Poxy Ponzi schemes - FX Trading

roundthebend

One of the people I've encountered talking about this stuff lately is of a similar age to me (40s). She is a successful business woman, though the lockdown has affected her business hugely.

This isn't just kids.

yocky

Have you got an example of one of these schemes? A couple of friends of mine have recently asked me if kids of theirs can come and talk to me about careers in finance/trading, which surprised me because I thought this world had lost it's cache after the GFC.

As @m_c said, at least with equities you have an edge. Your edge is that shares increase over time (simplistically put) and they pay you a bonus every year. FX pairs trading really is a zero sum game, and you know that old trope - if you don't know who the mug in the room is.....

roundthebend

@yocky ;
CashFX is one of the schemes/scams I'm aware of. You won't get much info though, I suspect. Basically, you join and pay a subscription. They promise to invest the money for you, I think, and you'll get pay outs. But, you get better pay outs if more people join up under your reference number. I don't think the trades ever make money, it's just the pyramid scheme continuing.

My son isn't involved in that. He gives trading "signals" for free that he gets from his "colleagues/friends", and hopes you will sign up to a trading platform using his affiliate link. It's more transparent what's going on, but I don't think it will make anyone rich anyway.

yocky

roundthebend said:

@yocky ;
CashFX is one of the schemes/scams I'm aware of. You won't get much info though, I suspect. Basically, you join and pay a subscription. They promise to invest the money for you, I think, and you'll get pay outs. But, you get better pay outs if more people join up under your reference number. I don't think the trades ever make money, it's just the pyramid scheme continuing.

My son isn't involved in that. He gives trading "signals" for free that he gets from his "colleagues/friends", and hopes you will sign up to a trading platform using his affiliate link. It's more transparent what's going on, but I don't think it will make anyone rich anyway.

Eww. That does look particularly scammy, thought there was going to be more of a veneer of sophistication from what you said.

https://www.fca.org.uk/news/warnings/cash-fx-group

Looks like they've fairly cleverly positioned themselves far enough out of reach that the regulator is still not effectively able to deal with them after 18 months. Nasty.

DefaultM

roundthebend said:

@yocky ;
CashFX is one of the schemes/scams I'm aware of. You won't get much info though, I suspect. Basically, you join and pay a subscription. They promise to invest the money for you, I think, and you'll get pay outs. But, you get better pay outs if more people join up under your reference number. I don't think the trades ever make money, it's just the pyramid scheme continuing.

My son isn't involved in that. He gives trading "signals" for free that he gets from his "colleagues/friends", and hopes you will sign up to a trading platform using his affiliate link. It's more transparent what's going on, but I don't think it will make anyone rich anyway.

That's what I was being told about. The way I looked at it was if I deposit £5k and sign up 10 friends that deposit 5k, that's £55k they've got. Who's to say that they haven't just moved that to one side, and every so often they give you a bit back and say "we did a great trade here is £xxx" whilst actually doing nothing? 
 Then who's to say they wouldn't get to a certain point and just piss off with everyone's money? 

roundthebend

mmmm hmmm 

ArchtopDave

Get the Kids to buy Black Tulips..... they're a sure fire winner. No way can you lose money, and, provided you buy whole ones, you can always grow them and flog the flowers for profit.

duotone

Sounds a bit like this.  He signed up & then got messages on what to invest in, the trades didn’t do well. He went head-to-head with a friend who was knowledgeable about the markets, to see who did best.

https://youtu.be/doi5NtjGu0s

DefaultM

I'm trying out some betting tipsters the last few months.
One guy claims £20k profit in the last 5 years. He said to bet on something at 4/1. I used an odds comparison site within 10 seconds of the message arriving and it was 2/1 so I didn't put it on.
The bet won, and he recorded it as a £400 profit, so I contacted him and said I don't think that's right. The most anyone following your tip could have got is £200.
 He basically told me tough shit, I should have put it on regardless of the odds and been happy.
I said yeah except this is happening regularly and it makes the profit figures you're advertising completely unachievable. He didn't reply.

Also who on earth puts £100 on a bet? Most people would do a tenner, so it's already 10x inflated.

Emp_Fab

You know I'm born to lose, and gambling's for fools, but that's the way I like it baby, I don't want to live forever....

DefaultM

Emp_Fab said:

You know I'm born to lose, and gambling's for fools, but that's the way I like it baby, I don't want to live forever....

Agreed, if you gamble like this guy was telling me to! Everything just seems to be a scam these days to make the owner money at everyone else's expense.