’t be a part of it if you don’t like the idea behind it. You don’t need to insult me because you don’t know the story behind it.
I’m not hitting on you? What can’t you give respect where respect is due. If you have nothing to say. Then keep your mouth shut…because I did not argue on what you think is right. My own views has nothing to do with yours…it’s my right…just like you have the right to share yours but don’t insult anybody.
Am I right? Keep your opinion to your self.
Ponzi schemes work until they don’t… and then it’s too late.
Better Living Global Marketing is a Ponzi scheme; that is a fact by virtue of the company’s Ponzi points compensation plan, not an opinion.
The story behind it?
Some dude in China saw Zeek Rewards go down and figured he could start a clone site based out of Hong Kong. Bingbaddaboom here we are – with the same idiots who invested in Zeek Rewards trying to convince everybody that this time it’s not a Ponzi scheme scam.
Because respect is earnt and not automatically due.
Protip: if you want “respect”, don’t run around the internet telling everyone Ponzi schemes are legit.
Nothing to say? Yo chief, Better Living Global Marketing is a Ponzi scheme.
Trouble is with Ponzi supporters they all run around with their ears plugged. That is until they lose it all…
And correction OZ…it’s a gift…so how I spent it is also my right. Why does it bother you so much…if you are not involved in this? No one is forced to join? If you are making money…don’t you want to share it to others? It just like eating in a great restaurant and you can’t wait to tell your friends about it.
I know how it feels to lose but it doesn’t stop me from exploring all possibilities. I care so much that it is Important for me that it works….because a lot of people are so desperate with what’s going on in our economy…and all this conspiracy going on in the world…you no longer know who to believe.
Our very one gov’t even scamming us. Yet, here you are trying to be righteous. You don’t even know how to respect others opinion because you want to force people to believe on your own idea and opinion. Let them think and decide for themselves.
Go ahead share what you think….but let them have their right to do what they think is best for them at the moment. Not everybody wins and I say it’s a gamble and a risk because you are joining at your own risk even if you know it’s not a guaranteed game to play.
It’s an investment into a fraudulent Ponzi scheme, paid by someone who wanted to recruit you into their downline and no doubt under condition that you pay them back with your Ponzi scheme ROIs.
Attempt to justify it however you want, it is what it is.
(Ozedit: Offtopic comments on bashing people, Forex, gambling, the stock market and currency investment removed)
It not at all like giving your opinion on a great restaurant. Its more like you’re a pig urging other pigs to join you at a trough.
I have joined and i am fine with it. I see the money grow quite fast.
If i get my money back that I put in, I am satisfied. People who say negatives, stay away. Bother someone else.
I bet those that you steal from who don’t get their money back when it collapses aren’t very satisfied. But hey, f’em right, you got paid…
You spent your money. What you are doing now is watching the flashing lights.
The money you’re getting back, and presumably reinvesting, isn’t yours. That’s why it’s not “your right”. If you bring others into this mess, you’re responsible for what happens to their money, and they have more to lose than a meal at a restaurant.
This is ludicrous. BLGM is fraud. It’s not better fraud just because you’re making money in the short term. What’s best for you at the moment is going to bad for a lot of people in the long term.
Congratulations, you’re now officially part of the problem.
BLGM has just started long long run… now in phase 1 called NETWORK, in the future bp8.hk will be like a child’s game, many pipelines are in under construction. BLGM has bright future.
No matter what you or Better Living promise, there is no justification for the running of a Ponzi scheme.
Zeek Rewards, which Better Living is modelled on, also made lots of promises. Didn’t make an iota of difference when the regulators came knocking.
What EXACTLY do you see?
You see something “growing”, and your brain has identified it as money. It hasn’t analysed what it really is, only ACCEPTED an idea about money growing.
An answer to my question should typically be something like “I see my back office balance growing each day”, or “I have seen the payouts to my back office has been growing for each new unit I have invested in” = a description of what you really SEE rather than a description of the ideas you have inside your head.
I dare Mr Chang, Oz, Norway, and other “smarty-pants” to (Ozedit: Offtopic derail dare and rant about earning money, politics and Chinese food removed)
i dont like ponzi, but i dont like people with double moral, because those big fishes owners of casino and lottery they have the same guilt on those people losing money, that should be illegal too, but they are not cus they are giving money to the gov. everiday thousands of people losing money meanwhile they earn, those people are the majority( millions)
Be that as it may, neither the lottery or casino use an MLM business model and are thus entirely irrelevant.
Do not attempt to justify Ponzi schemes by citing other industries, it is a strawman argument at best.
If okay everyone! My friend just got back from Hong Kong and took a picture with lue Chang. The ponzu scheme is gonna sustain it self for the long haul. Btw he took a picture with him also.. So I’m good now.
Everything the apologists for this ponzi have said should end with “as long as they [we] don’t get caught” (or, until people stop joining). Ultimately, that’s what it boils down to — it doesn’t matter what’s in the pipeline because it’s illegal (and unethical).
@Allgood
Yo, a photo?
What kind of dumbass logic is that? Ponzi schemes don’t sustain themselves on photos, they sustain themselves with new investor money, which eventually either runs out or is less than the ever-increasing ROI liabilities.
Ponzi logic fail!
Oz. lol.. I being sarcastic! I’m with you. The people who are involved are trying to meet this guy lau chin. There still convincing themselves this is legit. Posting pictures and whatnot spewing it out to whoever will believe.
I got an email in regards and a whole audio of the trip…lol I’m thinkiing this thing is gonna implode soon. Funny thought that the supposed leader in Hong Kong does photo shoots. Gonna be Houdini soon.
There’s a group of investors from SoCal in Hong Kong right now trying to meet the great and powerful Oz. They’re so enthralled with the program, that instead of pulling back the curtain, revealing a sad little con artist, everything they see only reinforces their faith.
If anyone else has tried this, I sincerely apologize, as I have missed it.
Not being a member of BLGM, I signed up as a member of Bidders’ Paradise. There is a screen that purports to be a way to purchase bids in quantities 25, 50, 100, 200, 500 or 1,000, but the “buy buttons” do not work. There are also no prices appended to the bid quantities.
Now perhaps these “buy buttons” will become functional when Bidders’ Paradise is opened to the Mainland China market, but now this situation only reinforces the premise that one can only participate in the auctions if one is an investor in BLGM.
Why leave money on the table when the company could let outsiders dip their toes in the water with bid buys, purchase products if they won auctions, and provide stronger temptation to become investors?
I suspected that. I tried to ask a couple of the affiliates about retail customers (e.g. posts #11 and #20), but then they simply disappeared from this thread.
The MLM investment part of the business will actually harm the penny auction part, make it become less attractive for normal customers to spend their own hard earned money in competition with affiliates with tons of free bids.
You have actually answered something I asked about in July. None of the affiliates have been able to answer it. I decided to stop asking questions like that because people disappeared in a mysterious way. 🙂
Simple questions like “WHERE and HOW do they sell them?” made people mysteriously disappear for WEEKS or MONTHS. I asked the same question to the same affiliate in post #11 and post #76. The effect was relatively similar to something from horror movies (vampires, werewolves, etc.), a “poof” and a flash before he disappeared.
I actually tried asking the same questions of an affiliate in person. The go-to response is that BLGM is opening up bidding in China and closing recruitment altogether at some undefined point in the future.
I also got the following responses: “They don’t want to get too big,” and “They don’t want to advertise.” So that’s the unsatisfying response you get from a person who can’t vanish to exit the conversation. Although, let me tell you, it can make polite conversation get pretty awkward.
That being said, it’s more response than I got six months ago when the answers to all my questions were: “It’s different than Zeek.”
@John
What better way to avoid retail customers complaining (the whole 2 or 3 of them) about bid inflation due to the Ponzi scheme, than by temporarily not offering retail on a permanent basis?
OZ
Zeek was not a ponzi. And better living global marketing and bidders paradise are not a ponzi. Mr teng is a visionary man, he should be contacting Warren buffett and billionaires in the world to join BLGM.
DR luke teng is 10 x smarter than zewk rewards Paul Burks. Teng is a Christian man , billy graham best friend, California top affiliates met him. They say he is the humblest man on earth.
All California teams are 500% to 1000% convinced that Mr teng is a reincarnation of Jesus chris himself. Why would Mr teng do any wrong?
I had a group leader trying to pitch this to me and said that BLGM is growing in a fast pace. He also said that the price of each unit will go up to 1300$ after october 18. The posts on this site made me think twice about joining this program and I was never part of Zeek.
When asked how the money was being generated to pay off the affiliates, the leader answered “there are other bidders that are not affiliates”, but when I went over to the site to purchase bids as a non affiliate I was not allowed. Any thoughts?
@David
Given that BLGM has been operating for a while now and retail bid selling isn’t even possible… where do you think the ROIs are coming from?
Better Living Global Marketing is just your run-of-the-mill Zeek Ponzi clone.
Many of my friends has joined few months ago and making tons of money. I did some searching and found this post. I hesitated at the first, but I joined without no one below me. I am about half way to ROI and got back half of my investment.
As far as I am concern, if I get all of my investment back, rest should all be free income without hurting anyone.
So far I am very happy with the system.
@kc
Tons of money or tons of numbers on a screen. “A few months” isn’t long enough to earn substantial amounts of real money in the Ponzi points plan. Those withdrawals only happen after about a year or so of reinvesting.
Well, except those that join after you. Your ROI money has to come from somewhere…
I just want to say something about the worth of bids argument. Take 1,160 and divide that by .58 cents…that equals 2,000. Do it on your calculator. That is 2,000 bids for the package price of 1,160 dollars US right? Right.
When a person is bidding on a item on the auction site, every time you, and thousands of others bid on that item, each time a bid is placed, the price of the item will go up 1 cent (example $64.55, $64.56, $64.57, $64.58 etc…) until either the clock gets down to zero, or it hits the surprise price which is less than 50% of the retail price.
Each bid IS worth .58 cents because you just did the math $1,160 divided by .58 cents equals 2,000 bids. How do you not understand that logic??????
The affiliate who bought the bids expects a >100% ROI over 99 days. Each bid revenue wise is thus a liability for the company.
Let’s not pretend there’s any retail activity going on.
Sooner or later all these $1160 deposits will run out and you’ll have BLGM snowballing into negative revenue just like Zeek Rewards was ($2 million the difference when the SEC shut them down).
Perhaps you haven’t considered… In getting that $1160, does the company then incur ADDITIONAL debt in terms of future ROI payouts? Like your money went in, and you expect to make your money back out, and MORE?
Where does that EXTRA money came from?
100% ROI is not guaranteed by company. There will not be any contract or commitment from company side regarding 100% ROI; customers pay HK$9900 to buy 2200 bid points, they get bid points that’s it. Daily profit sharing depends on daily sales (bidding), if there is no bidding = no profit sharing.
The Zeek dejavu is strong with this one.
Sure it is chief. No affiliate would buy bids without an implied >100% ROI guarantee on their investment. Whether this is written down or not is irrelevant, it’s the core premise behind the Ponzi points business model.
You seem to have stuffed that up. Here, I’ll fix it for you:
You’re welcome.
I think this is scam !!!
You’re asking the wrong types of questions. It’s better to ask yourself “How did I came up with that logic / How did I fool myself to believe in an idea like that?”, rather than to ask us about why we don’t understand it. Your brain is simply tricking you to believe in what you SEE and how it interprets that.
TEST IT ON SOMETHING ELSE
A method to detect if your own brain has tricked you is to replace parts of the idea with something else, to avoid “resistance” from your own brain.
Replace the units with an inexpensive pencil. If you pay someone $1,160 for an inexpensive pencil, will the inexpensive pencil then be worth $1,160?
* Will you have $1,160 worth of pencil in your possession?
* Will each sentence you write with that pencil be worth $0.58, i.e. will the value of the money you paid for that pencil be transferred down onto the paper?
* Can you lift the sentences off the paper and store each of them in a bank account? Or will it bring back $0.58 of your money each time you write a sentence?
* Does the pencil itself hold any monetary value, e.g. can you use it to pay your bills or deposit the pencil in a bank account? “I will like to deposit my $1,160 worth of pencil, to pay down some of my debt!”.
I will NOT believe in any ideas like that. What you are willing to believe in will be your personal choice, but you can’t seriously expect me to believe in ideas like that?
BTW, I can probably sell you some inexpensive pencil “units” much cheaper than $1,160 per unit. I also have a system where you can watch your pencils grow. After 50 days you will have 2 pencils for each pencil you have bought. To keep you happy, I can also allow you to withdraw some of the pencils as cash, but please tell all your friends about how great deal it is first.
That logic makes no sense because company already gain profit by SELLING bids, not when bids get USED.
Your logic is somewhat disturbing. I have analysed it point by point, but I decided to not post the analysis. You’re repeating what you can SEE and how your brain interprets that.
Start from scratch, and try first to determine what’s important and what’s unimportant. Use similar methods like the one I suggested about replacing the different factors by something else.
“1 bid pack unit = 1 pencil”. That idea will make it easier for you to identify the monetary VALUE of the unit itself and the individual bids. Identify the monetary VALUE in other parts too, so you can see whether they are important or unimportant.
1 pencil is of course not worth much, and neither are any of the individual sentences you can write with it. And neither are the units nor the bids.
1. Money IN
You pay $1,160 in to someone for 1 pencil. Someone else have received the monetary value, and you have received a pencil. This time the “someone else” is BLGM itself, so we can keep a track of the money. It ended up in BLGM’s account.
2. Bidding
Each time you write a sentence with that pencil, it will generate some unimportant results (a price doesn’t hold any monetary value, and neither does the sentences). Your pencil will get a little shorter for each sentence you write. If your pencil only generates unimportant results, so will the pencils of all others do.
Note:
“$1,160 / 2000 (sentences in a pencil) = $0.58” will reflect the COST of each sentence, not the VALUE. It will reflect what you have paid for that pencil and the cost of writing 1 sentence on a piece of paper. But the VALUE of each sentence will be ZERO. The price of the pencil doesn’t make each sentence become more “valuable”, they will only be more “costly”.
3. Profit share
Each day, when you and others are writing a number of invaluable sentences, the company claims to generate a profit it can share with you. Since the sentences were worthless, the profit share generated from them will be worthless too.
4. Reinvestments
Worthless profit share works quite okay if most of the people are reinvesting it into new pencils or potential sentences. The company will only need to deliver inexpensive pencils or pencil extensions.
5. Withdrawals
If anyone want to withdraw the daily profit share as cash, the company will need to bring in your $1,160 from a bank account and transfer some of it to other people’s bank accounts. That’s why they needed the money from you in the first place, to be able to pay the old investors.
Those two products are not the same, but the logic should be relatively similar for all types of products.
If you can’t store the product directly in your bank account or use it to pay your bills, it’s “worthless” if we’re only looking at the monetary value. The PRICE doesn’t make it more valuable, it makes it more COSTLY to buy if you accept the price.
You would probably NEVER have accepted to pay $1,160 for 2000 bids if it hadn’t been any income opportunity attached to the deal.
Simply put your not an IDIOT until you get stuck holding the bag from the “investors” before you. But make no mistake this is 100% a PONZI SCAM.
Would you have paid $1160 for 2000 bids if it’s NOT for the income opportunity attached to it?
If you won’t, then it’s clearly NOT worth 1160, which means 1160 is an INVESTMENT, not a purchase.
Interesting way to look at it, and you are both right. Entry into the investment scheme is what she paid $1160 for.
Actually it’s a standard test for Ponzi/MLM too, as it had something to do with “intrinsic value”. Pseudo-MLM Pyramid Schemes are fond of touting “we have a product, we’re not scams”, even though products can easily be disguises for the scam.
Zeekheads had raised the same issues. They keep saying “I was buying bids! I didn’t invest!” And the same argument applies: why did you buy the bids? You bought the bids for the VIP points which leads to “profit share”. So you did invest. Same here.
My co-worker just tried to get me roped into this. He dumped 27k into it last week and it hoping to be in the black in 3 months.
Hopefully the company is still long enough to cash out and get his investment back and wash his hands of this.
I doubt BLGM is going to collapse as quickly as other schemes. Luke Teng is a better con artist than Ming Xu. BLGM affiliates are not allowed to advertise, and, so far, they’ve been pretty good at keeping a lid on it.
BLGM itself actively avoids publicity, which is going to help their reputation, which is going to keep the new recruits coming in.
I noticed, though, that the Russians didn’t get the memo. There are a few You Tube videos springing up from Russia. I imagine BLGM will put an end to that.
Okay; I’m hearing 3rd hand rumors that some people can’t access their money. Anyone getting any news through the affiliate rumor-mill?
What do you mean “can’t access their money”?
Hope so. Got popcorn ready. What a show THIS is gonna be. I’m gonna venture to say this makes the news one day.
my mom was brought in by my aunt… she only speaks spanish and went to an spanish presentation, 2 hours away.
i don’t trust this game…it’s just big money people playing with those who have little but hope. has anyone ever backed off?
i mean they are most likely going to keep her money but does anyone know how she can keep it?
Transfer from the eWallet to an actual account.
Although, I heard from an affiliate who has supposedly made a successful transfer in the last week that some members are being “cut off” for purchasing “too much” at once.
@ermelinda
If she sets her withdrawal to 100% and the business doesn’t collapse or get shutdown before 99 days she should, in theory, get her money back.
And, as a head’s up, she’ll probably have pressure not to withdraw from her upline. She’ll likely be encouraged to repurchase from her ROI.
I was introduced to BLGM(scam) through a trust/respected friend. After I joined for 2 weeks, I started to realized, it is a scam.
I have invested aud $18000 dollars and after 99 days, I managed to get back $14,000 dollars.
@Phil
Wait what? They paid you less than you invested after 99 days?!
I know BLGM doesn’t guarantee the ROI but if it’s less than 100% over 99 days that’s indicative of the scheme running out of money. Nobody is going to invest if they can’t at least break 100% over the 99 day maturity period.
99 days ROI is a big lie! There is no way to get all the money back if you do not get new members to become your downline.
As each unit you pay HK$9098 and each day got back HK$70.
Ponzi is stealing other people money! The guy who got me into this scam is no longer my friend. He has stolen money from me and he does not believe this blgm is wrong! He is quite high up in the system therefore he is earning a lot of money.
I have learnt my lesson, when I heard from my friend about this scam. My initial reaction was how can this be so good, easy money, this is like a dream. Indeed this is a dream except I got burnt. Soon there will be many people agonizing over how stupid they are to invest their hard earn cash into such scam!
I think this scam is going to collapse soon as the BLGM site has been posting new rules, almost one every week:
1. They spread rumors about price hike for long time. I heard about price hike in around July and only received a notice on their website around Oct.
Then they delayed the price hike from Oct, to Nov with reasons like “It is our LA team’s birthday party for Bidders’ Paradise on the 18th of October, we will have to further postpone our price hike to 0:00 hour, October 22nd. Please note that this is final.”
2. They reduced the daily payout to $65 instead of $70.
3. They refused to deposit check Bank Of China without telling anyone.
4. They restrict cash withdrawal to once a week and maximum weekly limit of HK$50000
More bizarre rules posted on 28-Oct:
7. Effective November 1, 2013,
i. Authorization in writing no longer needed. During initial account registrations/re-purchase, there will be an option for Members to self-activate for the authorization. Note that it is not possible to cancel once this function has been activated.
ii. Your balance of bid points will become zero if the authorization option has been selected.
8. Effective November 2013, the “Profit-sharing Program” pay-outs will only be available 5 times a week. There will not be pay-outs on Wednesdays & Sundays.
9. Effective November 2013, all packages can only re-purchase for 3 more times. That is, a total of 4 cycles of 99 pay-outs. There will not be funds injected into your Sustainability Wallet on the last cycle (except for the HK$1,440 “Pension Subsidizer Scheme” monthly fee).
1-nov Notice:
Regarding returning from 6 times a week to 5 times a week with our “Profit-sharing Program” pay-outs. It is generally reflected as too short- noticed that leaders find it hard to cope with. The management has thus determined to postpone such move until December 01.
4-nov:
A notice only written in Chinese warning people who have spreaded negative comments about BLGM. If they are found out then their membership will be terminated.
My “friend” lied to me that ROI is 99days. Because he did not tell me that he has a lot of down line (including me) therefore his ROI was not 99 days, it’s less than 60 days. When he introduced me to this scam, he was already earning AUD$7000 a month (real money into the bank in HK).
I am glad that I did not introduce anyone (victim) into this scam.
So my word of advice to others who are currently in this blgm is to get back your money as much as you can but do not re-invest!
@Phil/Oz
The final results or ROI of joining Pyramid schemes like wcm777 , better living global marketing are the LOSS of Family and Friends.
I have a pending withdrawal since the beginning of October. This the first time I tried to withdraw. Many people started to complain that it take too long to receive the money. Is it the sign of collapse?
@Larry
Ponzi schemes only stop paying out when there’s no more money to pay out.
Its no sign of robust health that’s for sure. Maybe there’s not enough fresh meat being recruited.
I wonder if the fact that they weren’t allowed to do marketing is going to cause it to collapse sooner. It’s hard to keep the cash coming in if you can only recruit within your sphere of contacts.
They need to balance between growing too fast and attracting authorities’ attention, and keep the Ponzi going.
Hi,
I think it’s definitely sign of collapsing as today I found out they have created more rules to limit people from withdrawal:
Two or three of Frederick Mann’s scams have used a variation of this. It was called “the bucket.” X number of dollars purportedly were made available in the bucket for withdrawal.
When members tried to withdraw, they saw a message that said the bucket limit had been exceeded for the day — to try again at another time.
Fred Mann’s scams did this, too. They also implemented a scam-within-the-scam. This was described as a “restart” feature. The diabolical highlight of the restart feature was that the “program’s” liability was wiped away by fiat and members were duped into believing they somehow were being given an equity stake in exchange for their lost earnings.
“Negative” chatter also was outlawed, under the purported penalty of banishment and loss of earnings.
PPBlog
Wow seem like a lot on confusion in regulars to with drawing money. If I were dumb enough to invest in this scam I would be worried.
I am also wondering y dont we hear about more people complaining who have invested? Is there any other sites that discuss this program.?
People who are scammed are afraid if they talk bad about the scam they would lessen their chance of recovering anything, not realizing that it’s ALREADY LOST.
The victims of Pigeon King ponzi in Canada did the same thing. NOBODY complained to the police, hoping to hash it out in bankruptcy court, so police got minimum cooperation if at all, but even then it took a YEAR for police to conclude it’s a ponzi scheme.
This email is from a guy (possibly former Zeek reward) in the US(he is making ridiculous claim about BLGM):
This is going to be a long one but probably the MOST IMPORTANT UPDATE YET. Grab your favorite beverage and read all of this.
The silly bp8.hk is showing so called advertisements on their website by putting a link to youtube. Then someone from BLGM uploaded several Chinese advertising videos into youtube.
I suppose i should start putting advertising videos on youtube and expects company will start paying me advertising fees! That’s what the large internet advertising site is about:
Why do these Ponzi kings always think “phases” justifies the running of said Ponzi schemes?
When you start off with a Ponzi scheme, whatever your promise after that is irrelevant.
What’s sad is that some affiliates actually believe that is an example of paid sponsorship.
Hm, it seems their US Alexa rating has gone down since that email. They’re at: 22,258. What’s funny is that the average view per visitor is almost 7.9, so one person is going to that site 8 times per day.
Given that almost all of the visitors are male, logging in from home in the US and Russia, and many of them are logging on multiple times a day, I’d say it’s either affiliates or they’ve hired someone to up their page clicks.
Early on, one of the biggest red flags was that Bidder’s Paradise didn’t get enough website traffic to generate any revenue at all.
They are trying to “pivot”, much like Jubi tried it. They won’t admit they were illegal, but they *know* they are (why else would they be pivoting?)
Man talk about ANALYSIS PARALYSIS !!! plain and simple High Risk, High Reward. i’ve never seen so many people over analyse a company so much WITHOUT trying it. Forget what anybody says. if you want to do this DO IT.
if you don’t DON’T. Forget about the past. my ex gf had brown hair. my current gf has brown hair. did that stop me from dating her NO. companies are no different. dont let somebody’s opinion become your reality. ….. what?! it TRUE.
How does “trying it” benefit anyone (other than existing Better Living investors)? How a Ponzi scheme works is no secret.
and just invest your money. So that you can get your ROI.
Got it.
Right, because investing in Ponzi schemes is the same as your girlfriend’s hair color.
Your entire marketing strategy appears to be sum uppable as follows:
‘Forget you lost money in past Ponzi schemes, this time will be different I got in and invested early (you of course will still likely lose money). Oh and my girlfriend has brown hair.’
