A fraudulent business that promises high returns to investors at small risk is back. Return projections are often offered at higher prices than market prices, sometimes exceeding 50%, to attract someone to invest. This fraudulent business has a cool name, Ponzi Scheme.
This crime scheme relies on the perpetrators' ability to attract more new investors, because without this additional investment, there will be an inability to pay existing investors. For this reason, the perpetrators of this scheme must have a reliable story. The story must give investors something reasonable, from anything involving banks, mortgages, to international manufacturing companies. The key to making a story trustworthy is the use of diverse, complex, and unique situations.
Reporting from the eiseramper Site, the first Ponzi Scheme was designed by an Italian immigrant named Charles Ponzi in 1919. At that time, the government usually allowed individuals to exchange stamps for local currencies. Ponzi intends to take advantage of this system by buying post stamps from abroad and holding them back until the currency value increases. Ponzi friends and family join this business by providing the money needed to invest in the operation.
Ponzi promises a yield of 10% each month, thus creating a breakthrough for its business as banks only offer a yield of 5% per year. Ponzi is believed to be around $115 million from investors. He used 'new' money to give false profits to investors 'old'. When Ponzi was found to be bankrupt, investors asked for his money back, and the Ponzi scheme was finally exposed. Ponzi pleaded guilty to letter fraud and spent time in federal prisons and states before he was deported to Italy.
The pattern of fraud using Ponzi schemes occurs a lot around the world. The case of the famous Ponzi scheme after 1920, occurred in 2008 by Bernie Madoff. Madoff was able to convince wealthy businessmen and even companies to invest in his absolute takeover' strategy. Operation Madoff was discovered when he was unable to meet investor demand to pay back, just like any other Ponzi scheme that ended up failing. Investor Madoff eventually lost about $20 billion over the timeframe of its scheme.
SEE ALSO:
During the Madoff era, the average Ponzi scheme involved around $9 million. According to data published by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), consumers reported a loss of around $8.8 billion due to fraud in 2022, with investment fraud reaching more than $3.8 billion.
Ponzi Fraud Is Not New In Indonesia.
The case of Ponzi-type fraudulent investment in Indonesia is not new. Some time ago the police managed to arrest Putra Wibowo, the founder of the Viral Blast trading robot in Bngkok. Putra Wibowo has succeeded in being a fugitive for a year. The loss from the fraudulent investment case of the Viral Blast robot trading reached IDR 1.8 trillion against 11,930 victims, the mode of inviting victims to promise big profits by trading forex.
There are also many fraudulent Ponzi investments that use the work system by selling services on social media platforms. Financial observer Alfons Tanujaya stated that the Simonida Media case is actually not new in Indonesia. He gave an example of the cases of Gotiktok, Tiktokcash, and Goins which were later blocked by Kominfo at the request of the OJK for committing fraudulent investments or Ponzi.
"It's almost similar, the victim is lured to get a steady income just watching videos, doing likes, subscribes or commenting on videos that appear on the platform," he said.
Unfortunately, after being blocked by Kominfo, the perpetrators of this fraud slowly evolved and carried out their actions guerrillaally by offering freelance work to perform likes and subscribes. The victim, who is indeed a job seeker, is lured with a huge profit of 30 percent per day from the paid capital.
He explained that the techniques used by such platforms were quite clever and took advantage of the psychological condition of the'sunk cost effect' where a subject was informed that he was entitled to Rp75,000 as if he belonged to him, even though he had not done anything.
And he just needs to complete the final task before claiming the money that has become his, then most likely he will carry out the task because he feels a loss of IDR 75,000 if he does not do the task.
"Unfortunately, people are lulled by the act of spreading money from this less responsible digital platform to become complacent and embedded in their awareness that making money is that easy. Just click, share and introduce new members will be able to get easy money. People are consumptive, lazy and always want to expect instant results from each business. Work as little as possible but the results are big," said Alfons.
He hopes that in the future the government will be more active in supervising actions that are less responsible and giving a strong warning so that digital platforms do not carry out programs that will basically make people lazy and deceive.
The government must be sensitive and closely monitor the actions carried out by digital platforms in Indonesia in carrying out its business activities. If the practice that is carried out results in badly tricking the public, the government can prohibit the practice from being carried out," said Alfons.
Don't Use Articles 372 And 378 In Money Game Cases
Member of Commission III of the DPR, Nasir Djamil, believes that law enforcement officers can actually ensnare perpetrators of fraudulent Ponzi schemes by using the Law on Trade Number 7 of 2014 which strictly prohibits the application of Ponzi or pyramid schemes.
"If someone violates, according to Article 105 the perpetrator is threatened with a maximum imprisonment of 10 years and a maximum fine of Rp. 10 billion," he said.
This politician from the PKS faction compared, in some cases, money game actors with pyramid schemes were only charged with using the Criminal Code Article 372 concerning embezzlement and Article 378 concerning fraud where the maximum penalty was four years in prison.
In addition, with the application of Article 105 of the Trade Law, the police can move without waiting for the victim to fall. This is because the regulation adheres to a general offense (ordinary offense), not a complaint offense. Thus, so that the police can move more responsively without waiting for the pyramid scheme to be destroyed and claimed casualties first.
He revealed that the complaint offenses contained articles 372 and 378 of the Criminal Code rarely succeeded in ensnaring the perpetrators and the brains of the money game. Because, they already know one day and at what point their business is no longer able to pay bonuses and return the basic funds that have been deposited by the victims
The average money game with a pyramid scheme will be destroyed in 1.5 years to three years from operating. That's where they will escape. If they report, yes, it's too late because the owner has fled," said Nasir Djamil.
Spokesperson for the Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Center (PPATK) M. Natsir Kongah said that in addition to implementing trade laws, scammers such as the ponzi scheme could be subject to sanctions in accordance with Law Number 8 of 2010 concerning the Prevention and Eradication of the Crime of Money Laundering (TPPU) if they meet the requirements according to applicable law.
"They can be subject to sanctions in accordance with Law Number 8 of 2010 concerning prevention and money laundering offenses in Article 3, Article 4 and Article 5, with a sentence of 20 years in prison with a fine of Rp. 10 billion. The effect of a long sentence and a large fine is expected to make the perpetrators of scamming fraud or with a ponzi scheme," said M. Natsir Kongah to VOI by telephone., Tuesday, February 6.
The English, Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, and French versions are automatically generated by the AI. So there may still be inaccuracies in translating, please always see Indonesian as our main language. (system supported by DigitalSiber.id)
