With a case value of 20 billion, the largest fund in the currency circle collapsed
Editor's Note: This article comes fromEditor's Note: This article comes fromCaijing.com-Chain Finance
(ID: CaijingOnchain), author: Wu Yingjun, reproduced by Odaily with authorization.
On June 29th, Caijing.com received feedback from a number of Plustoken investors. Since the evening of June 27th, the Plustoken wallet, known as "the first fund in the currency circle", has been unable to withdraw cash. According to the current user withdrawal scale It is estimated that the collapse of this project with the largest capital market in the currency circle is a foregone conclusion.
A person who claimed to be close to the police said that the amount involved in Plustoken may be 20 billion yuan.
The picture shows Plustoken ETH address
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Acquaintances recommend community-based operations
Caijing.com pointed out in an investigative report on Plustoken in March this year that Plustoken mainly operates in a community-based mode. These communities are established by high-level members themselves, and each community has several 500-member WeChat group. So far, there is no exact value of the number of Plustoken investors, but in August 2018, the total number of Plustoken members has exceeded one million, and under the MLM promotion model, this number has been obtained half a year later. further growth. Earlier this year, Plustoken made it clear that the number of members would exceed 10 million in 2019.
At present, the problem of being unable to withdraw cash has caused widespread panic among Plustoken investors. After a survey by Caijing.com, it was found that there are many investors who have invested millions and cannot withdraw cash, and some even bought houses and cars because of this, and their wives and children were separated. player.
After analyzing the mechanism of Plustoken, it is not difficult to find that Plustoken expands membership through the MLM model. According to the definition of "pyramid selling" by the relevant national departments, pyramid selling refers to the illegal behavior of the organizer to develop personnel, obtain wealth through the development of personnel or require the developed personnel to pay a certain fee as a condition for obtaining membership qualifications. The essence of MLM is a "Ponzi scheme", that is, the money of the latecomers is used to distribute the proceeds of the previous ones.
An explanatory video on Plustoken’s level explanation fully reflects the nature of its pyramid scheme. Plustoken accounts can be divided into four levels: big account, big coffee, master, and founder. Each level can get additional rebates in addition to link benefits.
According to the statistics of Caijing.com, large households can get an additional 5% rebate, big coffees get 10%, big gods get 15%, and founders can get additional monthly dividends + year-end dividends from the platform. The total market value of the smart dog has reached 200,000 US dollars, which can take 100% of the direct push. To become a big account, you need to directly recommend 10 people to be effective and successfully activate the smart dog; a big coffee needs to directly recommend more than 10 people, and have three big accounts; a big god needs to directly recommend more than 10 people, three of whom are big coffee; There are at least three great gods under his name.
Analysis of the entry methods of many investors shows that they mainly started investing in Plustoken under the recommendation of their elders at home or friends around them. A student at school told Caijing.com that after returning home from vacation, she was asked by her elders to help her buy Plustoken. Afterwards, she was successfully brainwashed by her elders. It was not until she was unable to withdraw coins for a long time that she realized that something was wrong with the project.
One investor was scolded by his relatives for "doing not know how to make money" when he initially refused to invest, but after being brainwashed by his relatives, he finally started investing in Plustoken. Previously, a community promoter told Caijing.com that as long as you join the ranks of Plustoken members (that is, purchase Plustoken), the community will train members how to promote for free.
The promoter said that family and friends around him should be the first choice for initial promotion. Most of the investors in this community are full-time mothers and students.
The main reason for the players who have already entered Plustoken to actively develop offline is the high commission.
According to people familiar with the matter, the dividend for the first year is not less than 1.5 million US dollars. This statement was affirmed by another investor. A friend of this investor who entered the game early could get several BTCs in the later period just by paying daily dividends.
However, Plustoken investors did not wait for the good news of Plustoken’s successful listing, but waited for the bad news that they could not withdraw cash.
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Huobi OTC says Plustoken is the main deposit channel
According to Caijing.com’s data survey of more than 400 investors, more than 95% of investors purchased digital currency through the Huobi OTC channel and then transferred it to Plustoken’s address. Huobi OTC is Plustoken’s main deposit channel.
An investor said that if you don’t know how to operate, you just need to transfer the money to the “upline” who brought you in. After that, the “upline” will help you download and register the real Huobi, and then buy Digital currency, after buying the real currency, continue to help you download Plustoken’s plus app. During the registration process, you need to fill in the introducer’s information. After the registration is completed, Plustoken will give you an address, and then you can operate on Huobi. address transfer.