Good luck with that. When your recruits suffer the effects of “financial paralysis” because you told them to ignore everything and invest, you’re going to need it.
I don’t need to try shooting myself in the head to know it’s a bad idea. Same with trying a possible ponzi scheme.
Your argument is a typical HYIP pyramid selling excuses those people brainwashed you with. It makes no sense if you analyze it with a few brain cells instead of the “motivational rah-rah”.
The reality is BLGM is a Ponzi scheme, and if anything should be analyzed, it’s a Ponzi scheme. People should have the facts about a “company” (and I use the term loosely) before investing.
Those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it. And lose their life savings. And their friend’s and family’s life savings.
Pixie dust/ stop ponzies,
The final ROI of joining a ponzi or pyramid scheme will be LOSS OF FRIENDS AND FAMIlLY that you RECRUITED.
True.
Sort of.
Anecdotally, I’ve found that people who successfully recruit friends and family tend to have friends and family amenable to investing in Ponzi schemes. When one collapses, they all jump into something else that’s “different” from the last one.
Here, let me fix that for you:
Stop ponzies, its sad but you are right!
it never stops! GREATER FOOL THEORY….
They are insane, as per Narcotics Anonymous.
http://amlmskeptic.blogspot.com/2013/10/are-serial-mlmers-insane-by-common.html
BLGM is collapsing soon. Today there is a notice saying due to technical difficulty their monthly pensioner dividend cannot be paid this month. But there was no explanation.
Today somebody visited the office, there were nobody, all the doors was locked
It sounds like the end but nothing is official until they hire Robert Craddock to explain what happened.
Today is Saturday (in Hong kong) so they are closed.
Does anyone get paid in the last few days??
“Jerk: Today somebody visited the office, there were nobody, all the doors was locked
”
Was it during their office hours? Were there a lot of people tried to visit the office too?
Don’t believe it’s a Holiday in Hong Kong… But hey, wait till Monday or Tuesday. Of course, that would give them a couple days head start if they went running, but I would give them benefit of doubt. 🙂 I’m sure Luke’s just a generous guy and gave all employees an extra day off. 😀
BLGM is surely running out of money, as today notice saids it all:
In ponzispeak putting “bring in new members” and withdrawal jam issue in the same message translates to:
round one is finished and we need new money to start round two, otherwise this one is dead in the water”.
My last cheque was submitted on 2013-10-23 and it is still showing as processing!
bidderlife.com/default.aspx
This one is similar to Better living global. I wonder if they are run by the same scammer?
My friend requested in September and still showing as processing. My withdrawal was requested in the beginning of October. I called them many times but the phone was never answered.
Hi larry, we are on the same boat!
I requested for withrawal on oct 1 but i still dont have my money until now. I called the HK office last week and they said wait until the end of the month. I doubt if I will still receive my money.
I read Hong Kong Forum (in Chinese), no body in Hong Kong complain about waiting too long to receive the money. They said that every day there are lots people from mainland China bring money line up in the company to join the program.
what is the website of the Hong Kong forum?
Does anyone have more information on monthly bonus payout on 15th of each month? Up-liner told me 15th is change to end of the month. True?
I am in the same boat as some others waiting for first wire to US bank since middle of Oct 2013. Does anyone actually received through wired?
Statements from participants will need to be “correctly interpreted” to make any sense. Many people will not separate correctly between payouts to the back office and withdrawals of money, i.e. you will find comments from people claiming they have received payment when they in reality only have received something to the back office.
I have friends who received the remittance money, took them a while the first time. already 2 of my friends went to HK on Oct and Nov. week to verify legit, thank God, it’s legit.
She got the building/office pics and many are in line, a lot of clients with big smiles. Everything is a risk, even the goverment sucks money from us, but i considered this a calculated risk.
For the doubters, happy doubting and don’t speak if you have no proof, go there in HK and investigate before you compare this with other pass scams. It probably pains to believe how true is this.
@Ric
Uh, you know some dudes sitting around an office in Hong Kong doesn’t make a Ponzi scheme legit right?
The problem is with the business model, not people queuing up with smiles because they think they’re going to get infinity ROIs.
BLGM are lying about their business model? The company takes money from new investors (those people queuing up with the big smiles) and pays it to existing investors (who have even bigger smiles).
That’s a Ponzi scheme.
They absolutely did not verify its legitimacy. I know people who went to Hong Kong also. After the group returned, I got 15 minutes of how it’s “legit” because “Luke Teng is such a humble man” and “he’s a Christian man” and “he doesn’t want us to get too big” and “he promises we’re going to stop recruiting”.
By the way — the thing about promising that recruitment will stop has been going on since this scheme started. Initially, it was that all recruitment would cease when Bidder’s Paradise opened in mainland China and Russia. Now, I don’t know what the excuse is. I don’t think the faithful need one anymore.
That has absolutely no bearing on whether or not it’s a ponzi and is completely irrelevant.
Why do all affiliates talk like this as if it’s a real argument (or successful pitch)? Surely you know the difference between risk and a Ponzi scheme?
What “proof” do you need, and how in hades would going to Hong Kong change anything about the structure of the company?
Hi Rick,
Just want to know how long did it take for your friend to receive their money? I requested mine Oct 1 and until now its still processing. I tried many times to call and email but no respond. Im worried aboout my money
In that case, the authorities are well aware of them. Here’s what happened to last one that caused such mania:
This illegal pyramid selling company, based in the US, was closed a week later by HKPD.
http://amlmskeptic.blogspot.com/2013/11/continued-coverage-interush-closed-in.html
And this is Chinese news of Interush arrest in Hong Kong
http://amlmskeptic.blogspot.com/2013/11/breaking-news-interush-hong-kong-closed.html
If they REALLY have mainlanders lined up to join them every day, they are DOOMED!
Folks, don’t confuse Interush with BLGM. Merely saying that they’ll get what’s coming to them.
Hi Rick,
Just want to know how long did it take for your friend to receive their money? I requested mine Oct 1 and until now its still processing. I tried many times to call and email but no respond.
Im worried aboout my money from Oct 1? my friends all had their money if they applied before oct 5, but none of them got the money for those requests after oct. 15.
Agreed.
It’s a variation of the “we’re going private” explanation that surfaces in fraud scheme after fraud scheme. That is, the first in (smart people) are the exclusive lifetime beneficiaries of fantastic riches because the door to new registrations will close by design and the tire-kickers and dawdlers (dumb people) who lacked the insight/brains to hand over their cash will spend the balance of their lives in a prison of envy.
With BLGM, the “going private” part is occurring in super slow motion because of the grinding friction taking place out of public view: The Ponzi wheel needs to be constantly greased, so registrations can’t close.
In the context of BLGM, it’s a sort of double incongruity: The initial lure was that the “program” was private, invitation-only. (Also known as, “Get your Zeek and Profitable Sunrise people in before the doors close.”) And when they closed, BLGM would become even more private and exclusive, the Zeek and Profitable Sunrise that were promised but never delivered.
Five years from now, even if someone from BLGM goes to jail or if a body of governments moves to destroy BLGM one fateful dollar at a time, the faithful will see it as a wretched conspiracy led by Satan.
In the early stages, they will cast it as evil triumphing over good and further cast the accused as a political prisoner or a person condemned for his religious beliefs. Some people will cough up polluted money from BLGM or other schemes in a bid to hamstring the demonic prosecution.
Then, they’ll move to their next scam.
These phenomena are almost exclusive to the HYIP sphere. Virtually no one led cheers for Madoff, Petters, Stanford and Rothstein. And yet the HYIPers get the rock-star treatment from their victims, if not the treatment of a deity.
PPBlog
About the example:BLGM-Bidders Paradise
If a Rolex Watch is sale for $3000.00 USD ($10,000.00 USD retail price) and each penny is worth .58 each dollar=$58.00 then $3000.00 x $58.00=$174,000.00 USD minus Retail(Rolex=$10.000)
net profit=…….$164,000….Half for BLGM & Half for affiliates.
There is no net profit. BLGM have to pay out >100% of the amount spent on bids. That’s how MLM penny auction Ponzi schemes work.
Vulnerable people are being targeted, they are recruiting new affiliates all over Toronto now. My heart is aching, but cant do anything because I am being accused of ruining their business.
They told me that they also have a right to make money, so I should just shut my mouth and don’t say anything negative about it.
Hi Steve,
To receive money, it takes one week to respond to the email to confirm all the information is correct. Then, they said it will take about 4 to 6 weeks according to their email.
Look at post #276, they are trying to add more and working with the HongKong Bank’s for faster payment.
So far Mr Teng has been very truthful to his customer. Let’s wait and see good things happen to all of us.
And so did Paul “Zeek Ponzi” Burks, and Andy “Ad Surf Daily” Bowdoin… right to the point where cops walked in and ordered everybody to step away from their desks.
The fact that Teng pays neither proves nor disproves he’s running a Ponzi scheme. In fact, one of the hallmarks of Ponzi scheme is it pays REGARDLESS of economic conditions or external factors.
They also have the right to lose money too. It will be a learning experience for them.
Today my up line received payment which she requested at the end of September. Hopefully this is an encouraging sign.
That’s exactly what I’d do if I was running a failing ponzi / pyramid
Send out a handful of payments and make sure everyone heard about it.
Hello to all. I am a new member. Let me explain.
I met a guy online. I know him well now. I deposited $6500 into his Bank Of America account at my local branch.
He immediately set up my account and deposited the money in Honk Kong dollars, they had the HK dollars in an account ready to go. There was no “conversion” on my part.
I bought 5 units. The NEXT DAY my SPENDABLE bonuses were about 9200 HK dollars($1187 US almost enough to buy one more). I called my sponsor and he transferred to me $10800 HK dollars in order for me to buy 2 MORE units the next day so I could get the “bingo” bonus too. Now I have 7 units.
Once again the very next day I had bonuses of $5599 HK ($722 US). I simply transfered those back to him to partially pay back the $10800 he sent me the day before. It is common practice to loan HK dollars within your upline and downline I guess.
Anyway now my 7 units are worth $9300 US, I have only spent $7200 of my own money.
Beginning Monday my 7 units will begin paying about $60-65 US, 5 days a week, for about 5 months. You do the math. And dont forget the company MATCHES all that money in an S wallet to use to rebuy these units in 5 months, plus a bunch of other bonuses you receive….
CONCLUSION AND FACTS….
-My sponsor originally bought 15 units for about $17000 in April.
-He has used all profits to buy new units. No cash taken out yet.
-He now as of today has 153 UNITS! Yes , I said 153.
-HIS sponsor now has over 200 units and he claims he has withdrawn over $200,000 to his US bank account since February. They had to hire a big shot accountant to deal with the money.
Better Living IS INDEED paying out cash. This is GOLDEN opportunity to assist in the building of this company and sharing the profits.
As long as the money is paid out when requested then there is no risk and the profits are gigantic.
john
@john
Ponzi schemes pay out for as long as new investors dump money into the scheme, and existing members re-invest (erroneously claiming that they were paid when they weren’t because they just re-invested numbers on screen).
Your $7200 has been spent paying off existing investors, and your ROI pends on new suckers joining and investing after you.
You can’t pay out >100% of what your affiliates invest. That’s about as basic as maths gets.
Something which, by your own admission, you have no direct experience with.
Building what? You’re just introducing cash to pay out old investors. And since this scheme has been going at least a year, maybe more, I’d say that you are one of the many who helped bail them out of the recent cash crisis.
You transferred $6,500 from your bank account to his bank account. The MONEY is now in HIS bank account.
He didn’t deposit any MONEY. He used the BALANCE in his back office to “pay” for the units. The back office is designed to trick people’s brains.
NOPE, your units are still worth ZERO, if we’re talking about monetary value. Your sponsor has received the VALUE of the money.
You have spent $7,200 of your own money, and you have some units. So far your investment have paid zero ROI. You have $7,200 less than you had when you joined BLGM.
Try to replace UNITS with orange juice. If you pay me $6,500 for 1.0 litre of orange juice, will the orange juice then be worth $6,500?
If I give you 0.4 litre EXTRA orange juice (total 1.4 litre), will your orange juice then be worth $9,100?
I used orange juice as an example, because most people have relatively rational ideas about orange juice. Your own brain will not trick you if you already have rational ideas about something.
It doesn’t make any sense to do the math if you don’t use your brain, i.e. if you don’t clearly separate between real money and “monopoly money”.
The fact that you BELIEVE numbers on a screen is real money doesn’t make it true.
Back office = “monopoly money”
Internal e-Wallets = “monopoly money”
Third party e-Wallets = “unfulfilled transactions”
Take your “$9300” and a dollar note and you STILL couldn’t buy a cup of coffee.
When you actually withdraw more cash than you put in, then we can talk, until then your investment has just gone to payoff those who came before you.
I believe your upline is misleading you. The longer they can get other people to reinvest in new units, the more money will they be able to withdraw.
Your sponsor got $6,500 from you?
That’s the same as a withdrawal = money transferred to his bank account. Your so called “facts” didn’t reflect realities like that one?
BASIC BUSINESS PRINCIPLES 101:
Unless you have cash in your hand, all you really have is just numbers on a screen.
Got my Hongkong wire/remittance of 6,000 USD at Bank of America, have all my questions and concerns answered by Luke Teng, the teleconference helped a lot, disregard all the unnecessary comments of non-members.
Get all your transparent answers from Luke Teng, or else you will die of stress reading all the negative comments of people who are not engaging, and guys remember this is our freewill and our own money, our decision, our own risk.
If you have extra money and willing to take the risk then go for it, and for the bashers, you are entitled to invest your money somewhere, so keep it or put all your money in a hot boiling pot and chew it after. This is not for everyone. BTW I’m positive now and counting.
@Richard
Pray tell what is Luke Teng telling you to convince you BLGM isn’t a simple Ponzi scheme?
Sounds like he got you to ignore the business model and pulled the ol ‘it’s your money guy, what are you scared of?’, and you got down on your knees and swallowed.
Glad to hear you’re willing to lose your investment, but that’s not really the point.
AND IT’S ILLEGAL
AND YOU MAY END UP PAYING BACK ALL THE PEOPLE YOU ARE SCREWING OVER. CHEW ON THAT DUDE!
Better Living uses HSBC Bank. I just opened an account there too for transfers in and out of my BLGM account. This will make transfers much faster. I even told the bank that’s what I was going to use the account for. HSBC is based in Hong Kong but they do have US offices.
and P.S…..
About 99% of the “facts” stated in the negative comments above are incorrect. Jus sayin…
You’ll have to do better than that. 99% of all statistics are horseshit. Be specific.
You can start with explaining how BLGM accepting investments from affiliates and using those investments to pay out existing investors doesn’t make it a Ponzi scheme.
Crapping on about banks has nothing to do with the price of fish in
ChinaHong Kong.Check your OWN facts first? You’re unable to separate between “monopoly money” and real money.
Check your own logics too, with 2 simple questions you SHOULD be able to analyse and answer.
1. If you pay me $6,500 for 5 units of some type, will the units be worth $6,500?
2. If I give you 2 units extra, will your 7 units be worth $9,100?
You can use any type of units you like, as long as they cost almost nothing to produce. I suggested 0.2 litre of orange juice units, since most people have relatively rational ideas about the worth of orange juice.
If you have trouble analysing and answering those 2 simple questions, then google “cognitive dissonance wikipedia” to find out WHY you have trouble doing it.
You seem to like risks and challenges, Richard. Maybe you will like to try the logical test I gave to John?
The test is LOGICAL rather than mathematical, so the math isn’t important. The answers can be YES or NO (TRUE or FALSE).
Several people have simply “disappeared” higher up in this thread when I have asked other types of questions, e.g. about the value of the bids or about retail customers.
This argument drives me nuts. It’s not just your money and your risk.
Ponzi schemes are not victimless crimes just because you voluntarily invested.
Ponzi schemes are not victimless crimes just because people willingly invest.
How much are you still in the hole? Honestly.
Its not a return on investment you have received but a return to you of some of your own money. You are relieved that you have not lost ALL of it aren’t you?
You probably even believe you are one savvy son of a bitch who is smarter than everyone else. Does that make you bold? Guess what. It is supposed to.
Here’s a hint: do not fall into the trap. Soon enough you may be convinced to reinvest not only what you have just gotten back but MORE and if you fall for that you will be sucked in by inches and devoured.
So true.
To Richard they were worth $6500 since that is what he paid for them.
Impossible to answer until Richard attempts to convert the 7 units to cash.
You’re deflecting the real question. I didn’t ask about what the units are worth to HIM. But thanks anyway.
The initial 2 questions were directed towards John, not Richard. I asked Richard the same questions because he seemed to like risks and rewards.
The 2 questions were plain and simple LOGICAL questions, a method to help people IDENTIFY the type of logic they’re using.
If people are buying 5 units of gold, it’s obviously worth something. Gold is both an assets class, a currency and a commodity = it can be used to store value, it can be used to pay for goods or services (as a currency, e.g. in Utah), it can be used as raw material for other tradeable products.
The value of gold is related to that a general market can be willing to exchange it for other valuables = it’s TRADEABLE in a normal market. Simplified: The value of 5 units of gold will depend on what OTHER PEOPLE will be willing to give you in exchange for your units, it will not depend on what you have paid for it yourself.
We can look at other types of units, e.g. 5 units of shares in a publicly traded company. It will follow the same logical idea.
5 units of orange juice may potentially have some retailable value, but I can’t imagine that investors will line up in queue to buy those units for $6,500. It doesn’t really matter how much you have paid for the units yourself.
5 units of bids don’t really hold any monetary value in any normal markets. When John talked about how much his units were worth, he talked about an imaginary value.
5 units of “Hong Kong dollars” in a back office don’t hold any monetary value in any normal markets. They have internal purchasing power to buy additional bid units, just like monopoly money have internal purchasing power inside the game.
Withdrawals of the 5 units of “Hong Kong dollars” will require someone to bring in real money. That’s what John did, he brought in $6,500 from his bank account, allowing his sponsor to withdraw that amount. John will be able to get his money back if someone is bringing in real money.
I answered the question. You asked what the units were worth. The answer is; the price a willing buyer pays a willing seller in a free market. John is that willing buyer.
The medium of exchange is irrelevant and your evaluation of worth is personal to you (its your opinion) as John’s is personal to him.
There is no question that John may have misjudged the price he was willing to pay, but then again you may have misjudged as well.
What is a lottery ticket worth?
Expired Non-winning: nothing
Expired winning: slightly less than the prize
Yet to be drawn: whatever the “list price” is. 🙂
Man you guys are dumb. At the point that you have recieved more US dollars back to your local account, then you have not lost antything.
I will be at that point before my units expire (99 payout days, a little less than 5 months) due to the daily profit sharing only. Now that does not include the bonuses that you can also withdraw and also spend to buy more units and increase your daily payout that can be withdrawn or spent also. Thsi does not include the reserve bonuses you accumulate that can be used to renew your units.
The real issue is this.. Will the company be able to pay out all moneies requested and so far the answer is YES. I have proof.
Is that the answer you will give to John, Richard and other BLGM affiliates, e.g. to clarify what the units actually are worth?
My version is slightly different:
The units are not worth anything in themselves. The value people believe the units have is only an illusion.
What people really are paying for is their own ideas about the system itself, the complete idea about profit sharing, positive ROI, investments and reinvestments, and about “Hong Kong dollars” in the back office.
I would not even try. There’s no after market, the units are illiquid and there is no outside auditor or publicly available accounting data.
Neither are lotto tickets but people buy billions of them every year.
a chance to become wealthy.
Not exactly. Its just that the conversion rate between unit values and real world currency is unknown. Of course its often zero but sometimes its better (for some people at least) and we should not lose track of the fact that there are net winners in these schemes. For them at least converting units to real money is not an illusion but as real as converting Euros to Dollars (both of which are as virtual as any bit coin.)
Its certainly possible that John Richard and at least SOME of the BGLM members will profit from their investment.
Dumber still is the person who doesn’t think where their US dollars are coming from. Of course when you’re investing in Ponzi schemes, they only sort of make sense if you convince yourself there’s some magical fountain of never-ending money behind the curtain.
The second you invest in a Ponzi, your money is lost – it’s used to pay off existing investors. Any money you receive is on the hope that new suckers will invest after you.
What, your own bank statements? What a small world you live in.
Ponzi schemes can’t pay out >100% of what people invest into them. Dollar for dollar if we froze time Luke Teng doesn’t have enough money to pay everyone who has invested a >100% ROI. That’s just maths.
True.
Yes, that is the issue.
What you have is a single instance where you were paid…. not proof that payments will continue.
You’re making more sense now, when calculating the payback time rather than looking at all the virtual investments and virtual payouts.
My comments were partly related to that you failed to see that your sponsor actually is withdrawing money, while he’s pretending to reinvest it all.
Your $6,500 clearly ended up in your sponsor’s account, while he didn’t need to bring in any new money into the system to pay for the units.
“Hong Kong dollars” in a back office is NOT money, it will fail logical tests and tax doctrines. Adjusting some numbers on a screen and in a database is not the same as a monetary transaction.
It FEELS like a monetary transaction and it LOOKS like it, but it’s only an illusion. It will fail as an illusion if you try to pay any external bills.
Internal e-Wallets will also fail as illusions.
SOME OTHER TRAPS
External third party e-Wallets are not real bank accounts, they are software solutions designed to keep records of “unfulfilled transactions” (where the money has been assigned to you, but you have not received it).
Company funded e-Wallets and debit cards hold balances that can be recalled by the company (the funds they hold has not been received by you, they are still connected to the company’s account).
They are of course worthless in normal markets. Bids do have some retail value if you’re able to sell them to customers for real money. Units do have some retail value if you’re able to sell them to new investors for real money, just like your sponsor did.
But other than that, the value is internal inside the game, just like the different investments in a monopoly game. They don’t hold any monetary VALUE as investments. The feeling of seeing your money grow is only an illusion.
Says the dude willingly invested in a Ponzi scheme.
And, thus far, you have not received more US dollars back to your account.
The real issue is that the scheme’s downline is paying for your investment, but assuming you don’t care about that part then see above re: you have not received more US dollars back than you put in.
The company will be able to pay out all the virtual payouts almost forever. “Virtual payouts” are all the payouts to the back office, where there’s no monetary transactions.
For withdrawals of real money, the company became “under balanced” rather immediately. “Under balanced” is when you owe more money to the investors than you have in assets, when you are dependant on fresh money coming in from new investors to be able to pay the old ones.
That means that real payouts will need to stop when the supply of fresh money coming in from new investors dries out / is reduced to less than the money it has to pay out.
ZeekRewards had in its last month (July 2012)
* $162 million coming in from new investors
* $160 million paid out to old investors
* $3,000 million in virtual investments (VIP Points)
* $225 million in liquid assets (real money)
If everyone had started to withdraw 100% rather than reinvesting, Zeek would need to pay out $45 million per day from its $225 million reserves. It would have run out of money in 5 or 6 days.
BLGM is in a similar situation. It can continue to pay real money out as long as old investors are reinvesting, and as long as new investors are putting more money in. It will collapse RAPIDLY if the supply of fresh money dries out, or if people start to withdraw too much (e.g. “run on the bank”).
The flow of “Hong Kong dollars” and the investments in units are only parts of a “Ponzi game”. It could have worked as a game WITHOUT any inputs and payouts of money.
John is commenting on transfers out of BLGM to his personal Bank of America account.
The logic goes like this:
* Virtual payouts can continue almost forever.
* Real payouts will stop
* ZeekRewards as an example
* BLGM is in a similar situation
None of us can predict with any accuracy WHEN Better Living will run out of money, but we can predict THAT it will and WHY it will. John will need to do his OWN calculations for how long he believe it will last. I offered ZeekRewards as an EXAMPLE he could compare it to.
I would say that virtual payouts are no payouts what-so-ever, as they are all internal and have nothing to do with the external transfer of money from the accounts of BLGM to John’s Bank America account.
You keep running around in the same virtual squirrel cage, while the conversation moved on to real world transfers about two days ago.
I didn’t participate in your “conversation”. 🙂
If you feel that is a problem, it may be related to your OWN ideas. People may be heavily affected by the ideas they already have when reading something, and that may derail them from the actual content they’re reading.
You have already identified that you see each single statement in each single comment as a part of a conversation, e.g. you see certain “rules” for what people can post?
I’m not following the same idea. I’m following MANY different ideas, but the general idea in that comment was to add something to the information that already had been posted.
You simply misinterpreted the comment. It was NOT a part of a conversation, it was an addition to something already posted. You can test it against that idea rather than your own?
Not ‘my” conversation, but “the” conversation unless you were having one all by yourself (which seems to have been the case) .
