How I Almost Got Into a Ponzi Scheme Trap In Singapore

Sunshine Empire is one of the most notorious ponzi schemes in Singapore in 2006 that had swindled 20,000 Singaporeans (including many retirees) out of nearly S$190Mil. It has no legitimate profit generating business mechanism and instead relied on money from new investors to pay old ones. Not everyone loses money in a ponzi scheme. Those who entered as the pioneer batch actually can make lots of money. In spite of such news being published, the general public will eventually forget about such scams and new ponzi schemes will always re-surface and succeed in hoodwinking unsuspecting people.

My recent encounter with a Property Investment Scheme in China

This scheme is being marketed by my neighbour and also an ex-colleague just before COVID. Apparently, the China government is keen to help out all chinese people overseas. This investment scheme is opened to only chinese and supported by the China government as asserted by my neighbour and also ex-colleague. The investment involves buying a package into the development of one of China's 3rd tier cities. One can get back more than 100% within a few short years and make a huge profit. Once you signed up and pay for a package, you will enter and join into an investment "family" something like MLM upline/downline system. You also then need to bring in more victims investors into your "family" to increase the rate of return of your invested packages. The China development sponsor will also bring you on live tours around the china city for one to see the infrastructure development to prove that it is not a scam. Lodgings, drinks and good food are all provided.

Good people duped into scam

Make no mistake, the people who joined are probably some of the smartest people in Singapore. Some are businessmen who run their own businesses and some are professional & well educated folks like my ex-colleague who was once an audit manager in one of the big 4 public accounting firm. They flew to China to assess for themselves and took out money to buy the packages and then went on to recruit downlines to enter into the investment scheme. As with all fly by night businesses, the China operator only marketed how much return one can get and avoid all questions on the details like how the business operate and keep trying to get you to go down to the China city to see for yourself. I think that these are all tell-tale signs that a ponzi scheme is in operations. The scammers cleverly exploited a rampant fear of missing out on a golden opportunity as well as selective entry criteria to attract investors. 

Parting thoughts

I was lucky to have rejected my neighbour and also ex-colleague in their invitations to go to China to take a further look at their new investment scheme. The last I know, they were embroiled in a lawsuit against each other (their investment "family members") for losing money over the investment scheme. 

(P.S: On a side note, I am quite curious on what happened to the mastermind of Sunshine Empire scam James Phang. Saw that he has served his sentence in Singapore and is out of prison but faced charges in Malaysia. Also not sure whether the sunshine empire investors got back part of their money.)