In addition, when registering Plustoken, investors do not need to perform KYC certification, but when withdrawing coins, Plustoken will require you to verify your identity.
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Suspension or a foregone conclusion, it is difficult for investors to defend their rights
It has been two days since the Plustoken wallet failed to withdraw cash on the 27th, but during these two days, Plustoken has not made any official announcement to explain this. An investor said in the Caijing.com group that no matter what Whether it is a system upgrade or a withdrawal delay, Plustoken will issue relevant announcements in time to explain, but this time the problem of being unable to withdraw cash has caused widespread panic, and Plustoken has not yet issued relevant announcements.
In fact, some people who still believe in Plustoken are actively explaining that the inability to withdraw cash this time is only due to a system upgrade, not because the project party has embezzled investors’ property and maliciously stopped operations. However, this statement has not been convinced by the majority of investors. They believe that this is the time for some vested interests to appease their emotions in exchange for transferring assets.
However, based on multiple sources, it is not easy for Plustoken investors to recover their funds.
When Caijing.com suggested to report the case locally, many investors expressed hesitation. The uplines that brought these investors into the game were all their acquaintances or close people. Because of their personal relationship, they hesitated to report the case.
In addition, the absence of a clear person in charge of operations is also one of the difficulties in recovery.
According to a promoter of the Dezhong community, there is almost no actual connection between the various communities, and in addition to the community, members of the community have also developed various "arbitrage groups" outside the community. The Dezhong community is one of the many communities of Plustoken.
The daily promotional articles and explanatory videos are produced by these community leaders, and Plustoken does not have a complete external channel, so in essence, Plustoken is a decentralized decentralized management model.
Corresponding to the decentralized management, the identity of its founder is a mystery. Checking the official website of Plustoken shows that there is no founder information, investor information, or any exchange information.
According to the community information, Plustoken was developed by the Google team and the Samsung team, but after careful investigation, some people in the industry found that Samsung and Google had sponsored advertisements on the ETH browser.
However, Caijing.com found that "low-key" high-level itineraries are often announced in community groups. On March 25, a senior executive surnamed Chen was giving a speech in Vietnam to explore overseas markets. After the Vietnam conference, the investment enthusiasm of the Plustoken community was unprecedentedly high. “Many people added funds after the Vietnam conference.” An investor told Caijing.com.
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Investors need to actively recover
Based on the above difficulties, many investors have little confidence in recovering losses, so they advocate "protecting the market". They believe that Plustoken has not made a clear announcement that it will no longer operate, so do not go to public channels to avoid pressure on operators.
However, according to Caijing.com, as long as investors actively pursue compensation, it is not impossible to recover losses.
On February 28, 2009, in order to more effectively crack down on illegal and criminal activities of pyramid schemes, the Criminal Law Amendment (VII) voted and passed at the Seventh Session of the Standing Committee of the Eleventh National People's Congress added the "crime of organizing and leading pyramid schemes". Regulations: In the name of business activities such as selling goods and providing services, organizations and leaders require participants to obtain membership qualifications by paying fees or purchasing goods and services. In judicial practice, criminal responsibility will be investigated for crimes such as illegal business operations, fraud, and fund-raising fraud based on different situations.
Digital currency has been identified as "property" and is protected by national laws.
In addition to the protection of relevant laws and regulations, there have been successful cases of recovery before.
In February 2019, the Changsha police issued an announcement stating that the Plustoken blockchain wallet was investigated and dealt with by the Changsha police for alleged pyramid schemes.
On April 23, 2019, the Zhuhui Branch of the Public Security Bureau of Hengyang City, Hunan Province reported on its official account the progress of the previously investigated blockchain virtual digital currency network fraud case - "Hero Chain".
It is understood that the "Hero Chain" is an online fraud case under the guise of virtual digital currency, involving more than 300 million yuan. At present, 21 suspects involved in the case have been taken into criminal detention measures, and 15 people have been brought to the case, 9 of whom have been arrested by the procuratorate.
The report mentioned that in December 2018, the Zhuhui Public Security Bureau received reports from multiple informants that they were defrauded by the blockchain virtual digital currency project of the "Hero Chain" (HEC), and the defrauded amount ranged from hundreds of thousands of yuan to It ranges from a few million yuan. On December 29, 2018, the Zhuhui Public Security Bureau officially opened a case for investigation.