I didn’t participate in “the” conversation either, and I didn’t have my own conversation with myself. I was simply adding some pieces of information. Some of the pieces were simply used to give some context to other pieces.
I use different ideas than you, e.g. I won’t normally visit this website for conversation purposes. I use MANY different ideas, and I will also switch rapidly between different ideas, or combine different types of ideas.
You can’t expect me to identify all the different ideas I’m using. It’s probably better if you can identify your idea, the one you initially used in post #356? You probably had an initial idea there?
You have identified the different comments to be a part of a conversation, and that some parts already have been discussed and should be finished?
That for clearing that up. There must be an echo.
@Hoss
You can probably forget explaining your idea. I don’t really need it.
I use MANY different methods, and people may be unfamiliar with them. My first response will normally be to explain the logics in my own posts. If that method doesn’t work, I will normally need to ask for more information. I will also try to analyse the problem.
Most of the time, I’m following a slightly modified version of “factual and unbiased information”, the idea stated on the website itself. I have modified “unbiased” to become “balanced”, because that idea is much easier to live up to.
The logic in post #355 was actually plain and simple = I identified virtual values vs. real values (one of them could continue almost forever, the other would stop). And then I added ZeekRewards as a known example where we already know the numbers, and then the conclusion that BLGM is in a similar situation.
I did NOT participate in any conversation. That post added something to other methods I had used, e.g. the 2 questions, the “5 units of …” and some other methods.
Some of the methods I’m using is related to that I’m sales educated, e.g. I will try to add some visual ideas to my logical explanations from time to time. “5 units of gold” and “5 units of orange juice” were about that.
I actually started planning that “orange juice method” some days ago in another thread. K. Chang got some associations about “Zen methods”, but the logic is actually plain and simple.
Someone I know “invested” $6,000 in wcm777 in September also just “invested” $7,000 in BLGM last month (she said that’s the minimum needed to buy the units).
I asked her if wcm777 & BLGM are related. She said the person whom sold her these “investments” told her that BLGM is founded by a “brother” of wcm777’s founder. She said BLGM is even better than wcm777 as it’s at an early stage and the ROI is better.
I told her what I learned from here and from amlmskeptic.com regarding what happened to wcm777 in US and told her to be careful but she said it was not wcm777’s fault, it’s just the US government is creating problems for wcm777 but now it moved it’s office to Hong Kong so there shouldn’t be any problems any more.
Anyways, I told her that I don’t want to invest in any of these companies and I just give up in convincing her and the others in our Moms’ group to not ‘invest” in these two companies or even Lyoness (funny they all got involved with all these mlm companies and other ones such as Mannatech and Usana too and they all tried to sell each other these products and they all told me not to tell their husbands about how much they invested in these companies!!).
BTW, does anyone know if wcm777 and BLGM are indeed “related” at all? Also, what do you think of Usana and have you ever done a review on this company?
Hot hand fallacy: the good times will continue (until we say otherwise)
http://www.fallacyfiles.org/hothandf.html
It would be a pretty stupid bunch of fraudsters if they DIDN’T” pay out anything, wouldn’t it ??
Let me see.
If they pay you 1% a day, it will take 100 days before you get your initial deposit back and BEFORE you are “in profit”
Good luck with that.
@Eva
I don’t know about being related at the executive level, but I would wager a significant amount of money is laundered between the two. They are after all the two biggest Ponzi schemes operating out of Hong Kong at the moment.
Love the dismissal of getting busted for running a Ponzi scheme in Massachusetts as mere “problems”. Ah, the bullshit you need to feed yourself when you invest in Ponzi schemes is priceless.
Brother only in the sense that both are Chinese.
Ming Xu is from the mainland and used to work for the government radio. As far as I know Luke Tang is Hong Kong all the way. Hong Kong’ers despise mainlanders.
Don’t bother, may be illegal in China.
http://www.sequenceinc.com/fraudfiles/2013/07/citron-research-usana-health-sciences-operating-illegally-in-china/
You’re clearly NOT attracted to that type of “life changing opportunities, so I can focus on other parts of that problem.
Moms’ group turned into recruitment group pressure IS a problem. We don’t have any good solutions to that.
None of us will be able to CONVINCE anyone about why they shouldn’t join the next “life changing opportunity”, if they’re not already willing to believe in that idea, knowingly or unknowingly. People will typically convince themselves, they will not be convinced by others.
If you’re relatively sure you won’t be attracted to opportunities like that “in a weak moment”, there’s nothing wrong in being more relaxed about it. “Being relaxed” is often a part of a solution. I will sometimes suggest that idea.
I suggeested “Be relaxed” when I replied to a comment in 2012: “My girlfriend have become a ZeekRewards member, and now she want to recruit me too. She will blame ME if she fails to recruit anyone”. 🙂
I pointed out that Zeek most likely would collapse within 3 or 4 months, or be shut down for other reasons. Then I pointed out the 60 day free trial, where he could upgrade to Silver membership within 30 days or something ($10 per month). I estimated that it would cost him $30 total.
People will normally find their OWN solutions, and he probably did. The only idea was actually to make him feel more relaxed about options like that, relaxed enough to INCLUDE methods he normally wouldn’t have accepted.
“Being relaxed” might be a solution to something here, e.g. reducing the feeling of group pressure might reduce the actual group pressure, in that people might return to more normal social roles when there’s less resistance (the need for convincing will be reduced).
The comments in this thread will show you that we never have been able to convince anyone about anything, if they didn’t already WANT to believe in it. That’s reflected in some of the latest comments, e.g. in that I’m trying new ideas.
The idea is simply about if you reduce your own need to convince them, they might reduce their needs. That’s the best idea I was able to find. I can probably add much more substance to that idea.
Received my first payment today that I requested at the beginning of October. I received an email from them saying that it takes 8 weeks to remit that fund because the overhelm of workload, they are struggling with sudden rapid growth of business.
Bull****. membership and all that should be an automated script on the backend. You can BUY scripts like that off the shelf or pay some graduate in India a few thousand dollars to have it written for you in three weeks.
Either they’re still in the dark ages (i.e. processing Internet stuff MANUUALLY BY HAND) or there’s some other reason they can’t pay you. Either way it’s bull****.
Any idea if there is an investigation or how this can be shut down? I had a friend who was invited to a sales pitch and was shocked – and even more shocked that seemingly intelligent, educated people appeared deeply involved. Do the pitchmen plant stooges?
This needs to stop, they are intentionally targeting an older audience pitching “diversity of investment” and “retirement plans” for those with fixed incomes.
They also say they are breaking into the mainland Chinese market as the source of revenue, the millions of rich Chinese are lining up to buy the high-quality goods. Impossible!!!
Internet commerce is so regulated in Mainland China, pigs will fly before even a Hong Kong company can break in…
What can I do?
It’s not unheard of to plant some of your downline in a presentation and have them gush about at the opportune time.
This is the narrative fed to the rest of the world. The reality is, like a few scams operating out of Hong Kong, BLGM ship in and sign up Chinese investors on the same ROI promises they make to everyone else.
If you’re in the US you can report it to your local authorities and hope for the best. Unfortunately, and something BLGM is no doubt aware of, this appears to be in the hands of Hong Kong authorities. China proper is quick to come down on these scams, Hong Kong not so much.
It’s more likely that they are merely citing Taobao’s success.
They’ve been making this claim since the scheme started. It was always China and Russia that were going to support Bidders Paradise, and, when they “opened up”, recruitment would cease.
Astoundingly, some of the early investors still believe it.
In talking to some friends these past days, I am quite surprised how little people understand about how to identify a Ponzi.
I was told last night “don’t you know the difference between a pyramid and a Ponzi?”. In fact, I went to the U.S SEC website and it gave a chart to show the “differences”. How frustrating – the SEC needs to change its messaging to indicate a Ponzi can come in lots of packages, including as a pyramid.
In BLGM the pyramid and laundering of money through Bidder’s Paradise (well, if BP ever actually sees much/any of the money) tends to obfuscate the fact that the only output would be the money put in by those buying units. There is no real investment.
Mysteriously reproducing “units” can be acquired for processing fees a fraction of the $1295, so it SEEMs like a good deal and people add more money!
Whatever the facade the deposits are made under, nobody is putting money into BLGM without the expectation of a >100% ROI, paid out as advertised over 99 days.
Any money an affiliate pumps into the scheme they expect a ROI on is an investment.
Oz, Thanks – I could have used better wording. There is no real profit, nor a business structure that would produce real profit.
Doesn’t matter. Both are frauds, and modern schemes are often hybrid schemes with elements of both Ponzi and pyramid schemes.
At the most basic level, pyramid scheme REQUIRES recruiting and your gain is dependent on how many you recruit, while Ponzi schemes does not (but it heavily encourages recruiting as it needs new recruits to ‘sustain’ the scheme). However, it’s quite easy to mix the two.
It may be important to separate between them if asked directly about it, e.g. so you don’t add to the confusion.
Traditional pyramid schemes are money based chain recruitment schemes. The recruitment system is a clear signature.
Promotional pyramid schemes are product based chain recruitment schemes. The recruitment system is a clear signature.
Ponzi schemes are fraudulent investment schemes, often disguised to attract specific types of investors (e.g. as work or production). Falsely prospected ROI is a not so clear signature, so you will need look for more than one signature to detect them.
That logic will neither indicate them clearly nor separate between them? That logic will work partially for some types of business models, but it will not separate Ponzi and pyramids.
Both pyramid schemes and Ponzi schemes will require some types of investments from the participants. But legitimate investments will also require some types of investments from investors. ROI >100% is what ROI normally is about, WHY investors do invest in something.
Pyramid schemes are deceptive in nature = the participants will mostly mislead themselves to believe enough people will join after them.
Ponzi schemes are fraudulent in nature = the participants will need to accept some false information about how the profit is generated.
The CORE of a business is what the business is built up around. It’s normally where most of the money comes in from the market.
Deceptive business models will normally be reflected in the primary function of the core, e.g. a sales organization that primarily is selling the opportunity to sell the opportunity, or a consumer community that doesn’t really makes any sense for consumers.
Fraudulent business models will normally be reflected in incomplete components, e.g. penny auctions without retail customers, or participants being paid for work that doesn’t generate any revenue, or production without any customers.
Both types will be reflected in the insignificant revenue from external sources, e.g. customers or clients.
One way to separate between them is to look at WHERE the prospected ROI is supposed to come from.
* From an organized structure (like a matrix or a downline) will be typical for a pyramid scheme. The main function of a pyramid scheme is to distribute rewards upwards in the system, to the people at the top and near the top.
* From a “pool of money” (like daily profit sharing pools), or from vaguely defined revenue sources will be typical for fraudulent investments.
Ponzi investments will have missing components or flawed business logics, e.g. vague parts where money seems to be generated out of thin air (from IDEAS people can accept as real, but they are only illusions).
@M_Norway
I wasn’t trying to separate Ponzi and pyramid schemes, merely define an investment.
Whether a business is a Ponzi or pyramid is naturally determined by what they do with said investments (or membership fees if it’s a pyramid scheme).
Neither of which cannot be proven without complete access to the inner workings of the fraud under question.
By their very nature, fraudsters lie, deceive, forge, fake, create and mislead and are not bound by “normal” rules of debate.
Point out an inconsistency and a fraudster can simply change details, add numbers and fake documents, leaving a potential victim finding only clues, rather than finite proof.
My definition of an investment in MLM, and which closely aligns to the SEC (IMO), is that if an affiliate pumps money into a company on the expectation of a >100% ROI, implied or explicitly promised by the company, then you’re looking at an investment.
Doesn’t matter how the ROI is paid out, it’s money handed over on the expectation of a return.
“1.5% daily profit share over 90 days” will be an unregistered security, where the expected ROI is based primarily on your OWN invested money / reinvested daily returns.
The fraudulent part will be when the daily profit share is imaginary and fake, when you are led to believe that payouts to the back office in “Hong Kong dollars” are real money that can be reinvested directly.
“10% commission on your directly sponsored affiliates’ purchases” will be based primarily on the people you have introduced directly or indirectly, rather than on your own principal investment / reinvestment. It will fail to meet criterias listed in the Howey test.
Matrix payouts when a matrix is filled will clearly be based on other people’s investments rather than on your own investment. However, if you can buy multiple positions in a matrix, some payouts may be based primarily on your own investment.
When asked DIRECTLY, it may be wise to identify the logics used rather than the conclusion, either complete or simplified. Or else you will eventually find blogs and forum posts popping up all over the internet using you as an example for incorrect ideas. 🙂
Direct questions will normally require direct answers, at least if you’re trying to communicate on the same level as the person asking the question.
BLGM to my liking is going you might say somewhat private soon. No new multi level members. This will remove BLGM largely from any involvement in a Ponzi lookalike.
Revenue in the soon to be future will come from the purchase of bids to auction with and the auction sites advertisements only. BLGM Alexa rating is at 7,000th most viewed internet site in the US. 19,200 most viewed in the world.
The sooner membership closes the better. Thanks for your time.
Ponzi schemes don’t cut off their primary source of revenue (affiliate investment).
This is yet another pie in the sky promise to keep the investment money rolling in.
Might I suggest you spend a few minutes alone with Mr Google searching what “going private” means in terms of online “opportunities” such as BLGM.
HINT: They never come back from “going private”
“Somewhat private” means “try not to attract so many people as to arouse the attention of the authorities”
As a result, expect to see profits slow to a trickle in the near future due to “downturn of business”, “competition”, or “we got hacked”.
Lol, not that it has any bearing on whether or not BLGM is a ponzi, but I’ve been hearing this for months, dude.
Also, your Alexa figures aren’t accurate. Like, at all.
Your right I admit I was off on the Alexa rating in the US. Its actually 7200 as of recent. Sorry bout that. Thanks for your comments K.Chang and X. Isn’t freedom of speech great.
WCM777 had a presents in the states. Now they leave a trail the size of Texas all the way back to HK.
Alexa ranking is about how frequently the affiliates are visiting the site. Purchase of bids is about affiliates investing and reinvesting in units.
* To place the ranking into a context, this website has currently a rank of 8,800 in the US and 26,200 in the world. BLGM (blgm.hk) has more member visitors (94% of the visitors are members).
* Bidders’ Paradise (bp8.hk) has a rank of 18,600 in the US, 37,800 in the world.
Revenue is about MONEY, not about bids or “Hong Kong dollars” in a back office. You’re actually saying it will soon pull the plug and stop paying out more money?
BLGM.HK ALEXA STATISTICS
Country | % | rank in country
United States 44.7% 7,044
South Korea 17.0% 1,225
Sweden 10.8% 934
Chile 8.4% 959
Denmark 7.5% 725
Thailand 5.8% 2,030
Dominican Republic 1.8% 2,492
Hong Kong 0.8% 8,891
Bidders Paradise has relatively similar visitor statistics, the only auction users are the affiliates themselves.
BLGM first got some momentum in second half of 2013.
The organizers seems to have forgot that the payment processors will leave their own money trails, pointing directly at the organizers.
Payment processors used by BLGM:
C3252253 07/24/2009 ACTIVE GLOBAL PAYOUT, INC. JAMES LEE HANCOCK
C3543970 03/15/2013 ACTIVE GOLDEN GLOBAL PAYOUT, INC. THERESE BERNABE
Source: kepler.sos.ca.gov
BLGM seems to have been initially organized from the US, before it rapidly moved to Hong Kong when Zeek was shut down in August 2012.
Therese (Theresa N.) Bernabe seems to be one of the organizers in the US.
Source:
http://www.thegreenbaron.com/Stock%20Pick%20Profiles/Stock%20Profiles%20Global%20Payout,%20Inc.%20(GOHE)-9-4-13.htm
Nonsense.
You’re quoting something from post #361, a small part of a 7 day old discussion? 🙂
There was no discussion seven days ago. I have decided that I did not participate in the conversation.
Good to hear. I tried to analyse the logic, but couldn’t find any, so I couldn’t give you any reply. “Random and impulse driven comment, not to be interpreted in context with something” was a much better explanation.
My post here is meant to be interpreted in context with post #397. It’s a conclusion to that post. Post #397 was initially meant as a question, i.e. I assumed there was some logical explanation for something, but I was able to conclude it here.
This pretty much describes the characteristics of your contribution to the previous discussion.
The logic there was clearly explained in post #357, #359, #361 and #363. You will simply need to look at the logical explanation. The logic will not reflect your idea, but it will reflect the realities.
….and you can reference your posts after claiming you did not participate in the discussion/conversation.
Speaking of reality. Where is yours?
I have simply looked at the posts, and analysed the logic as it really is posted there.
You will need to look at the realities RATHER THAN your own ideas. If you mix in your own ideas, your interpretation will reflect your own distorted ideas rather than the realities.
“LOOK AT THE REALITIES RATHER THAN YOUR OWN IDEAS”
You can try that idea on something else, to see if it makes any sense?
We had a discussion about the value of bids when they were used in auctions, where you eagerly defended your own distorted ideas about $0.01 value of each bid. That idea can be used as part of a METHOD, e.g. a method to calculate auction revenue, but the idea isn’t true in itself.
Or you can look at some of the other ideas presented in this thread, e.g. the idea that “Hong Kong dollars” in a back office are worth something of monetary value, or the idea that the units are investments and have some monetary value.
None of those ideas will reflect the realities, and neither did your conversation idea.
“Hong Kong dollars” in a back office are not worth ANYTHING of monetary value in themselves. The function is more similar to monopoly money in a game than to real money, e.g. they can be used for internal transactions only.
I guess more system issues will occur when it is near collapse.
Posted on BLGM website today:
Christmas time is typically withdrawal hell for Ponzi schemes, so I’m entirely not surprised BLGM is having problems.
Apparently you did not comprehend the material. This is not surprising.
You’re constructing new flawed ideas based on your previous flawed ideas? 🙂
You defended the idea of $0.01 bid value actively and emotionally in several posts, but the idea isn’t true in itself and was misleading in the context it was presented.
You’re using similar methods like true believers do, e.g. the argument “you simply don’t understand the concept” is very commonly used by true believers.
They will normally use a “belief system” to interpret the realities, and construct new flawed ideas based on their own belief system. They will not analyse the realities, they will simply test new ideas against the ideas they already have accepted.
BID VALUE
George dagal (post #24 etc.) ideas revolved around the idea they had presented to him in a video, where the bids would be worth $0.58 when used in auctions, a value that could be added to the company’s revenue.
He used that flawed idea to construct new flawed ideas, more complicated than the first one, e.g. assuming that people with integrity would reflect the same belief system as himself. He constructed several ideas around the same flawed belief system. His ideas originated from the idea that the first information he had received from the company itself was true.
Your ideas were flawed too in that discussion, i.e. bids are neither worth $0.58 nor $0.01 in monetary value (value that can be added to revenue in business). Ideas like that will not reflect realities, they will only reflect flawed ideas.
CORRECTNESS IN FACTS AND METHODS
Logical arguments will need to be based on correctness in facts and methods, and you failed to meet both criterias.
The bid value discussion was used as an example here. I don’t see any point in repeating the same discussion.
Which is to say that you did not comprehend what was being said.
This is of course my point. You do not get it.
Value is subjective. Estimation of value is personal. Any price paid for an object or thing reflects the BUYER’s opinion of value at the time of purchase… not yours. If you can understand that you will understand what I have been saying, but I do not expect that you can…or will.
Concerning this thread: Your “numbers on a screen” diatribe does not and never will account for the transfer of BLGM funds in ( US Dollars) to an affiliate’s Bank of America account in the US. When asked about how your “numbers on a screen” theory was supposed to explain such external transfers you lied and said that you did not participate in the conversation (and then INCREDIBLY provided post #s that showed you did. ????
That’s horseshit. You know it and I know it.
Please drop the repeated use of the word “flawed.” Its tiresome.
If you believe you can add “personal value” and “subjective value” to revenue in business, then you can of course post something about it. The bid value discussion was about revenue.
I haven’t claimed it covered the whole idea either.
I analysed some specific parts for monetary value:
* Bid value, when used in auctions.
* Unit value, as “investments”
* “Hong Kong dollars”, when used internally (reinvestment)
None of those hold any monetary value in themselves.
They are part of a Ponzi game, i.e. the rules of the game will make it possible to withdraw some of it as real money, and allow people to sell some of it to new investors for real money.
When did you ask about that? You made a STATEMENT about something like that in post #358:
Please focus on the realities rather than on your own ideas? I didn’t reply to that statement at all, I didn’t interpret it as a question. I will NOT respond to each and every statement in each and every comment.
“Didn’t participate in the conversation” was about post #355 alone, not about the other posts. The other posts were about explaining the logic in that post, and bringing corrections to your idea.
As far as I could see, it was related to your OWN ideas rather than to the realities.
I never said I believed in anything of the sort, and in fact adding value to revenue is entirely nonsensical and no more possible than adding apples to oranges. I understand this. You apparently don’t and never will.
Revenue is about money / monetary value. You can clearly add a monetary transaction to the revenue in business. But you can’t add bids, units, “Hong Kong dollars” or “personal value”.
The bid value discussion started with a question from george dagal in post #28:
He had watched a video presentation from BLGM, where bids were explained as valuables that would add to the company’s revenue when the bids were used in auctions.
The company will get money in from the investors when they pay for units of bids, when they pay with real money (rather than “Hong Kong dollars”) DIRECTLY to the company (rather than directly to the sponsor).
All the ideas where bids should be worth something of monetary value would not reflect the realities he was asking about. His main questions were about the review, about the fairness of not telling the audience about the imaginary value of the bids (e.g. WHY we didn’t repeat the company’s own explanation, like he did).
George dagal has got the answers he asked for, but not the answers he wanted initially. Ideas about fairness can’t be based on a corrupted belief system.
Here is the problem. You misuse the terminology to the point that all meaning is lost. Unfortunately, continuing to converse with you only gives you more time to compound your errors and we end up in the mists of total confusion. Here is a quick guide for you
Revenue = income
Value = the monetary worth of (something).
Should you choose to think about it you will see that value does not equal revenue. For example:
I can value a car at $1000 but that does not generate any revenue for anyone since the mental process of valuation is not the transfer of money. I must actually pay the $1,000 before the car seller recognizes revenue. This takes a TRANSACTION. Valuation is not a transaction it is a subjective assessment of worth,ie., “how much should I pay for the car?”
Once I do pay and I own the car I may find that it is a lemon, in which case my assessment of its worth or value will change (decline,) but this would in no way affect the car seller’s revenue since it remains $1000 (the transaction amount) regardless of the value I now place on the vehicle. This demonstrates that value IS NOT the same as revenue.
Your statement that revenue (income) is about money is true but it is not true that revenue is monetary value (though it may have monetary value.) Revenue is income denominated in a monetary unit, and that is not the same thing as monetary value.
Lastly, suggesting that one can add a monetary transaction to revenue is confused and redundant for booking revenue is itself the transaction.
Good luck, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year Taking an elementary accounting class would probably benefit you.
I was not talking about the “mental process of valuation”. It was involved in the questions, but not like you have interpreted it.
You will need to look at the initial questions about bid value. George dagal was asking about why we haven’t included anything about the $0.58 monetary value of each bid in the review, i.e. the idea people believe in that the auctions are highly profitable because of all the bids people are using there.
The “mental evaluation of value” was about something else, about fairness and integrity.
Logical arguments don’t need to be 100% perfect, but they should preferrably reflect the realities and make some sense. It’s normally better to answer questions directly with the same type of logic, rather than to put up complicated theories about something else.
Your definitions are not true in themselves, as stand alone arguments. They reflect ideas rather than realities.
VALUE can be about many types of value, but I have clearly specified “monetary value” in almost every post. Your argument is irrelevant, it reflects your own ideas rather than the realities.
Money is monetary value in itself, in the fact that it’s commonly accepted and used in transactions and can be directly exchanged with other items of monetary value.
Revenue is, slightly simplyfied, about the monetary value of money (“Hong Kong dollars” in a back office can’t replace real money), the total amount derived from commercial activities in a business, in a specific period of time.
A business can accept other values than money in transactions, e.g. some internet based businesses can accept bitcoins, some businesses may accept gold or silver. But in the context of the questions asked it was about monetary value of money.
“THE PROCESS OF VALUATION”
The arguments about “process of valuation” are irrelevant in the context of bid value or revenue. Your arguments fail to meet the criteria for correctness in relevance.
You CAN however use “process of valuation” logic on the parts about fairness and integrity, e.g. in tests like “Would this website have become more fair if it had included the ideas people believe in?”.
I don’t believe that will solve anything, it looks like a part of a flawed belief system.
