The time I was called into a Ponzi scheme

It was Christmas.

One of my trips to my parents’ town in Spain.

I was called to a meeting by two well known “businessmen” or “hombres de negocios” of the town.

They wanted to “propose us a business”.

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It was a few years ago, and by that time, I still loved “talking about business”.

Drinks, a bar, and talking about business.

I couldn’t help it.

I reacted like my cats.

No matter if they are on the third floor of my townhouse, the moment that I open a can of wet food, they arrive to their plates in ten seconds… drooling, moving their queues, expectant, hopeful, and curious about the food that was going to be presented to them…

Now, you won’t get me out of home for a face to face meeting unless it’s to “make business”, which is quite different.

But, other times, other experience…

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So, there we were, my brother and I in the bar.

Four known business people of a small town...

Something weird could be happening and that attired attention of other people in the bar who approached us and stayed around our table like flies in summertime.

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“You buy a “participation” for X thousand euros, you can buy as many as you want, and the only thing that you have to do is to go every day to a website, generate five codes, and paste those codes in another website… they are like Ads on the internet…”.

They showed us proudly the website in their phones… And they continue…

“and you know what… you can invite other people to do that, and if they buy “participations”, you get Y% of the money that they do, and if they sell to more people you get z% and so on… It’s a great business”.

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Look.

I don’t remember the details.

It was, as I said, a few years ago, but I did the calculation on my head, and I got that in 7-8 months, without the need to get any new “affiliates”, I could recover my “investment”.

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My brother and I looked at each other. Half incredulous, half-laughing, half concerned… and I said:

“But you know that this is a scam, don’t you?”

A little nervous, and in low voice, one of the business guys said:

“I don’t know if this is a scam or not, I’ve been two months and it’s working, and I’m buying more”.

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They wanted to expand their affiliates in Canada, where I was living, and in Panama, where my brother was living.

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We left the conversation there.

We finished our drinks.

We left.

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What happened after that meeting is that by June, the system stopped paying the “dividends”, and by September, the scheme made some news in national newspapers. Many people got trapped in Spain and Latin America…

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At Christmas next year, I met one of the business guys again… It’s a small town… almost inevitable.

And I asked without too much introduction: “How was your business? Did you lose money?”

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He knew what I was asking for… He answered that he was able to “recover his money”, and that he kept generating, copying and pasting the codes every day in another website that the company had facilitated (as the authorities shut down the main one) “just in case”.

Not idea what happened to the other guy or their families, as they converted into affiliates many people around them.

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Well. To recap.

I’m talking about supposedly respectful and experienced “business people”.

They got greed.

Not even easy, but almost free money.

And they got caught.

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What I see is that this scheme was perfectly designed.

These guys didn’t pay attention to our reasoning about “if they only thing that you need to do is to generate codes and paste them in another website, why don’t pay a few IT guys and automate the process”.

No.

Not a chance.

Why?

Because it’s the perfect trapping 9 to 5 scheme.

You show up every day, no matter what, no matter whether you add value, and you do what you’re told to do with the hope of a generous paycheck at the end of the month.

They did not miss a single day of copying and pasting to be certain that the paycheck was coming.

They even put carrots in front of you as bonuses… or “affiliates”.

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It was brilliant.

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This is why that guy, six months later, was still doing that ritual of copying and pasting codes every single day.

“Just in case”… to feel safe and keep hope.

I thought that they were businesspeople… but their mindset was the same than people trapped in absurd jobs…

I’ll do it just in case.

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Look. Money is not hard to generate.

There’re many ways.

But you need to change mindset. From the “just in case” to a “growth and abundance” mindset.

You need to become confident of your ability to take control of your life.

Many things of what I’ve learned through the years about mindset and generating money can be found in my newsletter: www.theantagonist.co.