A sports talk show radio host claims he has access to an almost unlimited amount of discounted major sports tickets, and he needed a lot of money to buy them in order to share the profits. Do you believe him?
A "hedge fund of the year" with 18 billion assets did, and it appears they have lost $4.3 million they put into two companies controlled by this talk show radio host.
You may think who'd believe this sort of stuff, or how can they be this stupid, but really, think about it...
Hedge funds, esp. fund of the year are NOT stupid.
However, there's no doubt that this is a ponzi scheme... When the Feds arrested the radio talk show host and uncovered a trove of communications between him and his co-conspirators, as well as evidence of his millions in gambling debt. Robbing Peter to pay Paul is the very definition of Ponzi scheme. This radio talk show host, who co-hosts with a VERY famous former NFL celebrity, had been accused with running this scheme.
Yet you can see this sort of argument proliferate in the "make money fast" market, and promoters use the language of "this can't possibly be a scam because it associated with _____", and this guy has it in spades. A famous hedge fund gave him millions of dollars. He co-hosts a show with a celebrity. He can't possibly be a scammer, right?
WRONG!
Lesson to take away: when someone tries to sell you something on reputation only, think VERY VERY HARD on it. The risk is probably much higher than you think.
a blog about Skepticism, MLM, Scams, and Critical Thinking