Although I asked you to refrain from using the word flawed in every other sentence (knowing full well you could not) I retract my request. I will replace it with another. Please take something for your oral diarrhea.
Thank you
Yeah right, and everytime I consider the price of potatoes I stop and mentally evaluate how much fairness and integrity they contain. Blurg.
Most of it was related to analysing YOUR ideas, e.g. testing the arguments for relevance. The length of the post is partly a reflection of the material I had to test. I even simplified some sections before posting. 🙂
That was about the initial post (#28), not about your ideas.
“Mental evaluation of value” doesn’t make any sense in the context of bid value / revenue / profit share, so I tried to identify other areas where the idea could make some sense.
Nothing makes sense to you. Nothing you say makes sense. You just babble meaninglessly. End
I’m trying to use som standard defintions and standard logical arguments, e.g.:
That logic is clear but simplified. It’s simplified to reflect the current topic BLGM. It’s on-topic for what the discussion initially was about, i.e. it doesn’t derail the discussion.
Logical arguments like that should be relatively correct and “standardized”, and should make sense for most people. If it doesn’t make any sense it’s probably related to your own ideas.
You have more complicated ideas, where you don’t analyse arguments for RELEVANCE before adding them, e.g. the “personal / subjective value” idea isn’t very relevant if you’re analysing revenue.
You have several logical flaws, e.g. analysing your own ideas rather than the realities. Where you BELIEVE you’re analysing my statements, you’re actually analysing your own ideas.
One example:
The idea that “revenue equals value” is your OWN flawed idea. It doesn’t reflect anything in my statements, i.e. your making up flawed ideas yourself just to analyse them.
People will normally use methods like that when they don’t have valid arguments, i.e. they will need to “invent new problems” to get valid arguments. But those problems will be their OWN imaginary problems.
I have clearly used “monetary value” in almost every post. I have already pointed out that you’ll need to focus on the realities rather than your own ideas. Analysing your OWN flawed ideas won’t make much sense in a discussion.
Since I have stated that value and revenue are NOT the same on at least three different ocassions…
…and yet you still maintain that that I have, it strikes me that you must have shit for brains.
That was exactly my point. You’re analysing and discussing your OWN ideas, with hardly any input from me (other than identifying the initial questions, and some attempts to analyse your logic in that context).
You’re not correcting anything in my statements, like you BELIEVE you do. You’re introducing your OWN ideas, and then you believe I have the opposite ideas, and then you come to some conclusion that I must be misguided. But you’re only making up imaginary problems.
The topic here should normally be BLGM, e.g. whether or not it’s a Ponzi / pyramid hybrid. One of the sub topics is the bid value discussion, e.g. whether the bids are worth $0.58, $0.01 or ZERO.
“Personal value” isn’t very relevant in that context, but it might be worth mentioning anyway. WHY the “personal value” isn’t very relevant is because the bid value discussion indirectly involved BLGM’s revenue.
You CAN add monetary value to revenue, but you can’t add “personal value”.
Yes…..what are the bids worth?
Dagal valued the bid packs according to HIS understanding and YOU valued them according to YOURS. This is the essence of subjective valuation and is personal to each of you.
Accordingly, a personal assessment of value has EVERYTHING to do with the price paid or not paid for bid packs.
To Dagal the right to bid in increments of a penny was worth $.58 per bid right when purchased in bulk. We know this because he willingly paid that much. In YOUR opinion a bid or bid pack was worth $0 Your entitled to your opinion but don’t lose track that it is only YOUR opinion.
Since Dagal valued a bid at $.58 and was both willing and able to buy on that basis a monetary transaction (purchase) occured resulting in the receipt of revenue by BLGM of several thousand US Dollars.
Dagal may have been misled. He may be disappointed. He may not profit as he expects in which case his assessment of value was wrong and he overpaid for the bids; but should his return be greater than his expectations the converse is the case.
We can not know until all accounts are settled. It is only at that time that any one will know if his opinion was more accurate than yours.
However, what may be said with objective exactitude even now at this early date is this:
So long as Dagal does not lose ALL of his money the bid packs (and thus the value of individual bid rights for which he paid $.58) were and are worth more than $0.
I this respect Dagal’s opinion may prove to be more accurate than yours since the longer BLGM continues to operate the less likely it is that Mr. Dagal will lose ALL his investment.
Note: This is not to say or imply that bidding/bids/pennies or products have much, if anything to do with Mr. Dagals’ potential investment return but only that his assessement of value, his desire for participation, the risk he was willing to take and the returns he hopes to make are personally assessed and priced.
I used commonly accepted business logics rather than my personal assessment, e.g. by pointing out that bids are not monetary units that can be added to revenue. You don’t need “personal assessment of value” if you’re able to identify the correct logics.
Neither I nor George Dagal used “personal assessment of value” on that part. He referred indirectly to a marketing video explaining the value of the bids when used in auctions. The explanation was completely misleading, but he believed in it.
That’s why I have asked you to LOOK AT THE REALITIES rather than your own ideas, e.g. you can test the logic I have used or ask questions about it, but you can’t expect me to reflect your own ideas (they will often fail to reflect the realities).
I can probably find the marketing video, too. It’s one of the official videos explaining the program.
The bidpack units have SOME type of value, i.e. in that they can generate positive ROI indirectly. But they don’t hold any monetary value in themselves, the ROI is generated from the Ponzi scheme rules rather than from the units. The units are simply part of the Ponzi scheme.
“Personal assessment of value” will reflect people’s MOTIVATION rather than the value of something.
Business logics should normally be able to identify the value of something, but there are MANY different methods that all can be considered to be “valid methods”. I used a plain and simple method, i.e. I identified what revenue is about and whether or not bids could be added to revenue.
Whatever logic you choose still leads to a personal conclusion of value. I could consult the stars and come up with a number. Maybe Dagal used a ouija board. It does not matter since it is all reduced to the price we are each willing to pay.
What you describe as “commonly accepted business logic” is quite obviously not or everyone, including Mr. Dagal would agree with you. People invest or they don’t based on their own assessments not yours. Each person decides value for himself. Its subjective.
Every day someone is buying and someone is selling the exact same same stock. Why is that? Because each individual assesses value differently, views the future differently, makes different assumptions. which is to say that value as expressed as the price someone is willing to pay is subjective.
@Hoss
HOW did you interpret it to be a question about George Dagal’s personal MOTIVATION for buying the bidpack units? 🙂
I didn’t fully understand his ideas myself, but I was able to identify most of it, e.g. both the values he was asking about and for which purpose. It became clearer when he referred to that marketing video in his next post.
The most correct answer should normally be that bids are neither worth $0.01 nor $0.58 when used in auctions. Bids are “consumables” and will simply disappear when they have been used, i.e. they will not add anything to the company’s revenue. They are not monetary units, i.e. people are consuming them rather than using them as payment when they’re spending the bids in auctions.
The most correct answers to his other questions should normally be to tell him the truth, e.g. that his own ideas äbout bid value simply don’t reflect the realities, and explain WHY his ideas will fail.
George understood the way BLGM represented the auction process. He accepted it. His choice. Your explanations were rejected.
Truth is subjective.
Perhaps he has already doubled or tripled his money.
“Personal value” will reflect MOTIVATION rather than VALUE. It can explain why people are buying something, but it won’t explain how much something really is worth in terms of monetary value.
“It does not matter since it is all reduced to the price we are each willing to pay” reflects motivation rather than value.
Mr. Dagal “disappeared” rather quickly when he met some resistance, and would be forced to test his own ideas if he wanted to defend them. He has not returned, so we don’t know anything about whether or not he actually “got the idea”.
The logic is plain and simple:
1. Identify what revenue is about = monetary equalencies.
2. Identify if bids will meet criteria #1 = FAIL.
3. Conclusion = bids will not add anything to revenue.
It was of course supported by other logical test, but the general logic is actually plain and simple.
The fact that some people will choose to ignore plain and simple logic may be related to their own ideas, e.g. they’re not familiar with that type of explanations and how to analyse it, or they may have conflicting ideas that will prevent them from even looking at it.
“Commonly accepted business logic” means that it’s commonly accepted in business, e.g. the same logic will be accepted by almost anyone with SOME business experience. It will also be accepted by almost anyone else, but it might need to be presented using examples they’re familiar with.
I’m a former sales person, so I know perfectly well that we can’t convince anyone if they’re not already willing to believe in it (knowingly or unknowingly).
Look at the realities rather than your own ideas, e.g. you know very little about his decisions, or whether or not he actually “got the idea”?
We know he “disappeared” from the discussion, i.e. he’s not putting up the same type of arguments anymore to defend BLGM. His behavior has clearly been changed by that discussion.
George Dagal BELIEVED he understood how BLGM worked in his first post, but he suddenly dropped all “resistance” after 3 posts. Something in that discussion have probably made some changes to his motivation.
He used bold arguments about integrity, trustworthiness and other “core values”. People will normally CONTINUE a discussion when they first have introduced arguments like that, if they feel they have a solid case. But he disappeared rather quickly.
That’s the REALITIES we can see. Oz can of course have deleted some of George Dagal’s posts, e.g. permanently sending his posts to the spam bin. There may of course have been other reasons for why he disappeared.
Your own conclusions are mostly reflecting your own ideas, you have probably not analysed the realities before posting.
All value is personal. What value do you place on my dog or I on yours? There is no independent value to a dog.
Your feelings for the dog (“motivation”) will determine the personal value of that dog. But it will also have a “technical value”, e.g. for insurance purposes.
A $100 bill is worth exactly $100. Different people will be able to buy exactly the same quantity of goods or services for their own versions of it, i.e. the value is standardised in different ways. “Personal value” will not affect the monetary value of a $100 bill.
The monetary value of the bids is ZERO when used in an auction. “Personal value” will not affect the monetary value.
It will probably be much easier if you can look at the realities rather than trying to find arguments to support your own ideas. You can look at the examples in post #344?
Insurance value is no approximation of the value of a dog. It values the likelihood of the dog’s death and that is all. Its the same with humans. Do you think that insurance companies have a “technical value” for aunt Myrtle?
Of course not. We determine the death benefit not her “technical value” or the value she brings to her family and community (which are subjective)
This is so poorly written I can not respond to it. “Standardized in different ways” is nonsensical. Is it standardized or is it not? Is it different or is it standardized?
Generally true but lets not ignore the fact that there is nothing fixed about the purchasing power of $100. Currency traders constantly make personal judgments as to the value of the dollar.
You established no foundation for this assertion. Therefore its not convincing. Merely saying so does not make it true and you have provided nothing beyond a naked assertion.
However, if I have paid $.58 for every bid that I use, then the cost for each of my bids is $.58, not zero.
However a bid is only bid so of course it has no money value in itself. Bidding itself has no more money value than does showing a paddle to an auctioneer.
However if I am charged every time I raise that paddle then it will cost me $.58 every time I do so since I already exercised my personal discretion when I valued my investment and bought bid packs at the prevailing price.
I used it as an example for monetary value. The initial question from George Dagal was actually about the monetary value of the bids, and was a relevant part of this thread. Your personal belief system isn’t very relevant, i.e. this website isn’t about belief systems.
If bids had been a monetary unit, his logic WOULD have been correct, and the bids COULD have been added to the auction revenue. But he failed to identify that part correctly.
“Personal value” would also have failed. His idea WAS actually about “personal value”, about his OWN ideas for the functions of the bids.
It was not poorly written. The vague description prevented me from digging deeper into that particular topic. You should normally be able to identify that example yourself, and be able to identify how it’s standardized. Wikipedia probably has a lot of information about “currency”, “fiat money”, “monetary system” and other relevant topics.
It was an attempt to point out a direction that would lead you “back to reality”, a direction where you clearly could see your idea fail.
I didn’t say the value was fixed either. Look at the reality rather than how you have interpreted it?
It has a fixed value against other monetary units in the SAME system, e.g. a $100 bill will have the same purchasing power as 10 $10 bills or 5 $20 bills. It’s standardized in that way.
Each and every $100 bill will have exactly the same value against the other currency. Currency traders will not make personal judgments about the value of each and every one of them.
I posted the logical method, but only the most simple part of it. Look at the realities?
“Other logical tests” was about mathematical rules (“you can’t add apples to bananas”), logical rules (“member of the same group” failed), and about other logical definitions. I have also estimated “manufacturing costs” and “intrinsic value” for the product itself, and it’s clearly not any valuable product.
The reality is that I have posted the logical explanation in post #427. It’s probably better if you ask questions about that explanation rather than claiming it hasn’t been posted.
I haven’t claimed the COST was zero, only that the monetary value was zero when the bids were used in auctions. George Dagal clearly paid $1,160 per 2,000 bidpack unit, but that doesn’t mean the bids will hold any monetary value.
It will cost you one bid each time. It will not cost you any money. If you’re a regular bidder, repurchasing new bids will cost you money. If you’re not a regular bidder, you might as well consume those bids since you already have bought them (they will have NO monetary value if you store them).
George Dagal’s question wasn’t about the COST of bids, it was about the monetary value of each bid when bids were used in auctions.
A “bid” is an electronic state change in a computer so of course it has no monetary value. This is beside the point.
An electronic bidding system costs time and money to set up and run. This means that each electronic process or transaction itself costs something. Thus the bid system and the infrastructure required to run an online auction are not free. Accordingly we expect those who use such a system to be charged for its use.
BGLM as owner of this system sells bid packs which grant a limited license of use to its clients, e.g. a client/user may bid 4000 times providing the client pays a $2000 license fee. (numbers and amounts are representative)
This means that the client has paid 50 cents for each bid he is entitled to make.
Is this what a bid is worth? Yes. To the client who is motivated to use the system and participate in profit sharing this is the price he is willing to pay, BUT, it is NOT what it costs BLGM to issue and administer each bid (a bid’s production cost.) BGLM profits from selling bids to the public at a price well above its production cost. How much above? Probably a lot.
Your “numbers on a screen” should therefore show the client purchasing a bid pack followed by a draw down of available bids over time (providing the client is actively bidding,) and eventually a renewal purchase of another bid pack when the client has exhausted the initial bids and must buy more to continue participating in the auctions.
Note: that the client is still charged for each bid he buys. It only becomes a matter of where payment comes from when the renewal purchase is made.
Does the client write another check to BLGM or does the client pay for the bids out of his commissions and “profit sharing pool?” I think we can assume an answer here, but either way the bids are paid for, and thus a value can be attributed to them.
The value of bids are not zero because clients do pay for them with real money, and at least ostensibly can and do purchase more with the proceeds of their profit sharing and commissions.
This is a useless distinction. Entering a bid does not cost anything because the bids are already paid for? Such a viewpoint has no functional use.
Shall we say that tonight’s supper has no cost since our chicken was bought two weeks ago and frozen until now?
I think not. There was a cost for the chicken regardless of when it is consumed. Same for bids.
Dagal asked how much revenue would be generated for BGLM when a bidder used his bids to win an auction item. That necessarily requires us to know and calculate how much a bidder has paid for each of the bids he uses and how many times he bids before winning the auction.
You assumed some discussion needed to take place concerning the “monetary value” of a bid, but its irrelevant. A bid has no monetary value, its a blip, a state change in a metal box. What is relevant is how much Dagal paid for the right to make the bid. According to Dagal he paid $.58 That is what Dagal paid and it represents the revenue to BGLM on account of that one bid.
Does anyone ask what is the monetary value of a house? No. Its almost silly in its effect. We instead ask what is it worth or what does it cost. What is it listed for. What will it sell for, what did the exact same style of house sell for last week
A common and simple way to determine values is by appraisal. This is done by looking at comparable sales. If house A is about the same as house B and it just sold for $100 dollars we then assume that B would sell for the same and it is of equal value +/-
Nothing in this process involves a calculation of “monetary value.” We only need to know what the market pays to value the houses. Same with the bids. The price paid for the bid tells you the market price for a bid and this is a proxy for the value of the bid.
There is no need to meander about conjecturing about the “monetary value” of unused bids. They are worth what someone is willing and able to pay for them because they have utility. They may be used to participate in the auctions.
A bid is like a poker chip. Go to any casino and somewhere there will be a notice that a poker chip has no monetary value.
This means that you can not rely on the chip to pay all debts public and private as you might with a gold minted coin from US Treasury, However this does not mean that the poker chip has ZERO value. No not at all. There is utility in the chip which bestows value to it.
@Hoss
Post #433 is off-topic (irrelevant) in most of its content. The more new ideas you’re trying to mix into the discussion to support your own belief system the more complicated it will get.
You don’t really NEED to calculate the cost of software or administration costs to be able to establish the monetary value of the bids. Arguments like that will be valid if you’re trying to calculate a PRICE, but they will not be valid if you’re trying to establish the monetary VALUE of each bid when used in auctions.
Arguments will need to be relevant. You will need to analyse a couple of logical ideas first before posting arguments, e.g.:
* “What am I actually trying to prove here?”
* “Am I derailing from the actual topic?”
* “Is my argument valid?”
* “Does my argument reflect sound ideas?”
This website ISN’T about discussing belief systems. Try to identify CORRECTLY what the initial question was about, and don’t derail too much from that sub topic.
* If you’re in doubt about what the initial question was about, use some rules about “fairness” and assume he asked relevant questions.
I identified the initial question to be about the value of the bids when they were used in auctions. That interpretation is supported by some of the other questions he asked, and by some of the information he added e.g. in post #35 (where he indirectly said he had watched the presentation, and accused me of attempts to change how to interpret it).
That interpretation is also supported by how most other people have interpreted it, e.g. it’s being reflected in the answer Oz gave there and it was reflected in a follow up question from Michelle in post #240.
My interpretation is also RELEVANT for the main topic. We’re discussing BLGM, and the value of the bids when used in auctions can be highly relevant if you want to analyse whether or not it actually is a fraudulent Ponzi scheme.
If you have interpreted it differently, you don’t need to post long posts building up around your own ideas. You can simply identify the fact that you have interpreted it differently. Try to identify whether or not your interpretation is RELEVANT for the main topic before posting?
I have interpreted it as I understand it. The interpretation is relevant.
Your interpretation is bunk, habitual and illogical. It is not worth reading and is total excrement.
Imagine that. Of course you told him how to interpret things. Its what you do even though you are completely out to lunch. Its no wonder he left and never came back.
Your logical idea is flawed. You will need to clearly separate monetary transactions from other types of transactions, i.e. you can’t put both types into the same formula.
Here’s an example:
* John paid $6,500 to his sponsor for 5 units. The monetary value of the transaction ended up in his sponsor’s bank account. Can you add that to BLGM’s revenue?
* John’s sponsor paid for the 5 units with “Hong Kong dollars” from his back office. Can you add that to BLGM’s revenue?
* John borrowed some “Hong Kong dollars” from his upline, and used that and some of his own “Hong Kong dollars” to buy 2 additional units. Can you add that to BLGM’s revenue?
You don’t really need calculations. The only thing they potentially could add to BLGM’s revenue was “Hong Kong dollars” from John’s and his sponsor’s back offices. “Hong Kong dollars” in a back office will fail the logical tests for “cash equivalency”, i.e. calculations will be flawed anyway.
If you want to look at some logical test for “cash equivalency”, I can probably find them in Wikipedia. But it’s much easier if people can use some common sense, e.g. if they can test the idea “Can I pay my bills or pay for groceries with the Hong Kong dollars?”, or “Can I transfer these Hong Kong dollars DIRECTLY to my bank account?”.
How much John paid for the bids can clearly not be used in any valid calculations of that type. The realities in BLGM allows for both monetary and non-monetary bid purchases, so calculations will be rather useless.
Where is there anything published concerning these supposed Hong Kong Dollars transactions that eminate from back offices. I am asking for actual references. Do you have any?
No, if the $6500 stays in the sponsors bank account.
Paid who? BGLM? Where did the sponsor get the Hong Kong dollars from? Thin air?
John paid somebody $6500 and then borrowed some Hong KOng dollars from somebody and then used some of his own Hong Kong dollars to buy two additional units from somebody?
Who did he buy them from? BLGM? His sponsor? I have no idea. Its your story. I can’t make any sense of any of it.
Honestly, your example makes no sense at all.
“Market price” and “monetary value” isn’t about what A market can be willing to pay. It has to be about a NORMAL market.
John’s 7 units will not be worth much in a normal market, even if he paid $6,500 for 5 of those units and some “Hong Kong dollars” for the last 2 units.
The investments are more similar to investments in a game of Monopoly than to ordinary investments, but with some additional rules for the game (units CAN be sold to new gullible players, game winnings CAN be withdrawn as cash).
You failed to specify “normal market”. Your idea will not reflect the realities if it’s being tested in a normal market.
BTW, how do you calculate it when SOME people are paying with money directly to their sponsors, SOME people are paying with money directly to BLGM, but most people are paying with “Hong Kong dollars” from their own back offices?
Logical rules will normally require some consistency in the theories.
Post #324 (John).
Those two arguments redirects back to your own belief system, i.e. they’re not supported by anything else and they have not been tested for relevance against anything else.
I don’t believe we should continue this discussion. It doesn’t make any sense in itself.
You are using this idiot’s post, which you flatly refuted, at the time he posted it to exemplify the way to understand the value of a bid?
How fucked up is that?
I do not believe a word of it, and I do not believe you have the slightest , not the tiniest piece of a red pubic hair’s understanding of what you are talking about, how this program works or what John was talking about….Zip, Squat, Nada Zilch.
I have no problem ending the discussion. Its been fruitless.
When, you explain all differences of opinion or interpretation as belief system based unsupported by anything else and untested for relevance against anything else, its a good time to give up my efforts to understand you.
Your not really saying anything. Your just prattling.
By the way, how’s that frontal lobe lesion coming along?
If you have better explanations than the first one, you can of course post it. But what exactly does a statement like “I have interpreted it as I understand it. The interpretation is relevant” point to, other than to your own understanding of something?
Try to look at the realities rather than your own ideas. Does the statement point to anything other than your own understanding of something?
(post #442)
The logics were explained in the same post = “You don’t really need calculations. The only thing they potentially could add to BLGM’s revenue was “Hong Kong dollars” from John’s and his sponsor’s back offices.”
You have been discussing BLGM for several months. Most people will normally become familiar with the technical details, e.g. where the affiliates buy units from and where the payouts derives from, gradually during their own and others’ comments. In that context, most of your questions were irrelevant, you probably know the answers yourself.
Please focus on some RELEVANCE in your comments, i.e. analyse your own material before posting. Don’t mix in any irrelevant questions if you want answers to something.
FYI, the units are bought from BLGM, and most of them are bought using “Hong Kong dollars” from the affiliates’ back offices. The “Hong Kong dollars” are paid to the back offices via the compensation plan. This article is actually about BLGM, e.g. BLGM’s business model, compensation plan and other relevant info.
1. Statement “Your logical idea is flawed”.
2. Short explanation for WHY it’s flawed.
3. Long explanation for why it’s flawed.
The long explanation contained an example found in this thread, a short version of it. You got a link to the original post when you asked for it (post #324 John, posted December 9th).
It also contained a more detailed explanation than the first one, some methods for how to identify “cash equivalents”, plus a conclusion.
I flagged most of the questions in post #442 as irrelevant because of several reasons. Here’s some of them:
* You HAD already asked for the original source in post #441, so most of the questions were unnecessary.
* Some of the questions were about basic functions in the program you’re discussing, something you need to know to make any sense yourself and to be able to understand posts from others correctly. Most of it has actually been repeated several times in different variations.
* I simply don’t believe people when they pretend to have that level of poor understanding, but I can maybe make an exception for you.
Let me sum up what seems to be your understanding of how BGLM works. Please feel free to correct me if I am wrong (I am sure you will)
People set up bank accounts in some local currency which are converted into Hong Kong dollars. The monetary value of the Hong Kong Dollars is then entered into a big monopoly machine (computer) which generates numbers on a screen.
This keeps investors busy checking their monopoly money account balances and they are happy if the balance increases.
If a person can be pried away from this excitement and is willing to recruit others who are willing to pay money for the privilege of watching their own numbers on a screen, the recruiter sees an increase in the size of the numbers on his screen.
Does this mirror your understanding?
Most of it was explained in post #324 (John).
People register themselves as affiliates, typically through a recruiting sponsor (they register through the sponsor’s back office in most examples I have found).
The newly registered affiliate invests in a number of units. The payment for those units can either go directly to BLGM, or directly to the sponsor. In the last method, the sponsor will then pay for the units with “Hong Kong dollars” from his own back office.
The units will then generate daily payouts to the back office in “Hong Kong dollars” for 99 days / 5 days per week (total 19 weeks 4 days). The “Hong Kong dollars” can be reinvested into more units, or be withdrawn as cash via e-Wallets / debit cards.
