Zhimin Qian, the self-proclaimed “Goddess of Wealth” was convicted this week in the UK on money laundering charges related to a massive Ponzi scheme that she operated in China between 2014 and 2017 that cost her 128,000 victims $6.7 billion.  Qian claimed that she was a fintech innovator,  but the truth is that between 2014 and 2017 she operated her company, Tianjin Lantian Gerui Electronic Technology in China as a Ponzi scheme soliciting investors with promises of daily dividends and guaranteed profits of as much as 300%.  Investors flooded her with money despite there being no clear explanation of how her company generated protifts or even what its actual business model was.   Like all Ponzi schemes she kept the scam alive by paying early investors with funds derived from later investors.  She fled China in 2017 and went to the UK where she attempted to launder the stolen funds though cryptocurrencies, real estate and other assets.

TIPS

Of course, an immediate red flag is the too good to be true guaranteed profits and when this was coupled with no clear explanation of what the investment consisted of  you had a recipe for disaster.  No one should ever invest in anything that they don’t fully understand and Qian’s company offered no clear explanation as to how they generated profits.  Before investing with a company you should always do research on it.  Anyone doing research on Qian’s company would have found that it was not registered with any financial regulatory agency.  In addition, anyone doing research into Zhimin Qian herself would have learned that she had no degrees, knowledge or licenses related to investments.

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