TGI AG, aka Trust Gold International, operates in the gold investment MLM niche.

The company provides a corporate address in Lichtenstein on its website, however TGI AG doesn’t appear to have any actual ties to Lichtenstein.

Heading up TGI AG we have founder Helmut Kaltenegger.

Other names attached to TGI AG are Michael Ewy (Managing Director) and Katarina Kaltenegger (majority shareholder and Helmut’s wife).

Helmut Kaltenegger appears to be an Austrian national, and it is from Austria that TGI AG is actually run from.

We can further confirm this by examining TGI AG’s official FaceBook page:

TGI AG operates from three known website domains:

  1. tgi.gold – privately registered on February 24, 2024
  2. tgi.li – first registered on October 29th, 2020, private registration last updated on an unknown date
  3. tgi-academy.gold – privately registered on March 13th, 2024

From these registration dates we can surmise TGI AG launched in early 2024.

Prior to TGI AG, Helmut Kaltenegger was running GGMT.

GGMT launched as GGMTrading in 2018 and appears to have collapsed around February 2024. This means TGI AG was launched shortly after GGMT collapsed.

Read on for a full review of TGI AG’s MLM opportunity.

TGI AG’s Products

With respect to its MLM opportunity, TGI AG has no retailable products or services.

TGI AG’s MLM opportunity is funded by fees charged to affiliate investors.

TGI AG’s Compensation Plan

TGI AG affiliates invest funds on the promise of a 2% to 4% monthly passive return, paid out for 36 months.

At the end of the 36-month investment period,

2% is the default ROI rate. It includes a 36% bonus at the end of the 36-month investment period.

4% is paid if a TGI AG affiliate pays a 33.33% fee of the investment amount. A 200% bonus on the 33.3% fee is paid at the end of the 36-month investment period.

Note that with the 4% a month investment plan, it can be cancelled at any month but the TGI AG affiliate loses the 200% bonus.

Also note that a third of the 4% a month payout must be reinvested back into TGI AG. This effectively generates a new 4% a month investment plan.

Although not explicitly clarified, I believe TGI AG takes its 33.33% fee cut out of withheld ROI payments when creating the new 4% a month plans each month.

33.33% fees paid on the 4% a month investment plan are used to fund TGI AG’s compensation plan.

TGI AG pays commissions on 33.33% fees charged via a unilevel compensation structure.

A unilevel compensation structure places an affiliate at the top of a unilevel team, with every personally recruited affiliate placed directly under them (level 1):

If any level 1 affiliates recruit new affiliates, they are placed on level 2 of the original affiliate’s unilevel team.

If any level 2 affiliates recruit new affiliates, they are placed on level 3 and so on and so forth down a theoretical infinite number of levels.

TGI AG caps payable unilevel team levels at ten.

Referral commissions are paid as a percentage of 33.33% fees paid across these ten levels as follows:

  • level 1 (personally recruited affiliates) – 50%
  • levels 2 to 10 – 2%

Joining TGI AG

TGI AG affiliate membership is free.

Full participation in the attached income opportunity requires an undisclosed minimum investment. Whatever the amount invested, a 33.33% additional fee on invested funds is payable.

TGI AG Conclusion

Some things to note right off the bat with TGI AG is that, firstly, it is absolutely a reboot of Helmut Kaltenegger’s collapsed GGMT gold investment scheme.

In a since deleted August 2024 article published by Anwalte, GGMT’s familiar sounding business model is explained;

The Kalteneggers promised customers enormous discounts on the international gold price if they were willing to wait up to three years for delivery.

Promised discounts: The discounts were to be financed with gold from a mine in South America (Aulicio Mining Inc.), which was to be mined with customers’ money.

Anwalte reported GGMT defrauded “approximately 21,000 customers of a total of €34.6 million.”

It appears Austrian regulators are asleep at the wheel with respect to GGMT. A May 2024 article from Kleine Zeitung suggests a GGMT victim filed a lawsuit, however comments from Kaltenegger suggests he settled and possibly paid the victim off.

The story revolves around an upcoming fraud trial in Vienna following charges against one of his former companies, “GGMT Trading.” Kaltenegger is outraged by the story – and is fighting back.

There is no longer any injured party, no longer any plaintiff.

Despite TGI AG very obviously being a reboot rebranding of GGMT, Kaltenegger insists it isn’t.

The company GGMT Trading has nothing to do with the current company; they are two completely different concepts.

In offering passive 2% to 4% returns each month, TGI AG’s investment scheme constitutes a securities offering.

In Austria securities are regulated by the Financial Markets Authority (FMA). TGI AG fails to provide evidence it has registered its passive returns gold investment scheme with the FMA.

This constitutes securities fraud. Notwithstanding TGI AG is also not registered to offer securities in jurisdictions outside of Austria.

With nothing marketed or sold to retail customers, TGI AG’s MLM opportunity is also a pyramid scheme.

TGI AG maintains it buys and/or trades gold through Gold Crest Refinery, an Indian owned outfit purportedly operating out of Ghana.

The only way to verify this is through audited financial reports filed with the FMA and other financial regulators, which TGI AG has failed to do dating back to GGMT launching in 2022.

As it stands the only verifiable source of revenue entering TGI AG is new investment.

Using new investment to pay ROI withdrawals would make TGI AG a Ponzi scheme.

As with all MLM Ponzi schemes, once affiliate recruitment dries up so too will new investment.

This will starve TGI AG of ROI revenue, eventually prompting a collapse.

36 months is a long time. From the previously cited Anwalte article;

Many [GGMT] customers have been waiting in vain for their gold deliveries for years.

GGMT’s ultimate collapse proved Helmut Kaltenegger’s gold ruse was a sham. TGI AG is more of the same.

Whenever a Ponzi scheme inevitably collapses, the majority of participants lose money.