The system also have some internal e-Wallets, e.g. for mandatory repurchase of units when they expire after 99 days. Another internal e-Wallet can be used for internal transactions of “Hong Kong dollars” among the members.
Affiliates can also earn different commissions from recruitment, but that’s explained in the review.
In short, the system is a ZeekRewards clone, but with some cosmethical changes. People will disappear from the discussion if you ask questions about retail sales and retail customers.
My core understanding isn’t about the details. It’s about understanding enough of the system to communicate it and ask questions about it.
“Core understanding” means I also will separate between
‘ internal and external transactions
‘ “Hong Kong dollars” and real money
It will probably be easier if you’re able to identify your OWN understanding of the system rather than mine. You don’t need to post it, but you should preferrably have it e.g. in case someone asks about it.
Normally, a certain “core understanding” will be needed to be able to analyse the material and to communicate ideas properly. Normally it’s wiser to focus on your OWN understanding rather than others’.
So a unit purchaser is generally registered by his sponsor and is thereafter within the tracking system as an affiliate, eligible to bid, has a position in the matrix, and is eligible to participate in in “profit sharing” and commissions.
I take it that the “units” that you speak of are the Bidder’s Paradise packs, which are sold in bundles of 2000 for $1160.” Is this correct?
Correct, but they have increased the price to $1,295 or $1,300 per unit. John’s comment #324 also reflected some other changes, e.g. more reinvestment incentives.
Another change was that “99 days / 6 days per week” was changed to “99 days / 5 days per week”, i.e. it will pay out more slowly than it did before the changes.
OK, its changed to $1300 per bid pack/unit.
….according to Oz…..
“When a Bidder’s Paradise bid pack is purchased by an affiliate or sold to a customer, a position is created in the matrix.” and “Each bid pack position has a potential 8,190 matrix positions under it (within the ever-growing company-wide matrix), and thus can generate a maximum of $31,695 a month if it fills up with bought bid pack positions.”
So potentially if someone bought a single bid pack for $1300 they might accrue or perhaps even collect $31,695 per month! That’s a pretty good deal. Is this plausible or possible?
It doesn’t work the way you think, unless you have one of the top positions.
The TOP position will need 8,190 positions to e filled
The second level will need 16,382 positions to be filled
The third level will need 32,766 positions to be filled
If you buy your first position e.g. at level 14 (32,768 positions bought before your own), you will need 16,777,214 new positions to be bought after your own before the matrix is completely filled for your first position. It’s a pyramid scheme matrix = the few near the top will get most of the payouts.
Here’s what Oz thinks.
Oz quote:
is POSSIBLE to invest $1300
So…it is POSSIBLE to generate a maximum of $31,695 per month, PROVIDING 8,190 positions fill.
Putting aside “the way I think,” what I think, or even if I think at all, YOU seem to be saying that due to the arithmetic and geometry of the matrix, filling 8,190 positions (unless you are at the top) requires many more participants than just 8,190 and in fact by level 14 the number of new participants required to do so exceeds 16 million.
Do I understand you correctly?
YES, if you’re the master distributor or the organizer, and hold the top position. Other than that, the answer is NO. Only very inexperienced people will be attracted to that part of the compensation plan, the most experienced ones HATE systems like that if they are not offered an extremely good position.
Possible? NO, it only works for a few of the top positions, and each of them will need to fill in 8,190 positions.
“Company wide matrix” will normally be filled “top to bottom, left to right” or other similar systems:
A (top position = the company itself)
BC (first 2 positions in the matrix)
DEFG (positions 3-6)
HIJKLMNO (positions 7-14)
PQRSTUVWXYZabcde (positions (15-30)
If you enter the matrix at position “e”, only 1 out of 16 new positions will will be placed directly under your own position. And you will probably enter at level 16+ if you join now = only 1:65,536 to 1:524,288 new positions will be placed into your own matrix.
All the positions that already are filled into the matrix, higher up than your own position, will heavily reduce your chances for payouts.
It’s the PAYOUTS that are capped at 12 levels, not the matrix itself. Each new level will DOUBLE the number of positions to be filled, e.g. if your first position enter the matrix at level 14 (16,384 to 32,768 positions are higher up in the system than your own position), you will need 16.7 million or 33.5 million positions to be filled before your own matrix is filled.
Correct. “Company wide matrices” normally works that way. Before you can get the first position under your own first position, the total investment will have to be DOUBLED.
If they have a total of 100,000 positions in the matrix now, and your position is #100,000, you will get 2 new positions under your own when the number of investments have reached 200,000.
* You will get an additional 4 new positions (total 6 positions) when the number of investments have reached 400,000.
* You will get an additional 8 new positions (total 14 positions) when the number of investments have reached 800,000.
@M_Norway
I think “not feasible” might be the words we’re looking for, as it’s entirely possible.
I agree with that. Possible, but statistically improbable.
“Heavily reduce,” but not eliminate. If I understand you correctly you are saying that there is still a CHANCE that a person could receive some payout even at the lower levels. Is it possible to calculate such a probability? Does recruiting/selling increase the chances of a payout?
50% will receive NO payouts
50% will receive SOME payouts
25% will have 2 positions under their own
12.5% will have 6 positions
6.25% will have 14 positions
3.125% will have 30 positions
1.5625% will have 62 positions
.78125% will have 126 positions
.390625% will have 254 positions
.1953125% will have 510 positions under their own
“Company wide matrices” have the function that they will distribute payouts upwards in the system, e.g. to create some income examples people can use for recruitment.
He can point to someone higher up in the system, e.g. “my sponsor’s sponsor started with only 3 units, but after 2 months he had earned enough from those 3 units to buy an additional 6 units, and after 3 months he could buy an additional 15 units”.
He doesn’t need to tell you that his sponsor’s sponsor’s first units were bought 12 levels higher up in the system, that it will be 4,096 times more difficult for you to get the same income.
Is this based on the mathematical certainty that THIS particular scheme can not support payouts beyond the top half of the pyramid?
My a ha moment. Thanks I hope John is still reading.
Likewise put down 17,455 USD now cashed 22,000 since Sept. I have no downline as well, not planning to recruit at this time and i don’t need to, avoiding future headahes, just sitting and relaxing.
why would i recruit? well i’m making money without doing so.
John’s sponsor has probably focused on the program as a whole, rather than focusing on the details.
When recruiting, you should normally focus on the parts that are most easy to sell = the profit sharing parts (“you don’t need to recruit anyone”). Then you can use the income as a whole as an example, without explaining any details. Most people will accept that, they’re not interested in the technical details.
I have NEVER seen anyone focusing on the company wide matrix when they have explained their own participation. Most people will focus on the income as a whole, rather than breaking it down into details.
For most people, the company wide matrix will only pay peanuts. 50% of the units will pay nothing, and 25% of the units will pay less than $8 per month.
Neither did Charles Ponzi told his followers to recruit.
Neither did “Double Shah” of Pakistan.
Neither did Paul Burks of Zeek Rewards, AFAIK.
But just you talking about “having made money without having to do much” would be enough of a testimonial to convince some sheeple to join if they don’t even bother asking the dumb questions like “where’s the money coming from?”
ANY binary matrix (2-4-8-16-32-64-128-256-etc.) will have the same distribution of positions below other positions. Half of the positions will ALWAYS have zero positions under themselves. Half of the positions will have 2 positions directly under themselves (the last one of them MAY have only one).
Note: The math isn’t 100% accurate here, but it’s close enough to reflect the truth. It will be less accurate when only a few positions are filled. Math has some man made rules that will allow inaccurate answers.
Other types of matrices will have different distribution, e.g.:
3-9-27-81-243-729-etc. (67-80% will have zero positions)
4-16-64-256-1024-4096-16384-etc. (75-80% zero positions)
5-25-125-625-3125-15625-etc. (80-83% zero positions)
6-36-216-1296-etc.
7-49-343-etc.
8-64-512-4096-32768-etc.
9-81-729-etc.
10-100-1,000-10,000-100,000-etc. (91%)
So you bought some bid packs, have not recruited and have been able to withdraw actual cash of $22,000 so far. Did you ever participate in the auction or use your bids?
I do not understand this. Oz diagrams show symmetry…ie. one begets two, two begets four OR perhaps One begets three, three begets nine etc., a squaring if you will.
How does this ever result in half the positions having zero positions under itself?
Then you can look at the diagrams in the article, and COUNT how many of the positions that don’t have any positions under themselves?
The binary matrix has 8 “empty” positions, and 7 “filled” positions. “Empty” = they haven’t got any positions under themselves yet. The filled/empty ratio is 7:8.
The unilevel matrix has 13 “filled” positions, and 27 “empty” positions”. The filled/empty ratio is 13:27.
Wait a minute. If Ric, Post (#466 and below) is just sitting and relaxing (not recruiting) and yet is getting a return from his bid pack purchases….as he says; but can only make peanuts from “the matrices” as you say, then what is really going on here?
It appears he has made more than “peanuts,” in fact using his numbers I calculate he has already gotten all his principal back PLUS a 20% cash on cash Return, AND he retains his positions in the matrices for potentially more passive returns.
In other words what in the compensation plan accounts for this result?
You looked at a SPECIFIC part of the compensation plan, and that part will mostly pay peanuts to the many.
Ric has got nearly all his payouts from another part of the compensation plan, from the profit sharing part. He might have got SOME payouts from the matrices.
Is that part of the compensation plan independent and unrelated to Ric’s position(s)within the matrices?
Oz’s write up says this about : “Profit Sharing
When a Bidder’s Paradise bid pack sold or purchased by an affiliate, the affiliate who referred the customer or recruited the affiliate earns a daily commission for 99 days.
This commission is paid out 6 times a week (skipping Sundays), with Better Living Global Marketing matching all Profit Sharing payouts and placing the matching funds in an affiliate’s reserve wallet.”
Ric says he is not recruiting (I assume this means he is not selling or referring anyone either.) Under such conditions it appears that Ric has no entitlement to profit sharing.
So I guess I do not understand how Ric is cashing large checks if the matrices pay “peanuts” and he does nothing to become eligible for profit sharing.
Then you must ask Ric about the details. I can’t give you any details for HIS investment.
SpeakAsia had a system where you could create sub-accounts to your own main account, and earn commissions from your own investments and reinvestments. It had a standardized system, e.g. a “Tripod” was 1 main account with 2 sub accounts.
BLGM seems to be using a similar system, e.g. some standardized number of units, 1-3-7-15 units.
Surely you can reconcile his experience with your general understanding of how BLGM works.
Ric is entitled to profit sharing.
Nobody is entitled to “profit sharing” when all that entails is redistributing newly invested money to existing investors, all the while pretending to be legit.
Right…..as BLGM defines profit.
This begs the point doesn’t it?
Illegal enterprises can be profitable and share their illegal profits among participants.
can != entitled to.
What does that even mean?
Look up the definition of security (in any country, any US State) and you will almost certainly find the definition includes a “certificate of, or entitlement to profit participation.”
Ric’s purchase of a bid pack conferred such participatory rights. This why the SEC, or a counterpart agency, almost always gets involved in shutting these schemes down. Profit participation contracts are securities. This is what BLGM sells to make a profit and it is what Ric bought.
The various matrices and compensation programs only allocate the profits between participants. The profit itself comes from selling securities (the bid packs)
Calling it a redistribution scheme or an illegal ponzi is fine for sake of discussion but the basic profitable (thpough illegal) element of the BLGM business is selling unlicensed securities (profit participations) to the public.
It contains a fraudulent part, that’s why we identify it as Ponzi rather than as securities. Your definition didn’t cover that.
It isn’t for the sake of discussion, but because the definition is more correct. “Investment” and “fraudulent investment” can be quite different from each other.
Similar to that, we identify humans as humans rather than as primates, even if humans technically belong in the group primates.
Now there’s a revelation! I hope you did not lose sleep working this out.
Do you understand that securities FRAUD is at the heart of EVERY ponzi and that’s why they are illegal and why it is that the SEC or state securities divisions are the agencies that bring suit to stop them?
Your vague awareness of “fraudulent parts” is insufficient. You must be specific and move beyond vague generalities if you are to understand me.
This is like saying that you call a ponzi a ponzi even though they are technically security violations…..Which is exactly what I said. You call them redistribution schemes and ponzis for ease of use and discussion purposes without understanding that selling securities (profit participations) is what creates the redistibution and what makes a ponzi a ponzi.
The correct expression in this case is as follows…. All humans are primates, but not all primates are human. The same relationship holds between ponzis and security violations. That is to say that ALL ponzis are security violations, but not all security violations are ponzis.
Any such rights are automatically waived when it comes to the trading of illegal unregistered securities.
“Waived” No. That indicates one party or the other has the right to waive, but if BGLM is a ponzi this is not the case. The parties would have no rights or obligations at all because an illegal contract is null and void at inception not merely voidable or waiverable at one or both parties’ discretion.
Providing BGLM is actually a ponzi the parties are acting at will or at sufferance, not by virtue of any valid contract.
This does not mean that people can not profit from their investment or this sharing arrangement, but only that neither party has any obligations or rights to demand or make payment by virtue of any verbal or written contract.
If BLGM is a ponzi then it is BLGM that is the issuer of unregistered securities (the profit participations) and should this be of abiding interest to the US regulators, the contracts will be found to meet the definition of securities, and thus fall under the jurisdiction of the SEC or its international counterparts.
Which would include entitlements related to securities.
I never mentioned anything about not making profit.
That is as I understand it.
Perhaps I misunderstood when you wrote, “Nobody is entitled to “profit sharing” when all that entails is redistributing newly invested money to existing investors, all the while pretending to be legit.”
If you meant that no one is entitled by virtue of a legal and binding contract then we are in complete accord.
That’s all I meant.
The notion that anyone is entitled to anything in a Ponzi scheme is utterly ridiculous to me.
The problem is there is no real net “profit” in a Ponzi scheme. Thus, there is no “profit sharing”. Any such “profit” is fraud and misrepresentation, and if any one really thinks they are entitled to such via a “contract”, since the contract itself is based on false premises, and thus itself is fraudulent, it’s non-enforceable.
The specific fraudulent part makes it a Ponzi. Ponzi was NOT used for the sake of discussion, but because it was more correct to use.
The fraudulent part is about that investors / opportunity seekers are misled to believe in a profit generating “mechanism” that will pay them back a positive ROI on their investments.
* Selling securities can also be about legitimate sale of securities, so you can clearly not use that argument to define a Ponzi scheme.
* Security violations can be about other types of security violations, so you can’t use that argument either.
* Redistribution of money among members in a group can be about a lot of things. You can’t use that argument either.
Your logic assumes that humans are humans BECAUSE they’re primates, and Ponzi schemes are Ponzi schemes BECAUSE they’re about illegal sale of securities?
One of the basic logical rules is the one about groups. “A smaller group can be part of a bigger group, but a bigger group can’t be part of a smaller group”. Most of your pseudo logical arguments will fail.
hoss , Norway and Oz are you guys in BLGM
There are profits, and there is profit sharing but by and through illegal means.
Profit is generated when a company issues and sells to the public a minimum number of units of participation. Profit sharing takes when these profits are distributed via some compensation plan.
BUT . . . . just because the public is induced to purchase these participation units under false pretenses does not mean the company or the unit buyer can not profit. They can, though many will not
Maybe you will believe Ken Bell.
From Zeek Doc 169; Receiver’s Request for Leave to Institute Actions…:
“. . . the Receiver has determined that the scheme’s significant “net winners,” those who recieved at least $1000 more from Zeek Rewards than they paid in, should be required to disgorge their PROFITS . . . . and return the money fraudulently transferred to them . . . . etc”
Profits…. fraudulently obtained . . . but still profits.
False. This is not the mechanism that makes a scheme a ponzi. This is what makes a scheme a fraud.
I said security violations not selling securities. Wake up.
I specifically explained that the type of security violation that enables a ponzi is the sale of profit participations to the public.
“Other types” of violations are of no current interest. They are irrelevant to the discussion. There is no cause to discuss mortgage fraud or the filing of 10B forms on a timely basis or they myriad of possibilities. Quit muddying the water.
It could be about drug sales, or a poker game or a father doling out allowance to his children. We have been disucssing the distribution scheme related to ponzis. Stay on topic!
There is no BECAUSE about it. I said “All humans are primates, but not all primates are human.” Do you see the word because in there anywhere? There is no cause and effect. Humans do not cause primates or visa versa. One IS the other, not one is BECAUSE of the other.
A ponzi IS a specific type of security violation. That violation is the sale of misrepresented profit participations to the public.
I am not.
It also makes it a Ponzi, doesn’t it? I described a SPECIFIC type of fraud in my example.
Partly correct. It’s about the misrepresentation of profit / ROI, not about the other parts (they will need to be present in other types too, they are not typical signatures of a Ponzi scheme). It’s about a false or insignificant revenue source (or other type of profit generating mechanism), presented as a source for the profit.
You don’t need to specify “Sale of” or “security violation”, because Ponzi schemes belong in a sub group to both of them.
In a logically ordered system of groups and sub groups, the sub groups will have inherited sets of definitions from their parent groups. People don’t normally call humans “Mammals-Primates-Big Apes-Humans”, do they? They will normally identify the exact group, not all the parent groups.
We called BLGM “Ponzi scheme” and “Ponzi/pyramid hybrid” not for the sake of discussion, but because those groups represents the exact groups.
You CAN identify some of the parent groups, but it shouldn’t be necessary in normal conversation. It will be like INSISTING on identifying yourself as a “Big Ape-Human”. 🙂
NO. Your example was not specific at all and would apply to numberless TYPES of schemes and frauds (many of which have nothing to do with ponzis, pyramid schemes or security law violations.) A misrepresentation of where funds are coming from to pay back a lender/investor does not create a ponzi. It creates a rather simple fraud.
Something else is required for a ponzi scheme and that something else is a mechanism or method to redistribute funds from one group of investors to another. I have described how this is done and won’t repeat it.
A ponzi involves a specific type of security violation. A human is a specific type of primate. All humans are primates, but not all primates are humans. All ponzis are frauds but not all frauds are ponzis.
Think about it.
Sure. These are properly descriptive categories, but if you think categorization equates to understanding you are mistaken.
That’s why I gave you the “Big Ape-Human” as an example. In normal conversation, people don’t really need that extra information. It will become perfectly clear anyway during normal conversation. 🙂
Like I said. When you put things in a category it does not imply that you understand them.
Your understanding of taxonomy is truly abominable. Big Ape Human, indeed. Such nonsense as I have never heard before.
What type of understanding are you looking for? I have linked to different sources in other threads, e.g. for the shutdown of Zeek.
The PRIMARY IDENTIFIER for a Ponzi scheme should normally be the fraudulent misrepresentation of a profit source. That will separate it from other fraudulent investment types.
The more general description “a Ponzi scheme is a type of fraudulent investment” can also be used, to identify the TYPE rather than the unique characteristics.
“What makes a Ponzi scheme a Ponzi scheme?” will be that specific fraudulent component. All the other identifiers were general identifiers, e.g. for securities in general.
Ponzi schemes don’t need to be about securities at all, but it generally needs to be about some type of fraudulent investment. “Pigeon King” was a different type of Ponzi scheme, where farmers invested in breeding pairs of pigeons where they could sell back the offspring to the organizer.
When you mix in the definitions from securities into the definitions for Ponzi schemes, you may potentially miss the target completely. You don’t make it become any clearer, it only becomes more vague.
I didn’t remember the latin words “Hominidae” (Great Apes) and “Homininae” (Humans, Chimpanzees) when I posted that post. It wasn’t about taxonomy but about the logic for use of unique identifiers.
Fraudulent misrepresentation of a profit making component will be an unique identifier for Ponzi schemes, but that component doesn’t need to be about securities. Your logic failed there. It can be about other types of fraudulent investments, and it often is.
A classical logical fallacy is when we’re using characteristics from the wrong group to identify something, e.g.:
A: All men have hair in their faces.
B: Michelangelo has hair in his face.
C: Michelangelo is a man.
Arguments “A” and “B” are logically correct, but the conclusion “C” doesn’t make any sense. Michelangelo is actually a dog. “Hair in their faces” isn’t an unique identifier for men, that identifier is probably shared by all mammals.
A group can have characteristics from more than one parent group, even from multiple groups in different families of groups. Your mobile phone should probably share some characteristics from both phones, computers and cameras, and probably from many other groups as well.
My vague definition where I didn’t extend the identification beyond the first parent level was actually more correct than your attempt to produce a more complete explanation. “More complete” doesn’t need to reflect a higher level of understanding, it can reflect quite the opposite.
ON that basis alone one could not differentiate between a ponzi scheme and any other enterprise that misrepresented its source of profit and income (e.g., any other quasi-legal operation or criminal front business)
I hope then, that it is obvious to you that that this is not what DEFINES a ponzi.
Q. WHAT is the PROFIT SOURCE?
A. The sale of bid packs to the public.
Q. Do the bid packs purport to confer a right to share in the revenue or profits of the company?
A. Yes
Q. If a company issues and wants to sell the right to participate in the company’s profit does it need to file a disclosure document and prospectus with the SEC?
A. Yes
Q. If the company does not file with the SEC and register its public offering of profit participations with the SEC is it a violation of security law?
A. Yes
Q. If a company misrepresents the source of its profits is it a ponzi?
A. Maybe
Q. If a company states that its profit comes from a penny auction but it is actually derived from the sale of bid packs is it a ponzi?
A. Maybe
Q. If the company sells bid packs and takes that revenue and redistributes it in the form of profit sharing to those who have purchased bid packs is it a ponzi?
A. Yes
To reiterate, misrepresentation of a profit making components is not unique to ponzis.
In any event when a company sells bid packs that purport to confer a right to share in profits or guarantee a return then that company is by law and legal definition issuing securities.
If said securities are NOT registered and approved by the SEC (including full disclosure of the business plan and its risks) and said securities are sold to the public then the company is in violation of security laws. See Zeek….Shut down by the SEC Slam dunk, selling unregistered securities. Amen end of story.
Hopefully, by now you understand that income derived from bid pack sales was redistibuted via a profit sharing matrix and this is why Zeek was ponzi/pyramid,why the SEC had jurisdiction and why Burks’ capitulated.
You mean like dolphins and whales? You really need to abandon this line of reasoning. Its not your strong suit.
Ponzis are not “about” securities, but shutting them down is. No ponzi operator announces he is selling unregistered securities!
Quite to the contrary one of the most common aspects of ponzis is that the operators adamantly disavow that they are issuing or dealing with securities at all. The SEC doesn’t buy such arguments and neither should you.
And of OF COURSE, of course of course ponzis are about “some type” of fraudulent investment. Why do you think the SEC has jurisdiction to begin with?? It polices investments.
ANY person or company that issues, sells, notes, stock, profit participations, stock etc etc. is subject to SEC regulations.
Why do you think Gilmond and King argued that affiliate work effort excluded their activities from SEC oversight? . . . Hint . . . .so that Zeek would not fall under the jurisdiction of the SEC!
Enjoy the game. Go 9ers
Normally you COULD, because you have the additional information about “fraudulent investment” right in front of your own eyes, i.e. the identifier was used as a primary identifier rather than as a sole identifier.
“any other quasi-legal operation or criminal front business” will probably fail logical tests, i.e. they will probably not fit into the group “fraudulent investment”.
You must look at the realities. If you need to replace something in the realities with your own ideas, there’s probably something wrong in your methods.
I said on “that basis alone,” i.e., on the basis of your “primary identifier.” Now you want to add “additional information.” Fine.
You need it if you are to properly identify a scheme as a ponzi. You need to know where the money comes from (sale of bid packs) and how it gets redistributed back out in order to promote further investment (fixed as in a loan based ponzi or in accordance with a pyramid matrix as in an mlm scheme.)
Well I can not speak to your logical tests but any front business would contain your “primary identifier.” That is the point I was making. A primary identifier does not DEFINE what type of investment scheme is in play.
You must know more. That is what I have been trying to make plain to you.
Here you have replaced the realities with your own ideas? BLGM has/had a marketing video explaining its profit, where the bids were explained to be worth $0.58 when they were used in auctions, and that the profit derived from there.
The rest of the Q&A is reflecting the same problem.
Look at the “Pigeon King” Ponzi scheme? It involved other types of investment, and no profit sharing agreement.
http://www.cbs.com/shows/60_minutes/video/1413398678/scams-pigeon-fever
It wasn’t presented ALONE. You cut it out of its original context:
“Fraudulent investment” can get its PRIMARY IDENTIFIER from the group “fraud” rather than from “investment”.
You can test both those groups against “financial gains / financial losses”. One of the primary functions of investments is to generate financial gains for the investors as a group. Frauds will normally generate financial losses.
