Jimu Sharp commented| Zhang Ting and his wife "painstakingly" circumvented laws and regulations, expecting the legal network to be restored and not leaked

Jimu News commentator Qu Jing

Zhang Ting and Lin Ruiyang were investigated and punished by the relevant departments for suspected pyramid schemes, and the relevant details were constantly exposed. According to reports, in order to investigate this case, the Yuhua District Market Supervision and Administration Bureau of Shijiazhuang City, Hebei Province, dispatched nearly 400 people, spending a lot of manpower and material resources, because Zhang Ting, Lin Ruiyang and his wife found professionals to carefully design the TST business model to circumvent the relevant laws and regulations prohibiting pyramid schemes. (According to Sohu on January 11)

The "micro-business star brand" that used to have unlimited scenery is now suspected of pyramid schemes, which is surprising and very curious. Some people have long questioned Zhang Ting's and his wife's practice of pyramid schemes, and some people still do not know why they suddenly became pyramid schemes because they said that they were micro-businessmen. How to identify and define network pyramid schemes has become a hot topic for a while.

Some legal people have long summarized the popular science, the core characteristics of MLM have three: one is to charge the entrance fee, requiring the developed personnel to pay fees or pay fees in disguise by subscribing to commodities; the second is to charge the head fee, that is, to "pull the head" to give money; the third is the multi-level team remuneration, which is the so-called "development of the downline", and the sales performance of the following line is calculated and paid on the basis of the online remuneration.

In the course of many years of business, Zhang Ting and his wife have directly or indirectly involved the characteristics of pyramid schemes, but in the later stage, various means were used, such as requiring franchisees to share the circle of friends instead of purchasing products to join the association, and beautifying "pulling people's heads" into "playing idle connections" to circumvent the definition of relevant laws and regulations.

Even, some media reported that in order to evade legal responsibility, Zhang Ting and his wife did not directly hold shares in the Dawell company suspected of pyramid schemes, but set up three holding companies in areas other than Chinese mainland, and then used these three companies to 100% control the three companies in the mainland, and then used these three companies in the mainland to participate in the shares and control Dawell. But to change the way of thinking, if you are not weak-minded, you know early on that there is a problem with your own behavior, and you are suspected of violating the law, so why bother with such a big thing and build such a long ladder?

With the prosperity of social media and the development of social e-commerce, a variety of so-called "new sales models" emerge in an endless stream, with a variety of tricks, including many "high-end players" like Zhang Ting and his wife. However, do not look at the river surface as a mirror, to see the depth of the water, to define whether a marketing model constitutes a pyramid scheme, can not only look at how it says, how to behave, but to see whether it has the social harm caused by pyramid schemes.

The biggest social harm of pyramid schemes mainly includes disrupting social and economic order; undermining the construction of social morality and social creditworthiness system; causing criminal offenses and endangering social stability; and causing serious harm to individual participants and families. The TST sales model of Zhang Ting and his wife mainly has an impact on two types of people, one is that their members, that is, agents, are involved in the hierarchical sales model, are forced to develop offline, sell goods, otherwise they may lose their money; second, consumers who have purchased their products may have purchased low-cost, worrying-quality products at a very high price, and have been cut leeks by the star effect.

That is to say, any form of sales, as long as the product is promoted in the form of pulling people's heads, level development, and hierarchical remuneration, resulting in the consequences of "obtaining illegal benefits, disrupting economic order, and affecting social stability", may be suspected of pyramid schemes. No matter how to play with the means and engage in packaging, it is futile. In fact, Zhang Ting and his wife were investigated this time, and it is precisely because many agents and consumers who are deeply involved in it and are miserable continue to report that the regulatory authorities have thundered out and resolutely investigated and dealt with all difficulties.

On December 20, the State Administration for Market Regulation issued the Outline for the Implementation of the Construction of Rule of Law Market Supervision (2021-2025), which requires greater efforts to crack down on pyramid schemes, use technical means to identify new types of pyramid schemes carried out in the name of e-commerce, micro-business, consumer rebates, etc. under the new situation, and investigate and deal with direct marketing violations and violations in accordance with the law. It can be seen that there are many MLM acts, in fact, in the name of "direct sales" and "new formats", hidden in the "micro-business" and "e-commerce".

We expect that the case of Mr. and Mrs. Zhang Ting will come to light as soon as possible, and we look forward to the restoration of the legal net without leakage, not only hoping that the illegal profiteers will be punished as they deserve, but also hoping that the cases with great influence can promote the further improvement of relevant laws and regulations in the implementation, be vigilant and severely punish the new type of pyramid schemes carried out in the name of "micro-business", avoid being "professional" to exploit loopholes, further clarify the boundaries of the concepts of pyramid schemes and direct marketing for the public, and also give the majority of consumers a wake-up call, do not fall into the pyramid scheme trap because of greed for temporary rebates.

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