It is said that "often walk by the river, where there are shoes that are not wet." "Our "stock god" Buffett "planted a heel" in his own investment field, enough to make himself lose 340 million US dollars, about 2.2 billion yuan, what is the matter?
This is a california court judgment that describes Jeff, the owner of DC Solar in California. Carpoff (hereinafter referred to as Carpoff) created a Ponzi scheme that successfully defrauded many investors of about $1 billion in money, including Buffett, of course.
Everyone is curious, what kind of a "high person" is this Kapov, who can actually play Buffett between the stocks, you know, in the investment field, "stock god" Buffett can be regarded as experienced, in the investment field to strategize, where has suffered this kind of loss?
Leather bag company
This so-called solar company is actually a veritable "leather bag company". His boss, who was not long ago an auto mechanic who had to worry about a mortgage, now relies on the company to get them to wear gold and silver, including the purchase of more than 150 exotic sports cars, 32 properties and $19 million worth of private jet services.
Not long ago, the repairman named Kapov felt that repairing cars was nothing to worry about, and he thought of a way to make money quickly: first use the new energy gimmick to start a solar company. The company introduced that it is the production of a mobile solar generator set, which can provide emergency power supply for mobile phone towers, sports event lighting, etc., and can also be freely installed on trailers, referred to as MSG's new energy products, and then attract customer investment.
You think they're going to make money selling these generator sets? That would be a big mistake, their main target is the money in the pockets of investors.
First, they financed the generator set: turned it into a financial product, with data and codes in circulation. Among them, turning this physical product into a financial product is his ingenuity.
They said to the agent: You buy this unit, you have to go to the customer, this is a lot of trouble. Now we respond to the call of the state, you only need to buy the money of the unit, you can become our company's VIP agent, our company to help everyone to find customers, you buy after nothing to care, every month just wait for the rent on the line. And, the more units you buy, the more rent you get each month.
At the beginning, everyone did not believe that there was such a good thing, and they all held the attitude of trying it out, and everyone thought in their hearts: Anyway, the company and products are in front of us, can they still run? Coupled with seeing them under the banner of national support for new energy, it is even more convinced.
In the beginning, the customer pays the money, they also let the customer see the product, and every month on time to give the customer a high rent. Customers who tasted the sweetness passed on ten to ten hundred, one after another, and then they became customers who only paid for it, as for the generator set, there was nothing to look at, you just take care of it, as long as there is such a high income every month.
Everyone looks at it, there is a head, so there are more and more people who pay money, and the amount of everyone's subscription is getting bigger and bigger, who doesn't want to sit and wait for the pie to fall from the sky?
This seemingly high-return investment project quickly attracted Buffett's attention, and in the end, he didn't think much about it, and he threw up $340 million, about 2.2 billion yuan.
After the money arrived, the couple began to splurge heavily, and those engine groups and new energy sources were a slogan and a blank check. As for the rent distributed to customers every month, it is all about taking the money paid by the new agent to buy equipment.
At this point, the invisible web that the couple has fabricated is still expanding rapidly and blatantly. In the end, they sold more than 17,000 sets of this so-called generator set, with a total amount of more than 1 billion US dollars, equivalent to about 60 billion yuan.
Simple routines, bizarre money-making psychology
In fact, no matter from which angle to analyze, this is a very simple investment trap, and the method is not clever. At first, it is understandable that ordinary people were kept in the dark, but people like the battle-hardened Buffett still can't see through this set of tricks played by this auto mechanic?
Not really. After reviewing the relevant information, it can be understood from Buffett's investment memorandum that in fact, Buffett has done in-depth research on Ponzi schemes a long time ago, and he is hungry like this: Ponzi schemes are definitely not played by just a few promoters. He must be the result of the participation of all parties in the power of each other's bets. Most of the participants believed that they could get out of the way before the bubble burst, which meant that as long as there was a receiver behind him, even if he was a scam, the participants could make money in the process.
This shows that many Ponzi scam victims, including Buffett, are not actually scammed in the strict sense. They just don't run fast enough, or they don't participate early enough.
But what I would say is that when you find out that this is a Ponzi scheme, don't get mixed in. Although it is true that someone can make money in this process, the odds are too low.
Because from the dealer's point of view, all the participants are like fish in the net, and the most fish is when he collects the net. And you are in the water, you can't see clearly.
This pyramid model of making money, the income is often only the person who casts the net. Of course, then again, Buffett can certainly have the idea of giving it a shot, but we ordinary people definitely can't. Because first of all, Buffett has a strong analysis team, his judgment of the time to close the net is more accurate than ours, and the most important thing is that people lose hundreds of millions of dollars is just pocket money.
On the mainland, Ponzi schemes are a very common investment scam, and some illegal fund-raising groups with high returns and low risks use this model to amass money.
By extension trivia:
1. Ponzi scheme is also known in China as "tearing down the east wall to make up for the west wall" and "empty glove white wolf". In short, it is to use the money of new investors to pay interest and short-term returns to old investors in order to create the illusion of making money and thus defraud more money. This deception was "invented" by a speculative businessman named Charles Ponte.
2. In recent years, the concept of new energy has been extremely popular in the United States, and the US government has continuously implemented tax reductions and exemptions for the new energy industry.
3. Buffett has repeatedly said that he wants to enter the field of new energy, and at the same time buys energy companies in a big way. Buffett has a related new energy holding company: Berkshire. Hathaway Energy (BHE).
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Have you ever encountered this type of scam yourself or around you? Welcome to discuss in the comments section