A Ponzi scheme will get its main characteristics from frauds rather than from investments, i.e. it doesn’t need to be about typical investments or about security law violations. Some of the arguments you used initially in your attempt to identify Ponzi schemes in more details simply don’t reflect the realities.
We didn’t use “Ponzi scheme” and “Ponzi/pyramid hybrid” for the sake of discussion, but because they were more correct than most other definitions.
You now rely on a marketing video distributed by a company that for months you have been claiming is a scam and a ponzi. Two weeks ago you claimed the bids had zero value. Remember? You pitched a Norewegian Hissy fit over it.
Are you one of those people who can not remember what they said five minutes ago??
Let me make it as simple as I can. An affiliate buys a unit (2000 bids for about $1300 and depletes his bid bank by 58 cents each time he bids.
When a bid pack is sold to the public it is revenue to the company (whether its accounted for as $1300 per bid pack unit or as 58 cents per bid. So. . . . . unless you are now convinced that BGLM has not misrepresented it source of profit and does actually make distributable profits from selling toasters and ipads at auction. . . . . . . then it must be that the bulk of the company’s revenue, and thus its profit sharing potential and payouts comes from the sale of bid packs; not from retail sales at the auctions as BLGM would have you believe. You decide.
Fuck me dude. You do not need a profit sharing agreement to have a ponzi. You just pay off earlier investors with money you collect from later investors until the thing collapses.
If you learn nothing else from our discussion I hope you will at least take with you that homo sapiens are not decendended from Great Apes and that porpoises and whales do not have hair on their faces. At least tell me that you have learned that much.
Of course all of this is ignoring the fact when it comes to fraud (online fraud especially) it is entirely possible, indeed probable, NONE of what punters are being told is true.
And before any of the minutiae lovers jump on the use of the word “none,” in the real world of online fraud a statement such as that which came from the SEC when discussing Zeek Rewards “Approximately 98% of ZeekRewards’ total revenues and the “net profits” paid to investors were comprised of funds received from new investors in classic Ponzi scheme fashion” in practical terms is as close to “none” as damnit is to swearing, when you’re talking about an $800million turnover.
It’s interesting also the SEC used the term “CLASSIC ponzi scheme fashion” immediately negating the “CLASSIC” apologist / pseudo intellectual response “it’s not a ponzi because Wikipedia defines a ponzi as…………”
I pointed out that all your Q&A seemed to derive from your own imagination. You were making up those questions yourself and providing answers to them, having a discussion with yourself.
I was unable to identify any clear relevance to the comment you cited initially in that post. I used the first Q&A as an example to point out the lack of relevance.
Very good. You get a gold star.
Its difficult to discuss more than one lie at a time.
That post was about logics and logical fallacies, not about taxonomy or the characteristics for mammals and primates.
(post #502)
It was about “group logics” and some typical logical fallacies. The logical methods for how to identify a Ponzi scheme can be relevant, but a discussion about the different examples will be rather off-topic.
The logical order of taxonomy in that example wasn’t about descendance, but about “shared characteristics” among different groups. The fact that you share some characteristics with e.g. chimpanzees doesn’t mean you have descended from them.
logics? How many logics do you think are involved. 1,2,,3,4,5,6,7,8, infinity? There is just logic not logics. As in, everytime he opens his mouth he adds the the net universal sum of illogic (not illogics) Below is an example of YOUR illogic:
Here you are describing a classification system. The study of such systems is known as taxonomy (general), the practice and science (study) of classification of things or concepts, including the principles that underlie such classification.
Pretty screwed up since humans do not have the same taxonomy as Apes but at least I got the idea that you were saying that when one speaks of humans it is not necessary to cite the entire taxonomy of the species. OK fine, we all agree on this shorthand because we all agree on what a human is. But until there is consensus on what constitutes a ponzi we really should skip the shorthand and remember how we arrive at such determinations.
So, understand that if you want to describe a human you must meet all the taxonomic criteria. Describing only those characteristics that put an animal in the genus homo is insufficient to arrive at man, the homo-sapien. You might instead be looking at homo-erectus or homo-habilus.
When you insisted that you can identify a ponzi because it misrepresents its profit source it was like saying you can identify homo sapien by looking only at a fossil pelvis. That pelvis might very well allow you to determine the that the creature was from an animal of the genus homo, but without knowing the animal also had an opposable thumb you could never properly identify its species as sapien.
This illustrates why you were illogical and incorrect and why eventually you conceded you needed more information to make a determination (you needed to see the thumb) If you want to identify a scheme as a ponzi or even a variant you must know more than its genus: an entity that “misprepresents its profit source” and gather all the required information such as, but not limited to, its method of generating and distributing those false profits before you can determine its species: ponzi.
Like I said, just categorizing things is meaningless without understanding. Saying something is a ponzi without understanding what it is, is kind of vacant.
I could cite a dozen more instances of such “illogics” but it would be a waste of time. I congratulate myself. It is not easy trying to unravel what you write and all of the tangents you describe. I can only hope I have done a reasonable job of doing it and in good faith sticking with it.
Your right about that. When you threw Big Apes into the taxonomy I knew you were in over your head so I guessed that maybe you were confused andaying that that man descended from the Great apes instead.
Frankly at the time I had no idea what you were talking about. I just went with the geneological frame of reference for starters and assumed you would correct me if I guessed wrong.
I did NOT use taxonomy or genealogy initially, because the post was about group logics rather than about taxonomy. I checked Wikipedia for some latin names after you had brought up “taxonomy” and “descended from”.
My post was not influenced by “descended from” ideas, that idea was your own. I used the idea of “shared characteristics among groups and sub groups” rather than the idea of “descended from”.
The “descended from” idea won’t make much sense for Ponzi schemes either, e.g. the idea that Ponzi schemes have descended from investment or have descended from fraud. That type of logic will be too one sided to be functional.
A Ponzi scheme will probably be a sub type of fraud rather than a sub type of investment. The logic will most likely fail if you’re trying to make it fit solely within investment logics, or if you’re trying to make it fit solely within fraud logics.
(post #484)
Sometimes it will be more correct to use vague descriptions rather than trying to define it logically in a fixed system of identifiers.
The group “humans” have several billion individual members, and most logical ideas will probably be true for some of them. But trying to use ideas like that as identifiers for the whole group won’t make much sense.
“My vague awareness of fraudulent parts” was actually the most correct method to use. It contained the most important identifiers, and I didn’t try to make it fit within one specific group.
Normally several different logical ideas will be involved, and probably several different types of logical methods.
I don’t think I insisted on that? Check the realities rather than your own ideas? I called it “a primary identifier that could be used to separate it from other types of fraudulent investments”, or something similar.
You will first need to test whether or not my statement was relatively true in itself, in the context it was presented, before you can apply your own ideas to it.
If you CAN use the misrepresentation of a profit source as a unique identifier (within that system), and use it to separate Ponzi schemes from other investment frauds, then the statement should pass the test.
If it didn’t pass the test, check the ideas you have applied to it first. If you have applied some specific interpretation or other types of ideas, that might be the cause.
If it failed when you tried to use it to DEFINE Ponzi schemes, e.g. trying to use it as a sole descriptor, it will be your own idea that has failed.
I already explained that I had to guess what you were talking about since the Mammal Big Ape human analogy was so confused.
You introduced that confusion. Were you talking about the ancestry of man, his geneology, his taxonomy? Great apes, Big Apes Humans, Chimpanzees? How did any of that relate to the characteristics of a ponzi and what analogy were you attempting to draw? Who could tell?
Now that you have further explained yourself we both know you were not talking about the descent of man. Hurray for that. Next time I hope you will make sure your analogies make sense before you use them. It will save us both a lot of effort.
As it turns out (I think) all you were saying is that there is no need to include the entire taxonomic description of human beings when discussing humans. Fine we agree on what a human is.
Unfortunately your analogy is not appropriate since it does not extend to a discussion on ponzis unless and until there is an agreement as to what the word ponzi means to each of us.
You stated that a ponzi is “a scheme that misrepresents its profit source.” This is apparently what it means to you but this understanding is incomplete. A ponzi has this characteristic but by itself alone it does not define a ponzi, nor can it be said to be the “primary indentifier” of one since more than one criteria has to be met, and one is no more “primary” that another. (Can you categorize a great ape on the basis of a single “primary indentifier.” No you can not and if you think you can I would like to know what it is.)
In other words your definition and understanding are incomplete because there are species of schemes “that misrepresent their profit source ” which are NOT ponzis.
Thus, as I said your conversational use of ponzi in most of these discussions is a convention that you hope others will follow with out questioning you. You use it for discussion purposes and in a shorthand way but you do not even understand the elements that make a ponzi scheme what it is. This is why your comments are so often bloated nonsensical messes.
You apparently think there is only one thing that identifies a ponzi (your so called “primary identifier) This is not true. There is more to it.
Really? Like when for example?
And neither does this statement.
You thow a blanket over all and say “See, I have covered it, when all you are really doing is attempting to hide your lack of understanding of what’s underneath. You may fool yourself, but you can’t fool me.
It wasn’t an analogy, it was an example use to explain why we don’t include definitions e.g. from investment in a description. We don’t normally include the “selling of unregistered securities” or “security laws violations”.
(post #483)
That was the INITIAL comment where I introduced humans as an example. It was a response to your attempt to identify Ponzi schemes as “security violations” (post #482 + +).
You were trying to make all Ponzi schemes fit within the group “security violations”, by using “constructed definitions” like the one I quoted.
That logic will probably fail. The primary identifier for a Ponzi scheme should normally revolve around fraud rather than investment, if you’re analysing parent groups to establish the type.
“Pigeon King” can’t clearly be identified as “security violations” (e.g. the Howey test). That Ponzi scheme involved other types of investments. Farmers invested in breeding pairs of pigeons, and could sell the offspring back to “Pigeon King” for a profit.
You will need to look at the realities. Your idea about “security violations” may be wrong type of idea, it won’t fully reflect the realities.
We can compare descriptions? “My methods vs your methods”, or “my description vs your description”?
I have identified Ponzi schemes in 2 different ways:
1. By trying to identify a unique identifier for that group.
2. By trying to identify the TYPE (within a group system).
1. A unique identifier is used to separate it from other types (of fraudulent investments) in the same system. I used the misrepresetation of profit source for that. “Investors are misled to believe in real profit or ROI derived from a real source, but both the profit and the source can be fake or insignificant.”
I haven’t used the more typical Ponzi scheme identifier “robbing Peter to pay Paul” in that description. I consider that information to be “additional” (people are already familiar with it in most cases).
2. I identified the type to be a type of fraudulent investment, “some type of fraud rather than some type of investment”. The vague and general description is related to that I tested a wide range of different types of Ponzi schemes, and more than one geographical jurisdiction.
My primary method has been to look at the realities, i.e. I have looked at more than one type of Ponzi schemes and more than one jurisdiction. I have also used some logical rules for groups and sub groups, i.e. I have avoided some logical fallacies.
I’m not able to identify those completely, but it looks like you have tried to make the group “Ponzi schemes” fit inside the group “security violations” (nearly all your initial definitions contained “security violations”, in one way or another).
You first used a simple logical method where you looked at one or more Ponzi schemes (primarily BLGM, but also Zeek), later by adding some extra definitions to it. Those extra definitions were mostly picked up from my comments.
As far as I can see, your identification methods are primarily focused on one specific type of Ponzi schemes (with profit sharing), and on one specific law (“Security Act 1933”).
What I haven’t been able to identify is how you made “Pigeon King” fit into the group “security violations”?
Analogies ARE examples big foot and yours had nothing to do with a descriptions of an investment.
What you “normally do” has zero to do with this since you are “normally” wrong. Who is we? Do you have a mouse in your pocket? Nobody else is standing up for you on this.
Ponzis ARE security law violations. If you are ever able to properly define what makes a scheme a ponzi you will understand that. So long as your head will only wrap itself around the idea that a ponzi is solely defined by a misrepresentation of the source of profit you can not possibly understand this.
FULLY understand what a ponzi is and how it works and you will know that a ponzi ALWAYS involves a security law violation. It can not be otherwise or it would not be a ponzi.
This does not mean the SEC has or will take action but only that it has jurisdiction to do so.
Key word lumpkin. “INVESTED” in breeding pairs. Invested, invested, invested. Will you ever understand this.
What agency exercises oversight on fraudulent investment schemes? Is it the SEC? Yes. When they shut down a pidgeon ponzi is it because the frickin pidgeon cages are dirty? No. Its due to the fraudulent nature of the pidgeon investment scheme and that my little pollo hermano is what makes it a security law violation.
Every ponzi is a violation of security laws. Every one.
Good gawd man. You haven’t included this identifier? This the EXACT element that allows us to identify a fraud as a ponzi. It is the robbing of Peter using false promises that is the security law violation.
A company can not lie to Peter to induce him to invest his money in the first place, (do you think this is legal(?) but when the money thus fraudulently obtained is paid out to Paul it is at that point that the scheme meets the definition of a ponzi. Congratulations you figured it out….sort of.
How did you manage to get “Pigeon King” to fit inside that definition?
* For BLGM, you can use the profit sharing.
* For Zeek, you can use the profit sharing.
* For “Pigeon King”, what type of logic did you use?
“Pigeon King” should normally fail the Howey test, the test used to identify whether or not a company is selling securities. Breeding pigeons will primarily revolve around the investor’s own work, more than it will revolve around passive investment. It should clearly fail the Howey test.
If your logic only works on a specific type of Ponzi schemes in one specific jurisdiction, then you’re not analysing Ponzi schemes. You’re analysing the ideas you have yourself about that topic, rather than the reality. And those ideas are limited to what you have seen yourself, e.g. what you have seen here in the Zeek case.
The logic should preferrably work on other types of Ponzi schemes, e.g. “Pigeon King” types. It should preferrably work in other jurisdictions than the US, too. It won’t make much sense if the definition only will work in the US.
@Hoss
Here you have some “Pigeon King Iowa injunction” information, to help you identify it.
Source:
http://www.state.ia.us/government/ag/latest_news/releases/dec_2007/Pigeon_King_International.html
Your “security law violation” should clearly work on “Pigeon King”, too. It was shut down locally in Iowa by the state AG, Farming Division.
Uh guys, Pigeon King is based in CANADA. Several US states did expressed problems with it, in that it was NOT properly registered and marketed as a “business opportunity”, which has its own rules instead of securities law.
http://amlmskeptic.blogspot.com/2012/06/scam-study-pigeon-king.html
Take your pick:
any note; stock; bond; evidence of indebtedness; participation in any profit-sharing agreement; investment contract; contract. – See more at:
http://businesslaw.ncbar.org/newsletters/nbinov2010/security
I have no doubt that it would. Just because a scheme is shut down by one agency under a certain statute does not mean that it could not have been shut down by a different agency using other statutes.
You will never know what interagency considerations were taken into account and for all you know the Farming Bureau just had more room in its budget.
All you see is the headline news. Farm Bureau does Yada Yada. It does not say The SEC or security office of the State of Iowa did not do Yada Yada even though it could have. Expediency and available resources play a part in what agency takes the lead in these things.
That’s why I asked about your logical explanation, e.g. how do you make a Ponzi scheme like “Pigeon King” pass the Howey test?
“Pigeon King” was only an example, so it isn’t important that the company was located in Canada. The question was about the TYPE of Ponzi scheme.
“Pigeon King” sold breeding pairs of pigeons for up to $500 per pair, along with contracts to buy back the offsprings for 10 years for $50 per pigeon. It had no profit sharing agreement, the farmers were only paid for the pigeons they could deliver.
Your “security law violations” theory seems to have several flaws. It will only work for specific types of Ponzi schemes, and will fail to work for other types. It will require a very broad definition for securities, so it will probably fail to work in most jurisdictions.
I used an opposite type of logic. I used a very broad and general definition for potential laws. General fraud can be about almost any type of law in any jurisdiction, and will reflect the realities much better than your type of logic. I even excluded “typical investments”, by clearly identifying it as a type of fraud rather than a type of investment:
(post #526)
My basic idea was to test ideas against the realities rather than against my own ideas. Most of my typical Ponzi scheme ideas failed to reflect the realities, e.g. the “robbing Peter to pay Paul” idea. That idea will fail for SOME types of Ponzi schemes, e.g. some “Crambe seed investment” types of Ponzi schemes.
I believe you tested ideas against your own favorite ideas? All your initial descriptions revolved around “security law violations”, and you repeated that idea over and over again until you firmly believed in it yourself and were unable to back out of it.
As far as I know there is only one type disguised in many ways. This one used pidgeon breeding as its cover.
I assume that the prosecution alleges that “the King” fraudulently induced the farmers to purchase birds in accordance with a repurchase agreement (the securities in this case) which by its terms virtually guaranteed the farmers an oversized profit.
If you prefer to call it a Pidgeon Breeding Buyback Type ponzi I suppose that is your prerogative but I think its just like every other ponzi except this time someone dressed it up in feathers.
You are fond of pointing out that ponzi participants are given meaningless tasks to keep them busy. In this case the meaningless task was raising the birds since apparently There was no market for them.
It works all the time.
1. Fraudulently induce Peter to invest his money (the securities violation)
2. Use Peter’s money to pay Paul
If you encounter a scheme that doesn’t do this then its not a ponzi.
Securities will need to pass the Howey test, and pigeon breeding will clearly fail that test. The Howey test will require the ROI to derive solely/primarily from the monetary investment itself, rather than from your own work.
You will need to analyse that yourself.
It will maybe be easier if you can identify the method you used to come to the conclusion about “security law violations”, e.g. which programs you analysed.
If you ONLY have analysed BLGM and ZeekRewards, both those programs will fit inside “security law violations” (because of the profit sharing agreement).
If you have analysed a wide range of different types of Ponzi schemes, then please name a few of them.
Farm work isn’t “meaningless work” in itself and as the law will see it. The work will clearly produce something of value.
The lack of retail market will MAKE the production become meaningless after some time, but as long as “Pigeon King” continued to buy back the offspring the work produced something of value.
Posting 1 daily ad will mostly be “meaningless work”, as long as the ads don’t produce anything of value. If the ads truly are used to attract customers, the work will clearly make some sense.
You can try to analyse it yourself? It doesn’t make much sense REPEATING some of my statements out of their original context. You should normally be able to analyse yourself whether or not different types of work will produce something of value.
Clearly? Get a grip on yourself. Its in front of a jury for a reason and the Courts are interested in substance over form even if you can’t see past the bird cage.
You sound like those two birdbrains Gilmond and King at Zeek. Oh, we worked so hard and blah blah blah and the SEC doesn’t have jurisdiction because we worked so hard and blah blah blah and the pidgeons took up a lot of the farmers time and blah blah blah.
It doesn’t matter how many hours the farmer spent doing bird things. It matters if the income was in substance passive. Considering there was no actual market for the birds it is hard to imagine that the profit Farmer A received from welling his birds to the promoter was not due to the investment made by Farmer B.
You think differently? Fine, go start a pidgeon farm with Gilmond and King.
The jury will decide, and if they say its a ponzi, its a ponzi. If they say its not….its not.
All I can say is wow. You really do not understand any of this. Nobody said farm work was meaningless work. Raising pidgeons is meaningless in this context if raising pidgeons has little or no relationship to the “profit” the farmer makes.
Raising pigeons has to contribute in a meaningful way to the profit the farmer receives. If it does not then the income is considered to be solely dependent on the efforts of the promoter or third party.
“investment contract” for the purposes of the Securities Act (which later came to be referred to as the Howey test):
Are you guys STILL at it? 🙂 Pardon the pun, but you guys are trying to “pigeon-hole” ponzi scheme for quite a while. 😉
Focus on your own understanding rather than mine? I have even understood my own methods and have been able to explain them, and I have also been able to use other sources than my own belief system. It will be much easier if you can manage to focus on your own understanding.
Raising pidgeons will first become meaningless when the farmers can’t sell them, but until a certain point in time the work will have some value.
Raising pidgeons clearly has relation to the profit when you are paid per bird you deliver? If you don’t feed them, you’re almost guaranteed to totally lose your investment. A skilled farmer will probably produce more than an untrained one.
The Howey test will also require “Common enterprise”, i.e. the investment has to be in a common enterprise where the promoters or a third party is managing the investment. In “Pigeon King”, the farmers managed most of it themselves.
There’s some different tests for that, e.g. “pooling of the investment” is most commonly used, that each investor will get a share of the profit equal to his share of the investment.
For Pigeon King, each investment will be clearly separated from the other investments, they will be on different farms and in different states. Each and every investor will receive profit that will reflect their own production, there’s no “pooling of money” among the investors.
There are other tests too, but I only looked at the one most commonly used by most federal courts / most state courts. Some of the tests were not relevant at all.
To finish this discussion (Pigeon King is rather off-topic), how do authorities in other jurisdictions apply your logic?
You have identified Ponzi schemes in general, regardless of where they are located and operates, to be about “security law violations”, and you used “Security Act 1933” and potentially “Exchange Act 1934” to identify the rules.
Most authorities around the world will not have the correct jurisdiction to handle Ponzi schemes if they apply that specific logic.
You have no idea if this is true.
To use an extreme example, what if a farmer was paid $10,000 for every bird he delivered? Would that have a meaningful relationship to the work and cost of raising the birds? Probably not for pigeons How about $5,000 or $2,000 or $500?
You can not answer this. You do not know the economics of the operation, the value of a common pigeon and you sure as hell do not know all the facts. That’s why its been given to a jury, and why excuse me for saying so, you are talking out of your ass.
PS. Could you possibly learn to spell pigeon.
PPS. The common enterprise runs through the promoter. It does not matter where the farms are located.
PPS all your tests are relevant and the jury will doubtlessly take them into account.
I speaky pidjin English too.
I can’t possibly answer for every jurisdiction on Earth. How do they handle it in Norway?
I did it until I copied your spelling in post #540. “If he can spell it pidgeon, so can I” logic. You should probably focus on your own spelling rather than mine?
Analysing realities doesn’t include analysing hypothetical examples. It CAN include that method if it can clarify something, make some details become clearer. Other than that, replacing realities with your own ideas isn’t a wise method.
Arlan Galbraith was found guilty of criminal fraud, and 2 Bankruptcy Act offences, on December 5th 2013. I haven’t read any of the related stories, but they look like this:
Source:
http://kitchener.ctvnews.ca/jury-finds-pigeon-king-founder-guilty-of-criminal-fraud-1.1575864
From the article:
December 12:
Pigeon King founder will stay behind bars until sentencing
NOTE
I only used “Pigeon King” as an example, to see if you were able to separate between different types of Ponzi schemes and how it potentially would affect the ideas you already had. I will not participate in any lenghty discussion about that company, it will be rather off-topic.
I have separated between different types, and it has clearly affected some of my conclusions. “Pigeon King” was one of the Ponzi schemes I looked at.
Right, You might want to work through your mental checklist again on this one. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
When the company went bankrupt in June 2008, it had paid 394 pigeon breeders about $30 million and had committed to pay a further $350 million.
“The people that got in early made money
When the company went bankrupt in June 2008, it had paid 394 pigeon breeders about $30 million and had committed to pay a further $350 million.
BehindMLM readers now have a very clear understanding of why Andy Bowdoin was charged with and convicted of “Fraud, mail fraud, money laundering and conspiracy” and not with “running a ponzi scheme”.
Readers also now know how and why fraudsters constantly use the Our program does not fit the definition of ponzi because XXXXXX” mantra, and why both the SEC and FBI were included in the same Presidents’ Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force responsible for the recent ASD / Wright-Olivares / Profitable Sunrise / Zeek Rewards prosecutions and the formation of which has lead to the change in the way financial fraud is now being handled in the US.
It is no longer a matter of whether or not a particular program is “either / or” a securities violation, the FFETF has the capacity to act in either case, as Ms Wright-Olivares has discovered at great cost.
Right
Can I use Withheld amount to repurchase?
Thank you so much
@STE
I imagine so. The Ponzi points model is designed to have investors keep as much real money tied into the system for as long as possible.
@STE
Yes, you definitely can do that. You are lucky, BLGM knows what you are thinking. Today BLGM has published a tremendous deal. This deal does not benefit its member but mainly BLGM as BLGM has no regards for its members, they only see them as cash cow (mooo).
Looks like no one will ever be able to withdraw any money as point 2 clearly points out they want your cash to stay in the system:
I have logged into BLGM member website and copied today’s notice below:
Are you talking about the “Reserve Wallet”?
It can be used to repurchase new units when old ones expires, so you don’t lose any positions in the matrix. I don’t think you can use it to purchase new units.
Ask your sponsor about how repurchase works, e.g. whether it’s done automatically or manually.
