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NT$50 Million Taiwanese Bitcoin Investment Scam Swindles 1000 Investors

Last Updated March 4, 2021 4:47 PM
Samburaj Das
Last Updated March 4, 2021 4:47 PM

A local report has revealed that a Taiwanese couple has allegedly defrauded over 1,000 people in Taiwan with the promise of a large-yield bitcoin investment that quickly proved to be a scam.

A Ponzi scheme disguised as a high-yield investment program promoted by a couple simply known with the surname ‘Shi’ have defrauded over a thousand investors in Taiwan. The high-yield investment scheme promised a 250% return on Bitcoin invested, within a month and was marketed through locally popular messaging app LINE. Higher returns beyond 250% were promised over a longer period of time.

Local publication ETtoday  revealed that the couple told investors that it had received over NT$50 Million (approx. USD $1.5 million) within six days of the ‘investment-scheme’ going public.

Unlike most Ponzi schemes that see the scam eventually, investors did not receive any returns at all, according to the publication.

One victim of the scam who has since called for the news to be made public revealed that she had invested 16 Bitcoin (approx. $6670) and was expecting up to 10000 BTC in return for her investment.

Speaking to the local publication, Vivian claimed: “This matter should be made public…we have not seen our money back, we were mislead, we were cheated.”

Vivian and other victims of the alleged scam have started a public group to collectively demand that their investments be returned.

When news of the investment program that was a scheme all along broke, the scammers appeared on Facebook to publicly apologize with the promise that investors will see a return of 16% of the principal amount as investment returns. The victims, for their part, simply want their original investment returned in its entirety.

The news of the scam comes not long after a Vietnamese regulator warned citizens against using Bitcoin or other digital currencies, with an increasing number of Ponzi schemes and other scams in East Asian countries operating with crypto- and electronic currencies.

 Featured image from Shutterstock.