I-CON Review: Bitcoin trading and lottery games
There is no information on the I-CON website indicating who owns or runs the business.
The I-CON website domain (“i-congroup.com”) was registered on the 28th of May 2016, however the domain registration is set to private.
At the bottom of the I-CON Group website the following contact details are provided:
Unit 1542 – 15th Floor – North Tower
Concordia Plaza
1 Science Museum Road
Tsim Sha Tsui – East Kowloon
Hong Kong
Further research reveals a number of real-estate brokers offering leased units in Concordia Plaza. The exact nature of I-CON’s presence there is unknown.
The I-CON website links to a YouTube channel named “aikonbit”. A video titled “Aikon” on the channel suggests the original name of I-CON was Aikon.
Why the company changed names shortly after launch is unclear.
At the time of publication Alexa estimate that 28% of traffic to the I-CON website originates out of Spain.
As always, if an MLM company is not openly upfront about who is running or owns it, think long and hard about joining and/or handing over any money.
The I-CON Product Line
I-CON offer affiliates and retail customers participation in two bitcoin-based games.
- Play 8020 sees affiliates try to guess four numbers,
- FastCash 500 pits six affiliates against eachother, the one to answer math questions the fastest wins
Participation in games offered by I-CON requires a “Games Pack” purchase:
- $30 Games Pack = 2 Play 8020 credits and 1 FastCash 500 credits
- $60 Games Pack = 5 Play 8020 credits and 2 FastCash 500 credits
- $120 Games Pack = 9 Play 8020 credits and 5 FastCash 500 credits
- $300 Games Pack = 22 Play 8020 credits and 14 FastCash 500 credits
The I-CON Compensation Plan
The I-CON compensation plan sees affiliates invest in affiliate packs.
Each pack corresponds with a daily ROI payout, with I-CON affiliates also paid to recruit new affiliates.
I-CON Affiliate Ranks
There are nine affiliate ranks in the I-CON compensation plan.
Along with their respective qualification criteria, they are as follows:
- Associate – $600 in affiliate package revenue on your weaker binary side
- Builder – $12,000 in affiliate package revenue on your weaker binary side
- Leader – $60,000 in affiliate package revenue on your weaker binary side
- Executive – $180,000 in affiliate package revenue on your weaker binary side
- Executive Manager – $600,000 in affiliate package revenue on your weaker binary side
- Global Manager – $1,200,000 in affiliate package revenue on your weaker binary side
- Global Director – $3,600,000 in affiliate package revenue on your weaker binary side
- V.P. – $6,000,000 in affiliate package revenue on your weaker binary side
- President – $12,000,000 in affiliate package revenue on your weaker binary side
Exchange Share
I-CON group claim to trade cryptocurrencies, with “profits generated” shared with their affiliates.
Exchange Share ROIs are paid out daily, with an advertised “maximum daily earning” of 1.35%.
- Basic ($150) – qualifies for 180 days of Exchange Share ($225 maximum ROI)
- Start ($300) – qualifies for 210 days of Exchange Share ($600 maximum ROI)
- Platinum ($600) – qualifies for 220 days of Exchange Share ($1200 maximum ROI)
- Master ($1200) – qualifies for 240 days of Exchange Share ($2400 maximum ROI)
Recruitment Commissions
I-CON affiliates are paid to recruit new affiliates.
On uneven-numbered months they receive 10% of fees paid by even-numbered affiliates they recruit and 20% of fees paid by even-numbered affiliates.
On even-numbered months they receive 20% of fees paid by uneven-numbered affiliates they recruit and 10% of fees paid by even-numbered affiliates.
Indirect Recruitment Commissions
On even-numbered months, I-CON affiliates receive a 20% commission for every uneven-numbered affiliate their downline recruits.
On uneven-numbered months, I-CON affiliates receive a 20% commission for every even-numbered affiliate their downline recruits.
Residual Recruitment Commissions (binary)
Residual recruitment commissions in I-CON are paid out via a binary compensation structure.
A binary compensation structure places an affiliate at the top of a binary team, split into two sides (left and right):
The first level of the binary team houses two positions. The second level of the binary team is generated by splitting each of the first two positions into another two positions each.
In this manner subsequent levels of the binary team are generated as needed, with each new level housing double the positions as the previous level.
Positions in the binary team are filled via direct and indirect recruitment of new I-CON affiliates.
Each recruited affiliate package
At the end of each day new affiliate pack revenue is tallied up on both sides of the binary team, with I-CON affiliates paid 10% of the volume generated by the weaker side.