@M_Norway
Withheld amount of Sustainability Wallet that I am talking about. My purpose is I want to use Withheld amount of Sustainability Wallet and Sustainability Wallet and reserve Wallet to repurchase
@STE
First you should understand what is withheld amount? Actually withheld amount is for retirement plan, deduct 4 times in one cycle. That means you can not use for repurchase.
I have only watched some videos explaining the program, long time ago. And I didn’t focus on details, only on “How do the program work in general”. You should ask your sponsor or someone higher up in your upline if you want information about details like that, or read a FAQ for the Wallets.
In the videos I watched, one of the Wallets was used for repurchases when old units expired after 99 days. It didn’t fully cover the full amount for the first unit, so they had to use something from a second Wallet. That’s all I remember, I didn’t focus on the details.
Repurchases when old units have expired should normally be done automatically. It shouldn’t need to involve any user inputs. Most people wouldn’t have managed to handle manual repurchases correctly, it would only have created chaos.
“Withheld amount” indicates either Reserve Wallet or Sustainability Wallet, or both. It was about repurchase, I’m not familiar with any retirement plan (but it may exist).
Most programs have access to FAQs or explanations via the back office, and I don’t think BLGM is different in that area.
eWallet, sWallet, rWallet explained:
slideshare.net/vyacheslavsemenov/better-living-global-marketing-blgm-bidders-paradise
page 18 rWallet 0.3% repurchase only
page 21 sWallet repurchase account $695 ($585 from eWallet)
page 23 the different Wallets and how they are used
I didn’t bother to check more than that. I only checked whether or not it contained the information you asked about, and which pages it was found on.
I stopped when I had found enough information to see whether or not it had some interest. You may find more information there.
@STE
I googled “blgm sustainability wallet” to find that slideshare information (without the quotation marks). I used the first search hit I found, and I didn’t check any other.
If I focus too much on details, I will typically start to mix things up when I’m trying to recall it from memory. BLGM users will need to understand some details, but I generally don’t need to remember details.
Ok i got it and Thank you so much M_Norway and HKJ for your value time to sharing detail information.
Tank you so much everyday for sharing information
Interesting they chose to render Chinese 開戶積分 as “Cash Wallet Points”. Chinese literally says “Open Account Accmumulated Points”.
It’s also interesting that they rather give you this ‘eWallet’ thing rather than real money, and make it sound as if they’re doing you a favor.
The IMPLICATION is they’re in a cash crunch, and has been for some time.
Great, they’re going to launch SpeakAsia in Hong Kong! WTF?!
That should tell you that registered more than 15 accounts is encouraged… Stacking is a way to get around per-account limits.
Also, this “CashWallet” points sounds like some sort of requirement, which refers to this…
This basically is another form of withdrawal limit, in that you are required to keep X amount of the money you earned in your new accounts, such as opening new accounts.
That’s yet ANOTHER sign of cash crunch: inventing new rules to prevent the money from leaving the system.
If the BLGM pay consistently or faster to the member, I am going to invite my friends and other my relative to joint
It has actually paid slower in the last 4 months, and the new changes should normally make it even slower.
“Starting January 16, a certain percentage of “Cash Wallet” points must be used to register new accounts.” SLOWER, you will need to reinvest more and can withdraw less.
“For withdrawals having pended over 45 days, they can be turned into ‘Cash Wallet” points upon request.” This is about failed withdrawals = they haven’t had enough cash to pay all.
“With immediate effect, until 23:59:59, January 23rd., 2014, Members opening accounts #16 to #31, can choose to use 100% eWallet points to settle payments.” This can potentially reduce withdrawals = it can potentially speed it up for a short period of time.
What is the new change?
“Starting January 16, a certain percentage of “Cash Wallet” points must be used to register new accounts.”
SLOWER, you will need to reinvest more and can withdraw less, if I have interpreted it correctly.
“Cash Wallet” should normally be money you can withdraw (if they have cash, the failed withdrawals was about lack of cash).
“Must be used to register new accounts”. I don’t know exactly what that means, but you can’t withdraw it.
When a program is using money coming in from new investors to pay the old ones, it’s doomed to fail. It will pay out slower and slower until it stops paying out more money (withdrawals). The money you have invested will then be like monopoly money, “only worth something inside the game”.
BLGM adjusted the TIME from “99 days / 6 days per week” to “99 days / 5 days per week”, paying out in 19.8 weeks instead of 16.5 weeks for the profit sharing.
It increased the PRICE from $1,175 per unit to $1,280 per unit = more money would be withheld and would have to be reinvested.
Both are major changes, but people will normally accept them since they don’t sound too bad.
Foot in door technique. They already got you hooked, they just start to squeeze you slowly. Ever heard of the “boiling frog” story?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog
ANYONE WHO IN ANYWAY SHAPE OR FORM states that this is not a PONZI SCHEME should please kill themselves because your ignorance is like a virus that is affecting many others.
It is very simple and a FACT that everyone involved in BETTER LIVING GLOBAL MARKETING is taking part in ILLEGAL ACTIVITY IN THE UNITED STATES (can’t speak for other countries).
This is how it works you DEPOSIT money and it turns into VIRTUAL HONG KONG MONEY. Not HSBC HONG KONG not CHASE BANK HONG KONG not BANK OF CHINA HONK KONG you deposit and that money is not in YOUR ACCOUNT what you get instead of a real bank account is this website “member.blgm.hk/en/login.php”.
Any programmer can create a website like this. Having a website with numbers is not the same as having a BANK ACCOUNT with numbers. So that’s it you deposit money and you get to see numbers on a website.
I don’t understand how anyone can even try to defend this business and if you are one of those people then you should kill your self TWICE because you are the reason this world is so fucked up! Oh and you guys should see THE WOLF OF WALL STREET starring LUKE TENG!!!!!!!!
BY THE WAY no one in LOMPOC, SANTA MARIA, SANTA YNEZ, PISMO BEACH and GUADALUPE has had a successful TRANSFER TO THERE ACCOUNT.
Oh and you know how the LEADERS say they have all ready gotten there money back…..what they don’t tell you is they did’t get the money from A TRANSFER FROM BLGM….they got it from you the new investor!
How did BLGM pay for the previous 4 months? What does it mean MLM?
Only existing players are allowed to add extra accounts, maybe? To add to the “exclusiveness”?
@STE
Cuz people like you kept joining and handing over their life savings.
Oh dear.
Withdrawals:
Money coming in from new investors. But many withdrawals failed because of lack of cash.
Internal payouts:
“Numbers on a screen”, “monopoly money” or whatever you want to call it (other than money).
The profit from the penny auction is fake, the money comes in from investors rather than from the auctions. Bids are “consumables” that will disappear when consumed, rather than monetary units that will generate revenue and profit.
When you pay $1,280 real money for 1 unit:
* The money is worth $1,280 in monetary value
* The unit doesn’t have any monetary value
If you had bought 1 ounce of gold at a fair price $1,280, the gold would be worth close to $1,280 in a normal market. It has market value, and it may also have monetary value some places.
If you had bought 1 unit of orange juice for $1,280, it would be worth $1-$2 in market value, but zero in monetary value. Orange juice isn’t a monetary unit, but it may have some value anyway.
Normally it means that withdrawals will fail more and more often, and eventually stop. You MAY see a short term effect of changes they make, e.g. forced reinvestments may temporarily have some effect.
They’re trying to get people to put more money in by introducing a new component “Watch ads / answer questions”. I don’t know how that will affect the situation.
I joined this member about. 3 months ago by starting Little unit. Everyday I have to learn or think by myself . Anyway, thank you so much for all answer
@STE
If you KNOW what it is about (potential Ponzi/pyramid hybrid), it should normally improve your chances for getting your money back with a potential profit, e.g. by avoiding to buy new units after a certain point in time (e.g. if they suddenly introduce some new incentives to bring in more money from the outside).
That point in time was October 2013, when they started to have cash problems and made their first changes. People still have some chances to get their money back if they joined after that month, but the chances are reduced.
Recruitment will heavily improve your own chances, but it will also expose you to many unknown risks. The people you recruit will have very poor chances.
“Reinvestment vs withdrawal” is about risk/reward, reinvestments may give you higher rewards but also higher risk. You should gradually try to reduce some of the risk.
A general advice is to keep records (money IN / OUT, in all the details for that). You don’t need to keep any records for internal transactions, they don’t involve any real money anyway. Keeping records can be useful for tax purposes, e.g. you can deduct losses.
Try also to make some notes about the name (user name) of your immediate upline. It can be needed to identify your account, e.g. if BLGM is being shut down by authorities.
BLGM is a great company. They are paying out withdrawals as promised. The authorities are not investigating and will not shut this down.
You people are liars and frauds who are making all these false claims about BLGM. I am reporting this blog to authorities.
Welcome to BehindMLM, Luke Teng.
SPECIFY some of them, rather than claiming they exists? I can specify a few of my points.
The core conclusion here is about Ponzi/pyramid hybrid, a recruitment driven and fraudulent investment based business model.
The Ponzi conclusion is about …
* the penny auction profit described in marketing material is fake = bids are not monetary units that can be added to revenue in a business.
* “Hong Kong dollars” in a back office isn’t real money, i.e. it won’t add anything to revenue when people are reinvesting payouts to the back office, it will only prevent people from withdrawing too much cash.
Good luck with that. BLGM also has tax evasion methods and potential money laundering methods.
Methods like that are being reflected in post #324 “john”, where john paid directly to his sponsor’s bank account, and his sponsor used “Hong Kong dollars” from his back office to generate 5 units. He also borrowed John some “Hong Kong dollars” when John bought 2 additional units:
When reporting the blog to authorities, you should clarify what your complaint is about, e.g. “They make false claims about Ponzi and pyramid, about tax evasion methods and potential money laundering”. That will involve the right types of authorities. It will also allow you to “exercise some faith in the company”.
Authorities? Whose authorities? Yours?
And what’s false about the claims?
Face it, you don’t like reading what’s here, and you’re reacting EMOTIONALLY to what should be a LOGICAL decision, is BLGM a scam?
But you’ve been trained by your recruiter and yourself quite well: suppress your logic, react to anything with emotion instead.
Too bad that training is not good for you in the long run. There is a Chinese saying: those in the strategem are blind; those outside the strategem see clearly.
You are blind, and you don’t even know it.
My up line said that her up line, who is the agent of BLGM in southern California, who is responsible for paying those who win the bids in the States, said that in February, the time to receive money will be shorten to 14 days.
I have bad news for you.
It’s not going to happen.
SD
or put another way
“Man who leap off cliff jump to conclusion.”
My friend said that her up line said that some one who requested a withdrawal on October 15 got paid today.
My friend requested on October 26, I requested on October 31, still waiting………
Good news. I requested end of October too. Hope we all get paid soon. Heard February the paying process should be much faster.
One advise, don’t request too much money at one time. I would say less than $10K. My friend was rejected because of requesting too much money at one time. They send it back all the points plus taking the 19% processing fee.
End of October .. February is an extremely long time?
How did the withdrawals work BEFORE October? 14 days or 3 weeks or something can be normal. More than 3 weeks will indicate some cash flow trouble = old investors are trying to withdraw more money than new investors are putting in.
A failed withdrawal shouldn’t cost any processing fee?
always negative mind… but it’s ok. you or you guy makes sense about ponzi thing… I read them all. But I already invested… and all I want is to get my money back.
I like to hear some good news like some of us thinking positive.
“Thinking positive” doesn’t make Better Living any less of a Ponzi scheme. Nor does labelling people with a “negative mind”.
By participating in Better Living you’re ripping off investors who come after you. The least you can do is own it.
Flashing big money, and then enticing people with BS promises, and then having them eventually lose their money, is CRIMINAL.
People who play dumb about this are just as guilty. Everyone who knowingly participates and/or promotes this should be prosecuted.
CA commissioner of business oversight issued Cease and desist order against WCM. BLGM , bidders paradise and Telexfree are next.
If Bl gets the axe, like many of you are hoping, whatever will all of you do with your time?
Whatever they were doing beforehand I imagine. BLGM is just one of the latest Ponzi scams to run amok in the industry.
There’s no “HOPING” involved
I think RESIGNATION” would be a more appropriate word:
to which I would add:
It’s touching that you would be so concerned for others.
It’s touching that you cared that others cared.
Or perhaps you meant that sarcastically? In that case, I am too.
Why is no one really talking about the company in a positive light? I would like to hear some good things about Better Living?
Seriously?
i got paid, requested nov.
I only requested $3000 hk dollars last oct . That should be peanuts to blgm If they are claiming they make $140 million a day.?
Guys please stop your self denial in admitting that you have been cheated. I have accepted I am a fool to get into BLGM.
When recruitment slows/stops, the money slows/stops. BLGM is being overly cautious on the recruitment front because they don’t want to get caught, and Teng probably doesn’t want to look like a whack job like Phil Ming Xu. The downside is that he has to pile on the BS to keep affiliates satiated.
By the way, for those of you affiliates hearing a bunch of nonsense about cash flow coming from advertising because bp8.hk is getting so much traffic now that bidding is available in mainland China, you might want to have your eyes checked. If you honestly think there’s a single ad on that website that someone paid for, then I have a bridge to sell you.
Even though BLGM is pretty good at keeping its affiliates from making crazy You Tube videos or publicizing online, I’m still kinda’ surprised at how little noise there’s been from regulatory agencies in any of the countries where they are operating. Cash wise, it’s got to be big enough by now to be on somebody’s radar.
How much you want for that bridge?
Hey guys,
I got invited to a meeting about Better Living this weekend and did a follow up to get a bigger picture of what this really is, And like its been stated here before this seems to be a class example of an ponzi scheme.
They where very eager for me to sign up and start investing im pretty young 24 so i think they might have seen me as an easy victim for their Signup commission ?
So as i can understand its all about recruiting new investors and thats where the main income is coming in, There was a lot of talk about acting and investing very fast because of the Limited Spaces for Affiliates are around 600,000.
I also heard a lot of the second phase of the company about what they claim is happening after the quotes of Affiliates have reached their limit where the main incomes for the company will come trough Ads ?
To be honest im highly confused about all of this and it seems that some people made some good money so far but the company seems highly bizarre.
Then you have probably missed that opportunity forever. All those “limited offers” will usually be filled extremely fast. 🙂
Post #324 have a positive user experience from a new member, December 2013. I have used it as example a couple of times to show the true value of the “Hong Kong dollars”.
You can borrow tens of thousands of them from complete strangers, once you have signed up and paid them some money.
This is a recurring theme these days with Ponzi schemes. They run the investment fraud now on the promise of legitimacy later.
Firstly whatever is promised later doesn’t justify the running of a Ponzi scheme in the present, and secondly the “second phase” never happens.
Advertisers aren’t interested in advertising to Ponzi investors, not in any amount that would sustain schemes paying out well over >100% over a few months.
Ha! They’re telling previous investors that there are no more recruitment meetings. The latest I heard was that they’re making so much money off of the existing ads (check ’em out on the bp8 website for a good chuckle), that they’ve been able to stop bringing in new recruits, but you can “recruit if you want to”.
LOL that is hilarious because i know for a fact that they are having many more meetings here at this location and very eager to get new investors into this so called secret ”Gold mine”
Thank you M_norway & Oz for you comments on this thread they have really helped me and gotten my mind clear on this thing.
I joined BLGM last week of Oct 2013, I invested $8,000+ and now have 9 units. I requested a withdrawal of $1,200 last week of Nov and received the money (wire transfer) last Jan 15,2014.
I have two more pending withdrawals that I made last Dec 1, 2013 for $900.00 and the second pending was last Jan 3,2014 for $2000.00, so far I have not received the last 2 withdrawals…Im starting to believe that I got scammed by BLGM as they never reply to my numerous eMails.
Now, anyone that are members of BLGM that are saying that this people are legit PLS PLS tell me what is going on??? all we hear is that Mr.Teng is trying to open two more banks as his original bank couldn’t keep up with the withdrawals.
I guess my question is, if this is the real problem…How long does it takes to open a bank account??? you can do this over the phone for God sakes!!!
Alright kids, today’s homework:
Call up a local bank and tell them you wish to open up an account for your international Ponzi scheme. Report back tomorrow.
How many other examples of banks being unable to keep up business account withdrawal requests have you ever heard of (other than from the HYIP ponzi industry, that is)
$1,200 / $8,000 = 15%, but you can still consider yourself to be lucky. “Money in hand is better than units in BLGM” is an old “Jungle Sayin'” from the deep jungle of Bengalla, where The 21st Phantom lives in his Skull Cave.
Delaying the payments for as long as possible is a commonly used method in Ponzi schemes, used to keep them floating a little longer. But it will also make people become really nervous, so it’s mostly used close to the end of its lifespan.
Oz / M_Norway:
You guys are very knowledgeable to this kind of scams, were you guys been victimized also in the past? I can’t believe I fall for this kind of business! well, I guess I will have to suck it all up… “fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me” LOL.
Nope, and I’m not very interested in scams, I’m more interested in other parts of the programs, parts that can be useful to me in normal business.
My primary interest (of some relevance) is general business, and I’m not very specialised either. I only have enough knowledge to communicate different aspects of business, enough to use OTHER people’s knowledge.
I have been “scammed” once or twice or maybe more, like most people, e.g. when you buy something you normally wouldn’t have bought because of misleading sales arguments.
For me, it’s just another type of market where people are buying opportunities rather than products (if I apply a professional perspective to it, rather than my personal one). The market has both illegal and legal parts.
The statement about delayed payments was about that I have read hundreds of comments in forums. People do really get nervous when payments starts to fail / starts to be delayed more and more.
I’m more interested in useable business ideas than in flawed ones, but I will need to analyse BOTH types to clearly understand the difference.
Thank you so much for the information, but this made me little confuse. as i understood this is also like other MLM ponzi schemes but if i want to invest how can i find the better one?
My personal advice is… don’t get involved in this sort of business.
People who really make money in this are “insiders” who have a ready following. They are “invited” when the scheme’s formed and they get the near peak of the pyramid. Then their minions go out to recruit and make themselves a little money, victimizing the new recruits.
Unless you have accumulated hundreds, perhaps thousands of minions, and managed to teach them how to recruit more victims through ANY means necessary, including half-truths, lies, and such, your chances of making money is minimal, as you can’t predict how much “viability” is there in a scheme. By the time you’re invited, top positions have all been filled and you’ll just get stepped on.
You have a much better chance of making big bucks by learning some Android programming, then create the next viral app. Remember, Flappy Bird was made by a guy in Vietnam.
Hmm… spam warning at orange.
Or it could be someone who’s genuinely interesting in the subject of finding best of the worst… But there is no such thing. 🙂 It’s like “timing” the stock market.
He’s commented in three separate threads with generic enough comments. Link included… looks spammy enough to me.
You mean that “networking eye” link? It’s definitely MLM related… But it seems to contain scambusting articles as well as MLM “how tos”. Orange level it is. 🙂
I got in the business about two years ago I was getting paid every month but we have not gotten paid in three going on four months, noted that I’m still doing the work, if I don’t get paid this month you can label this business a scram……
@myra
As per BLGM’s business model, it was always a scam. You personally getting paid is neither here nor there, although it might indicate a lack of new investment.
As for scram, Freudian slip aficionados eat your heart out.
Oz, lighten up a little, will ya? 🙂 Myra meant it’s a scam to HER. 🙂
Listen up people!!! I’m a living proof or victim of BLGM.. DO NOT GET INVOLVE TO THIS KIND OF BUSINESS!!! Keep your money and save yourself to a whole LOT of trouble, stress, worries…etc etc. THESE PEOPLE (Luke Teng & his cronies) ARE HEARTLESS F*CK!!!
How did you pay?
Did you pay DIRECTLY to the person who recruited you, or did you pay directly to BLGM? It may make a difference.
Post #601 has a link to post #324 “john”, showing a description for where he paid $6,500 directly to his sponsor, while his sponsor used “Hong Kong dollars” from his back office to pay for 5 units.
John may potentially be able to recover some of it from his sponsor / upline, if he has realized the difference between “Hong Kong dollars” in a back office and real money.
Money lost in Ponzi schemes are generally tax deductible as “money lost to theft”, but I don’t know anything about the details for that. The IRS has some “collections of information” related to different Ponzi scheme scenarios.
The method used by john’s sponsor is, among other things, a method to avoid clawbacks from a Receiver. It may cause other types of trouble.
M_Norway: I paid the person who recruited me who’s a good friend of my father in law. I didn’t even know there’s a big diff… anyway, I’m done w/ this kind of business!
This will be the first and the last…like I said before, “Fool me once shame on you, Fool me twice shame on me”.
In the US this would be claimed as a Fraud Loss. Such a loss results in a deduction only to the extent it exceeds 10% of Adjusted Gross Income. Because of this the tax benefit is very much diluted.
How exactly does John’s sponsor avoid clawbacks in this way?
?
John’s sponsor has got $6,500 in cash from John, and have used his own worthless “Hong Kong dollars” to pay for John’s 5 units.
Those $6,500 will not show up as a monetary transaction in the company’s books, or in any of the bank records. John’s sponsor has simply received “unregistered money”, an invisible payout of money.
I’ll add that while the unit (or whatever virtual currency the scam is using) transfer will show up, it’d be a forensic nightmare to peg a dollar transfer through a third-party to the transfer of units.
Especially when the third-party could be anyone, and even then it’s not conclusive because you’d have to assume funds deposited were the market value per unit at the time.
Your money is still in your sponsor’s account. 🙂
He RECEIVED money from you, when you got units from him. And he used his own worthless “Hong Kong dollars” to pay for the units. He NEVER sent any MONEY to pay for the units, he only sent worthless “Hong Kong dollars”.
You can potentially be able to recover some of the money directly from him (he still has your money in his account).
The alternative solution will be that you can file tax deduction for money lost to theft (next year), where your documentation to the IRS will show a transaction to HIS account, along with an explanation for how the money was lost (clearly showing HIS involvment in the fraud).
But relax a little before doing anything. Make sure you understand the idea completely, and make sure you are relatively reasonable yourself.
The method of accepting payments directly from people they recruit can have many different purposes, e.g. to protect against clawbacks, to avoid paying taxes, or simply to save transaction costs and time.
Sometimes that method is organized by someone higher up in the upline, rather than by the sponsor. Factors like that may affect your chances to recover money. But someone in your upline should still have your money.
I understand your explanation. The sponsor has received real monetary compensation (from John) which does not show up on the books of BLGM. Too bad for John.
Yes
M_Norway: Thanks for all the advice I really appreciate it! right now I’m trying to forget all this stupidity…I got laid off from work that’s why I desperately join BLGM, now I realized that desperate people tends to do everything! I mean, even without thinking.
I’m an educated college grad person, falling for this kind of business is just so DUMB! I guess I was just victimized by my situation and people like Luke Teng is trying to “prey” on desperate people like my self.
John’s claim will be against his sponsor rather than against BLGM. But he shouldn’t CLAIM money from his sponsor, he should rather try to talk about “solutions”.
It WILL most likely become a problem for John’s sponsor when John will try to deduct the money lost to theft in his tax returns for the tax year 2014 (April 2015).
John’s documentation will show a $6,500 transaction from his own bank account to his sponsor’s bank account. John will need to give a detailed explanation for what actually has happened to show that the deduction actually is legitimate.
The method used by John’s sponsor may reduce the risk of clawbacks from a Receiver, but it will introduce another problem. People will have claims against him rather than against BLGM. I have pointed out that problem a couple of times.
I’m trying to find methods to recover 50% or more, in a completely ethical way.
But you will actually make it easier if you DON’T do anything right now.
A wise idea is to collect a couple of screenshots showing the back office, to show which program you invested in and how it was organized internally (units, payouts, e-Wallets).
Well the company hasn’t gone bust so until that happens there’s no reason to do anything. In addition if you want to view the money the sponsor received as off the books compensation then the year he received it was 2013 not 2014.
I have no idea how John might inform the IRS that he “thinks” his sponsor under reported income for the year 2013. Even if there was a way the sponsor would characterize things quite differently.
He’ll never even come close trying to use tax deductions so unless his sponsor is Mother Theresa reincarnate, he is better off hoping BLGM will be a smashingly successful money earner (his initial premise) or consider it a learning experience and move on.
You applied a “10% of Adjusted Gross Income” rule in post #624. Where does that rule come from?
Section 165 of the IRC. https://www.google.com/search?q=Section+165+Fraud+loss&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&channel=sb
That seems to be about “Other personal property”? 🙂
But that indirectly proves your point about “It will require a substantial loss before it will be worth the frustration of trying to understand deduction rules”.
