To survive the ravaging economic effects, Nigerians have decided to invest their hard earned money in popular but informal Ponzi schemes that promise to yield at least 30% profit of any sum invested.
The High Yielding Investment Programs (HYIP) popularly known as Ponzi schemes which came to being in Nigeria this year, 2016 following the bad economy of the country is no coincidence. It has gotten many Nigerians to invest a whole lot of money in it, and making others leave their jobs to face it as a business.
The HYIP, which many have adjudged to be scam, promises unsustainably high return on investment by paying previous investors with the money invested by new investors. Most of these HYIPs work from anonymous offshore bases which make them hard to track down.
One of the most popular of them is the Mavrodi Mondial Moneybox (MMM), whose decision on Tuesday to freeze the accounts of its operators in the country has thrown millions of Nigerians into anguish at the wake of this festive period.
Against the several warnings levelled out by the Federal Government and other agencies not to venture into any of the Ponzi schemes, Nigerians seem unswerving towards their decisions, as they say the present administration of the country have failed them.
Here are 6 of the most popular HYIPs that trended:
1) MMM
MMM stands for Mavrodi Mondial Moneybox and took its name from its founder, Sergei Panteleevich Mavrodi of Russia. Three years after he founded MMM in 1989, the scheme was declared bankrupt and Mavrodi disappeared, until his arrest in 2003. The scheme was launched in Nigeria in November 2015.
2) Ultimate Cycler
Ultimate Cycler is among the hottest online networking business in Nigeria today just like MMM and the other Ponzi schemes. In Ultimate Cycler, members donate money to members meaning you are not paying money into the site system. It is a mutual community where members help members.
3) Zarfund
Zarfund is basically a voluntary donation platform. This means that members voluntarily donate money in exchange for more donations to come to them. This is all done voluntarily. There is no admin getting involved in handling any money. This is all done member to member.
4) iCharity
International Charity Club (iCharity Club) is an International network of donors. iCharity Club is a peer-to-peer donation platform for members to help other members in a systematic way. By using this platform, member can give and receive donations from each other. It is open to everybody, anywhere in the world, and anybody can join the program.
5) Crowd Rising
Crowd Rising is a person-to-person (peer-to-peer), direct funding and crowd sharing platform. It brings forth a new way of raising funds for various causes, whether it is for personal needs or a host of worthy causes, such as churches, schools, non-profit organizations, etc.
6) NNN
This is a community of ordinary people, selflessly helping each other, a kind of mutual aid. This is the first sprout of something new in modern soulless and ruthless world of greed and hard cash. The goal here is not the money. The goal is to acquire as much as you can. NNN surfaced few days after MMM users account were frozen. It is said to have a resemblance to MMM but much better with 35% profit as opposed to MMM’s 30%.
However, with the freezing of accounts of investors in the MMM scheme, it is unclear if other surviving schemes will enjoy the continued patronage of Nigerians.