Matched volume is flushed from both sides, with leftover volume on the stronger side carried over the next day.
How much an I-CON affiliate can earn daily in binary commissions is determined by their I-CON affiliate rank:
- Associate – $750 a day
- Builder – $1000 a day
- Leader – $1250 a day
- Executive – $1750 a day
- Executive Manager – $2500 a day
- Global Manager – $3500 a day
- Global Director – $5000 a day
- V.P. – $7500 a day
- President – $10,000 a day
Game Pack Commissions
Game Packs purchased by retail customers and personally recruited affiliates pay a 15% commission.
Game Packs also pay a residual commission, using the same unilevel compensation structure as direct recruitment commissions:
- level 1 (personally recruited affiliates) – 10%
- level 2 – 10%
- levels 3 and 4 – 6%
- levels 5 and 6 – 4%
Game Prize Commissions
Play 8020
When an I-CON affiliate wins a game of Play 8020, 20% of their winnings are paid out to their upline (reverse unilevel).
The affiliate who recruited the winning the affiliate is paid 4%. The affiliate who recruited them is paid 4% and so on up another three upline levels (4% paid out each level).
Fast Cash 500
As with Play 8020, when an I-CON affiliate wins a game of Fast Cash 500, 20% of their winnings is paid to their upline.
The affiliate who recruited the winning the affiliate is paid 4%. The affiliate who recruited them is paid 4% and so on up another three upline levels (4% paid out each level).
Rank Achievement Bonus
Starting at the Builder rank, I-CON affiliates are given the following bonuses for rank achievement:
- Builder – 1 BTC
- Leader – an “Apple watch”
- Executive – a Montblank Starwalker pen
- Executive Manager – a Rolex Sea Dweller watch
- Global Manager – 75 BTC
- Global Director – 100 BTC
- V.P. – 150 BTC
- President – 200 BTC
Joining I-CON
Affiliate membership with I-Con is tied to the purchase of an affiliate pack:
- Basic – $150 (must be renewed after 6 months)
- Start – $300 (must be renewed after 9 months)
- Platinum – $600 (must be renewed after 9 months)
- Master – $1200 (must be renewed after 12 months)
The primary difference between the above affiliate packs is income potential through the I-CON compensation plan.
As per the I-CON compensation plan, all affiliates are also required to “use at least 1 game pack”.
A Game Pack purchase adds an additional $30 to $300 to the cost of I-CON affiliate membership.
Conclusion
According to I-CON, their share exchange generates revenue when the company ‘buy(s) coins at low market tendencies and sell(s) them when they grow in value”.
If I-CON are able to consistently deliver the 150% to 200% ROIs offered to affiliates, it begs the question why they don’t just trade their own funds.
A 200% ROI annually would turn even a modest bank loan into a monolithic fortune within a few years.
No proof of I-CON’s alleged trading activity is provided on the company website, with I-CON stating only
We are sharing with you the results of the benefits resulted from the trading activity.
That I-CON’s owners are anonymous doesn’t exactly add any credibility to the company’s claims.
As it stands, the only identifiable source of revenue entering the company is affiliate investment in packages and Game Ticket fees.
Retail is possible but unlikely (I-CON’s games are nothing new), with that leaving affiliate funds as the primary source of revenue generation.
Given I-CON is set up as an MLM underbelly scheme, there’s an extremely high probability all they are doing is using newly invested funds to pay off existing investors.
The whole variable ROI rate and long maturity period is owing to invested funds also used to fund recruitment commissions.
The recruitment commissions alone make I-CON a pyramid scheme, which lends itself to Ponzi fraud.
Other than retail customers being able to purchase Game Tickets, there’s nothing remotely in I-CON representing a legitimate MLM opportunity.
I-CON will be able to rig initial 180 day ROIs owed by usng Start to Master package invested funds. Some of that ROI will be recuperated via affiliates repurchasing Basic or higher affiliate membership, however at 240 days after launch it’s crunch-time.
Either I-CON will have enough funds to pay Master affiliates a ROI or the scheme will collapse.
One consideration is if initial investment volume was slow but picked up at a later date. This would see crunch-time extended until a majority of Start or higher packages have matured.
Regarding the use of bitcoin, this is intentional as gambling is highly regulated the world over.
If a regulator steps in to close I-CON, the use of bitcoin means recovery of victim funds will be next to impossible. This is also true if the I-CON instead collapses.