Its not worth getting into. There is a host of Post-Madoff legislation and side letters that affect the application of the codes. The IRS doesn’t even understand the rules.
Any one can tell what happy to BLGM now? I feel sad to read the comment. I joined BLGM on Nov 13 and withdraw two times but up to date. I have not received any money. They did not reply my mail either.
IRS focused on the relevant rules only, so it didn’t mention that particular rule for “Casual theft”. It didn’t mention money lost to natural disasters either.
One of the explanations had an estimated time = the time people can EXPECT to use on filing a deduction. It was estimated to more than 8 hours (and that’s why I decided it wasn’t worth it).
It had problems already in October, 1 month before you joined. But since most people HOPED they would get their money back, nobody posted anything about problems.
One of the reasons why for I stopped discussing tax deductions was because it required a complaint to be filed to the police about the theft. That will require some knowledge about the organizers and the company itself.
I believe BLGM actually was organized from the US. It started from the US, but was hastily reorganized and moved to Hong Kong when Zeek Rewards was shut down in August 2012.
We provide a platform where people can share information, but that’s generally all we do. It will generate some experience and knowledge, but you can’t expect “expert advise” from anyone. I will only try to get ENOUGH knowledge to communicate different aspects of the businesses reviewed here.
Another place where you can share information / discuss solutions / ask for information is the realscam.com forum. It probably has a BLGM thread. This website is primarily a review site.
I hope so.
Neither of which apply to investment fraud
That’s your choice. It would not apply to everyone.
@Hoss
The 10% rule was about “transaction NOT for profit”. The rule doesn’t apply to Ponzi scheme losses.
165( c)(2) – Ponzi scheme losses
165( c)(3) – other losses
165( h) – the limitation rules
SOURCE:
irs.gov/irb/2009-14_IRB/ar07.html#d0e357
Section LAW AND ANALYSIS (Issue 1, Issue 2)
Well I guess it was worth getting into. After reading the 2009-14 Rev Ruling I agree with you. Fraudulent investment losses such as ponzis do not appear to be subject to the > 10% AGI limit. I was mistaken.
It means, i lose all my money. 🙁
At least one person is still excited. Not sure why my friend is such an outlier, but I recently sat through a ridiculous assertion that they hit $1m on the investment. When I challenged this person on whether that money now exists as USD in their personal bank account, they claimed it did, but I suspect that wasn’t the truth — just a way to respond to a question they didn’t want me to ask.
Still, this person remains as excited as they were on the day they first pitched it to me almost a year ago. Also, the same person keeps talking about “winning” at auction, which, given how many units he has purchased, means absolutely nothing to me, but they keep talking about it, as if it somehow legitimizes the scheme.
Then, of course, the conversation devolved into me going on a rant about Ponzi schemes not being victimless crimes and a useless appeal to this person’s conscience.
Interesting note, same conversation led to a defense of Lucrazon, which is a scam based in my neck of the woods. In the Ponzi venn diagram, WCM (or whatever it’s called today), BLGM and Lucrazon share an affiliate base.
Through Faith Sloan’s marketing efforts, you can add TelexFree to that diagram too.
Tracking affiliate base is worthless. We know there’s a pool of new suckers born everyday (sort of) as they are addicted to the scheme.s
What we need to track are the “leaders”. I have a feeling the “net winners”, at least those who got a high amount, in Zeek, would be an interesting list of who’s who in this corner of the Scamworld.
I get what you’re saying, but it’s also helpful to understand who is being targeted and who is doing the targeting. I have a theory that WCM, Lucrazon, BLGM and TelexFree targeted immigrant communities in my area primiarly to get immigrants to pitch to their friends and family overseas. I think it’s why you see these particular scams springing up in the same countries over and over again, almost on cue with wherever the scam is in its lifespan. That’s anecdotal, though.
I do agree about the net winners because it would likely illustrate that they were professional scammers. I guess I won’t know until BLGM falls apart whether my friend is a net winner or loser. Even then, though, he wants to believe in Luke Teng so much, I’m not sure he’d be honest about it.
Does anyone know Luke Teng’s personal phone number and email address?
If I go to HongKong I can receive the money in my withdraw list on my ewallet? It’s well over 4 months since I requested the withdrawal.
I am willing to go to HongKong if I can get my money back.
Ask your upline. A group of investors met with him late 2013, so maybe someone in your upline is in contact.
Or, better yet, why don’t you file an official complaint? That’s what this whole scheme is waiting for–someone to do the right thing.
BLGM was initially organized from the US, but it suddenly decided to change location when Zeek Rewards was shut down in August 2012. You should probably look for main organizers in the US, e.g. look for companies that did some business with MSP Power Marketing in 2012.
As far as I can see, using specific search methods “MSP Power Marketing” / date June 15 2011 to September 15 2012, MSP Power Marketing was first registered in Hong Kong on August 28 2012. I had to translate some Chinese info to get that information.
Launch: August 15 2012.
Zeek’s shutdown: August 17 2012.
Relocated to HK: August 28 2012.
You will probably find someone locally in the US who may be among the main organizers.
Try some other combinations of the “MSP …” keywords:
* “MSP Power”
* “MSP Marketing”
* “MSP Network”
* “MSP Power marketing Network”
* and so on and so forth.
Here’s a better source, showing the registration date in English:
http://www.coinfo.info/r/MSP%20Power%20Marketing%20Limited
It was registered in Hong Kong on August 28 2012, only 13 days after the program was launched.
Here’s a review from August 15 2012.
Source: betterlivingreviews.com/index.html
Here’s some of the products marketed by MSP Power Marketing, search limited to June 15 2011 – October 15 2012:
MSP EP-2 Grease
MSP Fuel Conditioner
MSP Penetrating Lubricant
MSP Engine Formulation
MSP Formula 2-6-8
Juvenon Youthful Energy
The idea here is that some of the background info from 2012 potentially can help you to identify some of the organizers.
You will probably find some “lifestyle coaches” among the top people, e.g. Randy and Steve from Limitless Lifestyles. They have been involved right from the start in 2012.
Any one received money yet from withdrals from Dec 2013?
I know there was a tele conference last week with Mr. Luke Teng, unfortunatley i was not able to participate. Did he menitoned anything about all pending withdrawal and when and how he will resolve this issue? Please share info.
You must mean Mr. Took Things?
I was only able to find the February 17 (2014) “Blessing Gold Club” conference call.
freeconferencing.com/playback_ow.html?n=%2Fstorage%2FsgetFC%2FRRrcG%2FiyZQR
Phase 1 is about to end:
“No new members, no more units, no more recruitment, no more MLM compensation plan (but you will earn a share of the profit for the units you already own)”.
Phase 2:
“Log into Bidders’ Paradise each day, 1 time per unit, watch an ad and answer 3 questions (get paid per correct answer?)”.
Withdrawals:
“We are still waiting, we will just need to finish October and November first. Once we come to the December payouts, it will go faster”. “Request withdrawal every 30 day to cash wallet (you can sell them (Hong Kong dollars) or withdraw them)”.
He’s actually offering to sell units for $500 per unit, “before February 28”. 🙂
* One of the main organizers in the U.S. seems to be Everett Hale. Note that I used “one of …”, I have only done some initial search. “Organizers” will include master distributors and other types of organizers.
The creation date doesn’t indicate a MAIN or INITIAL organizer, but it’s not uncommon for an organizer to enter at a later date (e.g. acting as an “independant consultant” first, to avoid the risk of failure).
Facebook (random search hit):
facebook.com/BLGM.MN/posts/236070146561939?stream_ref=10
Everett P. Hale has organized other companies earlier, e.g.
Global Health Trax
OvatioN Lifestyles, Inc – Youngevity
Everett P. Hale is clearly an organizer, not a person you can expect to join an opportunity.
1. I have partly used info from the February 17 conference call (“Blessing Gold Club”), e.g. info about the Las Vegas meeting mentioned early in the recording.
2. Then I have searched for “Better Living Global Marketing” plus some of the names mentioned in the conference call.
3. Then I searched for “Everett Hale network marketing”, to get some of the background info.
Here’s some additional info about the “Blessing Gold Club”, about the people on top of the list.
Page #13 in a Realscam.com thread, the page that popped up in search results:
http://www.realscam.com/f42/blessing-gold-club-2457-print/index9.html
Those people are trying to sell BLGM units for cash, for $500 per unit. They are also trying to recruit BLGM members into their own cash gifting scheme.
I have been following BLGM for the last 8 months and decided to jump on the training call they had last week. The call was a trainwreck from the start. I couldn’t understand half of what Luke Teng was saying.
Some of the highlights (or lowlights) that I could interpret:
*Luke Teng has met with CEO’s of Samsung (and Sony?) and they are all on board with the new advertising model
*They have made 1.5 billion dollars in the last year
*He can only make a certain number of payments from his bank daily- like 20 or something. If the amount is over $10k it counts as 3 transactions
*There is no plan yet to make payments in a timely fashion
*They want to make 1/10th of what Google made this year- he said something like $50 billion
*Luke said you could pay handicap people to watch the ads for you- as long as they aren’ blind because they will have to answer questions at the end
*Some of his BLGM members got on the phone and gushed “From the bottom of their hearts” for this wonderful opportunity.
My advice – get as much of your money out ASAP. This ship is going to sink.
CORRECTION. Everett Hale does seem to join other programs when his own are about to fail. He may join as some type of “business partner”, the OvatioN Lifestyles –> Youngevity was about something like that, a transfer of right to sell a product.
His companies generally seems to be small and relatively short lived.
The current state of Better Living Global Marketing as reported by Sheila Zimmer and Michelle Orkline in the Blessing Gold Club conference call tonight:
1. Rich Granatelli and Will Hunt “are no longer associated with the Blessing Gold Club” (by their own request, reportedly). Michelle Orkline and Sheila Zimmer now state that management responsibilities lie solely with them.
3. The withdrawl (requested January 11) from Better Living Global Marketing that the BGC Admins claimed that they were going to inject (in a never-specified amount) into the stalled gifting queue?
“We were told that it would take five months, but we were told that we were welcome to sell the ‘HK dollars’ in our cash wallets (monopoly money) to anyone who wanted to buy them and use that cash”
4. Michelle and Sheila think it would be a good idea for everyone to “forget there ever was a ‘side opportunity’ and revert back to the original spirit of the club and just get those incoming donations from BGC members moving right along again.
SD
Interestingly, the group of affiliates I know of in Southern California involved in BLGM have never heard of Blessing Gold Club. They claim, as of yesterday, to still be receiving payouts in excess of $1m.
Ask them how much they have been able to WITHDRAW in the last few months, e.g. January – March?
Have they heard of Everett P. Hale or Sheila Oien? Everett was mentioned as a local organizer in the Blessing Gold Club conference call, on February 17. He had personally visited Luke Teng to be briefed about BLGM’s upcoming “Phase 2”.
freeconferencing.com/playback_ow.html?n=%2Fstorage%2FsgetFC%2FRRrcG%2FiyZQR
The Vegas meeting was mentioned right from the start, a minute or so into the audio. Everett was mentioned ~2 minutes into the audio, and Sheila was mentioned as Everett’s sponsor in BLGM ~3 minutes.
Both Everett and Sheila claim(ed) to have official positions in BLGM, in their LinkedIn profiles.
I think Better Livng Global Marketing is on its last legs.
Many people who couldn’t afford to lose are…. losing.
Will they keep it going?
Agreed!
Let’s face it if there were payouts happening everybody would be posting how happy they were with the company. Not happening.
Investors in the scam are gonna not sag anything because they are afraid to upset the BLG. If they complain maybe they will be banned from the site it some other ramifications. Bottom line nobody getting paid and if so it slow cause lack if investors. Game over people please step up and tell your story so others don’t fall victim to the lastest ponsi scheme.
A guys I know is is visiting Hong Kong for second time. Y? I think so he he can convince himself of a positive outcome. Y visit agian if all is well in the world of BLG? Because people aren’t getting paid as planned.
This guys got almost 100 people involved in this scam. Better get some answers or u might end up getting a beating in a dark alley. People it’s over.
If you are one of the unlucky investors please step up and tell your story.
Apparently, nothing. Which is news to me because back when I originally heard the $1m number, I specifically asked if it was real, U.S. currency in their bank account.
They answer, thus far, is no, but I noticed that some details of the investment change, the more questions I ask.
I sent an email to Samsung today asking them to put out a press release about their advertising relationship with Bidder’s Paradise, if any. It Tweeted at them too, but they have a zillion Twitter accounts, so it may be a matter of finding the right one.
I feel like we should just nip this Samsung-advertising-revenue thing in the bud right now.
file your complaint there….
oag.ca.gov/contact/general-comment-question-or-complaint-form
contact Samsung here..
contactus.samsung.com/customer/contactus/formmail/mail/MailQuestionGeneral.jsp?SITE_ID=76&PROD_ID=2088
News on BLGM member website:
A major institutional investor is being introduced. We have already entered into the final stage of negotiations. Relevant re-structuring as well as auditing are in progress too. However, during such period, all withdrawals will have to be postponed, but estimated to 2 to 3 weeks only. Once approved, all pending requests will be released as fast as can be. Your understanding & support in this matter is much needed & appreciated, thank you!
The queue to withdraw money has already been more than 4 months, and now this note is saying there will more delay? They are running out of interesting excuses.
This email has been circulating for months. Some uplines sent the email claiming that Samsung was the institutional investor but were promptly told to knock it off when it became clear that affiliates were walking around telling people Samsung was entering into some kind of relationship with Bidder’s Paradise. It seems from recent communications like people have been instructed to no longer use brand names.
The latest news of the gullible is that if you board a plane to Hong Kong and physically go to the office, you can get cash in hand. This is supposed to prove that the delays are due to bank restrictions on wire transfer amounts.
Below is an email as seen on the comments of this site: http://retirehealthywealthyandwise.net/my-better-living-global-marketing-review, posted by C N:
So what, they’re just going to turn it into a cookie-cutter advertising-based Ponzi?
Riiiiiiiiiiiight. They ran out of money because Teng got cold feet. Trying to go legit, and advertising Ponzi legit of all things, isn’t going to work.
Any perceived value to an advertiser to market to Ponzi pimps is undermined by the fraud suggested in the update (‘hey everyone click on the BLGM links!’). Nobody is paying BLGM for that.
Where is our EFFING money???!!! Americans are not known for their patience??? WTF …been waiting for 5 loooong months and still nothing! All we got is bs and blah blah blah…not even sure now what really is the problem, is it the bank or no more money???
What happened to the Samsung deal??? Lots of commercial now huh!, where is our money??? Even if Mr. PoonTENG get the $50 million deal, there’s still a problem with that bank issue! Never ending crap!
In the bank accounts of top BLGM affiliates. I’m sure Teng has stashed away some of it too.
That’s how Ponzi schemes work.
The low-profile approach was only going to last for so long. All Ponzi schemes need suckers at the bottom feeding everybody else’s ROIs.
Someone named Rayn is claiming that Everett Hale has sent an email that he has left BLGM: retirehealthywealthyandwise.net/my-better-living-global-marketing-review. Unsubstantiated at this point.
I just listened to the audio of a conference call led by Mr. Hale, which you can find here: l.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.infinear.com%2Fs3%2F0640bfa48eb9d6a6a83e7ca2e12e78fb-2014-04-08-21-07-57-iphone.call.100.mp3&h=PAQGr2MQV&s=1. The call audio was posted to Facebook on April 10.
Anybody who checks in here happen to get the text of the email from Hale?
I don’t see any connection between Everett Hale and that conference call. The first 1/2 of the call is some super-salesman-wannabe named Matt G. Marovich from New Brunswick, New Jersey who is currently believing:
The second half of the call is filler fluff from some hot little baby doll named Marina Bello; she can’t seem to put two complete sentences together without ADD yanking her off topic.
She apparently seized her chance at 15 minutes of fame by marrying Sean “Hollywood” Hamilton, a now 51 year-old DJ with a national reputation.
The question I am pondering (considering that we all knew long ago that Better Living Global Marketing is a Ponzi/pyramid), is:
How comfy is an on-the-road middle-aged DJ with the idea of his hot little wife spending a week in Hong Kong with an ambitious, smooth-talking young man who believes from those numbers on his computer screen that he is getting rich?
SD
The call was an internal “Blessing Gold Club” call. He was talking about a Las Vegas event where one “Everett” had been present, and mentioned “Sheila” as “one in Everett’s team”.
Sheila Zimmer isn’t in Everett’s team (in the context it was presented in the call). Sheila Zimmer would have been presented as a BGC leader rather than as “one in Everett’s team”.
I identified Everett P. Hale and Sheila Oien from small details like that, based on search hits. They both have/had official positions in BLGM.
You will probably find their positions in BLGM by looking at their LinkedIn profiles.
M_Norway, I should have specified I was replying to “Stop Ponzi Schemes” post that preceded mine.
The 4/10/2014 Matt Marovich/Marina Bello BLGM pep talk call:
http://www.infinear.com/s3/0640bfa48eb9d6a6a83e7ca2e12e78fb-2014-04-08-21-07-57-iphone.call.100.mp3
The 2/17/2014 Blessing Gold Club call you are referring to:
http://www.freeconferencing.com/playback_ow.html?n=%2Fstorage%2FsgetFC%2FRRrcG%2FiyZQR
SD
You’re right, M_Norway. I got the link from a message circulating amongst Hale’s group and wrongly attributed the caller as Hale.
I still can’t verify whether Hale is still personally promoting BLGM as of today. Something major has happened in the last week to the program and some of its leaders, but I’m having trouble finding specifics as each group sends out emails to its members with slightly different details.
Ah. Two different calls, but there is some connection between the them because the call link I posted came a few days after a FB post–from the same group–about a previous event with Hale’s group.
If they’re not in BGC, then there’s, at the very least, some communication between the two groups.
Yes indeed. Sheila Zimmer, Will Hunt and Sheri Bonay are all on Marina Bello’s FaceBook “friends” list. These hucksters seem to have a gravitational attraction to each other for sure.
facebook.com/marinabello1
SD
Here’s the current reply from BLGM, the eMail came from WD BLGM (?) with no signature whatsoever…hmmmm.
After numerous eMail for my Dec 2013 withdrawals they finally responded. Im really puzzled as to what Mr. PoonTENG is up to??? very very interesting character! LOL
They are frenemies. 🙂
I just wanna say that I heard a lot of how eventually people will get paid and tht payments have slowed. Has anybody anybody been paid in the past 4 months?
What legit company can’t pay associates? If your waiting for money and still believe this is gonna work out I have bad news for u. ITS OVER!
Guy I know went to HongKong and came back excited talking about phase 3. These people in HongKong are all smiling and laughing cause US money is paying them. All 400 at the banquet are in on the scam and probably can’t believe how stupid the Americans are.
5 months no pay. Lmao people still hopefully they are gonna make $3500 a day and actually get paid. ! Hilarious. ! Good luck suckers.
Told all my friends to stay away. But they don’t listen. Enjoy explaining this to your wives or the people u conviced to jump into your obvious Ponzi scheme.
I unfortunately bought a unit last October…then realised very quickly that it was a huge mistake. By Jan with the introduction of the C wallet – any slight hope I had that it was not an elaborate scam were dashed.
The leaders have turned on each other, you can’t trust any of them as they continue to plug it.
I cannot believe that people still can’t see what a scam this is. You can’t say anything in the groups as you get slated and kicked to the curb. Its like a cult or something.
Every week there is a new rule introduced that tries to force people to part with more hard cash. And I don’t know of any payouts at all. I wish this got reported and the people plugging it got reported to.
It doesn’t make any sense posting anything in a cult or a “clicque” (other than to show your own loyalty to the leaders, etc.).
You can try, next time you’re invited to a conference call, to sell the unit(s) you have to one of the leaders at a reduced price? The price in February was $500 per unit, if I remember it correctly. But don’t accept payment in “Hong Kong dollars”. 🙂
@M_Norway : This is a VERY good idea! I will try to sell my unit to one of the “leaders” at least I can have half of my money back. And yes! I want it in US $$$ and CASH!!!
Wait till they have talked themselves “warm” about how much money they will make in the future, simply by watching video ads and answering 3 questons. And then you can introduce your own offer, “you can get my collection of units for $500 per unit,to make even more money”.
If they don’t respond to it, throw in “… and some Hong Kong dollars if you buy a pair“ (or trio or whatever you have).
If they do respond “We want to buy!”, throw in “… plus shipping and handling”. 🙂
Unfortunately I have already tried that, a few months ago I tried to sell my units for a bargain. I am not the only one who did either.
Interestingly my offer was not taken up by anyone! The leaders do not want to pay US dollars. They have many many units and are constantly encouraging those with much less, to part with hard cash for c wallet dollars at discounted price. However do not want to buy a bargain bunch of units themselves. Hmmmm.
no one has posted in a while. Any updates? has anyone received money?
One relatively new article:
https://behindmlm.com/companies/hong-kong-police-launch-blgm-investigation/
Better Living doesn’t have its own group, it’s sorted under the general group “companies”. If you want to find articles about it, you can use the “Search” function, upper right side of this website.
BLGM collapsed in October / November 2013. You can’t expect to get any money from it, the current strategy is simply to mislead the victims and delay the final collapse for as long as possible.
Be sure to report your lost in this scam in next year’s return. Did anyone report this scam to law enforcement agency?
If anyone still hoping, here’s the latest: Mr. PoonTeng strategy is to let members to watch his so called “commercial” so that these small time business owner in China who’s paying him will keep on advertising on his Bidders Paradise racket site.
In return Mr. PoonTeng is laughing all the way to his bank and NOT giving a single dime to his members or I should say victim.
Bottom line: DO NOT WATCH ANY OF THIS COMMERCIALS!!! STOP MAKING MR.POONTENG RICH!!!!
Here is some latest news from BLGM but I couldn’t know about it because it is in Chinese language, can anyone translate to me??
Latest News 最新消息 2014-11-11
根據與一眾風投基金及廣告業界深入交流有感：「本公司目前是全球最具潛力及價值互聯網創業企業。其一，公司廣告模式的創新乃是對金融資本價值的創新，屬 “獨一無二”，之舉；其二，公司平台在全球的營銷所取得的互聯網廣度，即参與的國家和地域，非一般互聯網公司可比，難能可貴，極具價值。
公司將一如既往，帶領全球同寅“與時並進、繼續創新”；並在不遠未來，與具前瞻眼光之大機構丶財團合作，全面進入 “非創會會員” 領域，並實現公司與 “創會會員” 攜手，長久持續運營，讓 “商家丶公司丶創會與非創會會員” 全面共赢，進而做強資源整合丶充分發揮及延伸價值不菲的大數據值。
望全球會員靈慧獨具，抓緊公司創造，並來之不易的丶有限的創業時期（第一階段），以廣拓財源丶豐富人生，見證歷史！
在全球市場的催生下，公司將作出以下調整，望市場快速有效領悟及傳達。祝各同寅 “創業成功”！
由2014年11月17日起：
1. VlP 可提款期從五個月（151日），延長至九個月（271日）。
2. 首次提款日由最後一張新單加三十日計算。
3. VlP門數最少七單，最多十五單（非VlP則不限）。
4. 以後每隔三十日可提一次，每次上限為入單總值15％；無論門數多少，總可提款額為入單總值65％。
另：由2014年12月1日起，直至另行通知為止，無論門數多少，開立VlP戶口必須最少使用40％VlP開戶積分。
Auto-translate:
One withdrawal every nine months?
Sounds like the same old Ponzi points bullshit.
That means “SUCKERS”…. in Chinese!
I read that is you can’t ever take out more than 65% of total “value” in each account (戶口), and you can’t START withdrawal until 9 months, starting from your first “new order” (新單).
No idea what is this “gate count” (門數), may be stacking (multiple accounts)
Does anyone know what does it mean which was published on BLGM site??
scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/1710420/police-arrest-five-over-suspected-online-auction-scam-netting-hk50
This should answer most questions.
Thanks for the heads up Bonie, much appreciated!
They didn’t specify “Hong Kong residents” or anything like that. It means victims in other countries CAN contact them (Commercial Crime Bureau).
Here is what you do if you win an item on Better Livings web site. Unless you want to pick up your item in HK, you need to purchase the item and submit receipts to BL.
Then they will deposit money in your ewallet. You can request a withdrawal once they are paying. Which they are not currently doing.
Is that really winning by paying for your own item?
I think I just not try to win and not get what I won from this place.
Better Living Global Marketing companies is scammer.
I have about 700 units with BLGM and until now I didn’t get a penny out of it. I invested lots of money and send a few emails to them with no answer at all.
I lost any hope that they will pay me any money.
Yeah this was definitely a costly learning mistake on investing… Somebody ate good off our money for a while…