Cheats also in existence from time immemorial a la Amway

Trivedi boasted that the Amway is in existence in 90 countries (which is not true) cannot escape law and cannot cheat people all over world. But that is the crux of the issue. The answer is well known.

Members are enrolled by a friend or a relative and how they could file a criminal case against their own friend or relative even if they were cheated. That is how this fraudulent company is escaping the law even after blatantly cheating them. They do not want enmity with their friends and relatives but they develop cold shoulder and never trust them again. That is how the social relations are getting damaged in all societies all over world.

Funny point is that Amway offers a good business opportunity but one need not enrol members, need not compulsorily purchase products. But still it is a good business opportunity. The members need to renew their membership paying a hefty fee of Rs. 995 every year which the Amway India coolly pockets it without extending any services or products.

Now, Trivedi predictably comes out again stating that there is no compulsion for anything in Amway. But the inducement for commission is so strong that everyone is out to enrol new members and for more commission. That is why it is an illegal business opportunity.

MLM quickest way to lose your money and friends

Shyam
I have previously suggested that the gruesome little gang of intellectually-castrated character-assassins who regularly appear on the Internet to disrupt, and/or drag into the gutter, all calm, rational attempts to explain how the 'Amway Corp.' is the counterfeit 'commercial' front for an ongoing, major organized crime group, are probably counterfeits themselves.
At no stage do any of these de facto 'Amway' agents provocateurs offer any extended, logical argument to support their simplistic, illogical claims about the authenticity of the so-called 'Amway Business Opportunity.' The best the intensely-annoying Messrs. Scott 'Tex' Johnson and David 'IBOFB' Steadson have recently come up with on your Blog to defend their own absurd, inflexible positions, is to draw your readers' attention to the fact that, in January 2004, a George W. Bush administration-appointed official at the US Federal Trade Commission, James A. Kohm, issued a highly-incriminating letter that temporarily placed the 'Amway' mob above all previous, and long-established, common-sense interpretations of US federal laws concerning pyramid scams, or money circulation schemes, camouflaged as 'Business Opportunities.'
However, after greasing the palms of numerous high-level Republican politicians with 'contributions' (i.e. bribes) totalling many millions of dollars, in recent years, the FTC has been infested with high-level, legally-qualified law enforcement agents who have deliberately turned a blind eye to the criminal activities of the 'Amway' mob and various copy-cat 'Multilevel Marketing' racketeers. Indeed, George W. Bush appointed a de facto agent of the 'Amway' mob, Timothy Muris, as Chairman of the FTC.
Mr. Muris came to the FTC directly from his highly-paid job with the Antitrust Division of Howrey, Simon, Arnold and White LLP. One of this law firm's main clients was none other than the 'Amway' mob. In 2004, Muris returned to private practise with the Washington law firm of O'Melveny & Myers, where he then was handsomely-paid to represent 'Primerica Financial Services,' another 'Multilevel Marketing' racket.
Interesting, in the USA, anyone, including corrupt: politicians, judges, law enforcement agents, lawyers, etc., can be indicted under the federal, Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations Act 1970, for accepting the proceeds of racketeering activity to obstruct justice.
In the case of the billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob and their paid supporters, all that is required in the USA (where 'Multilevel Marketing' has acquired the reputation of being not only one of the quickest ways to lose your shirt, but also all your friends) is the political will to bring such a long-overdue prosecution.
David Brear

Amway & others' money came from pockets of victims

Shyam
It is important to keep reminding your free-thinking readers (including Indian: Judges, law enforcement agents and legislators) that the one essential characteristic which identifies the activities of Charles Ponzi, Bernie Madoff, the bosses of the 'Amway' mob, et al, as fraud (a form of theft), is that, despite what these manipulative charlatans steadfastly pretended to be reality, the fiercely-complex schemes which they maliciously instigated, all had no significant, and sustainable, source of external revenue. The substantial capital assets which these otherwise-mediocre narcissists all acquired, and controlled, came entirely (or in the overwhelming majority) from the pockets of the victims of their seductive lies; for the real source of the 'rewards' (which they all offered to pay to their existing wide-eyed believers), could only be an endless chain of further wide-eyed believers.
David Brear

Real estate scam is not new; Ponzi started earlier

Shyam
The absurd, but nonetheless pernicious, real estate scam that now infects your country, is not at all new.
After running a multi-million dollar 'international postal coupon investment" scam in Boston Mass, Charles Ponzi was charged with 86 counts of mail fraud. On November 1st. 1920, he pleaded guilty to a specimen count before US federal Judge Clarence Hale, who declared before sentencing:
'Here was a man with all the duties of seeking large money. He concocted a scheme which, on his counsel's admission, did defraud men and women. It will not do to have the world understand that such a scheme as that, can be carried out ... without receiving substantial punishment.'
Ponzi got 5 years in federal prison, but he was released after less than 4 years only to be indicted on 22 Mass. State charges of larceny. Ponzi sued, claiming that he had made a plea bargain in 1920 and as a federal prisoner he could not be tried by a State. The case, Ponzi v. Fessenden, went to the US Supreme Court, which ruled that plea bargains on federal charges have no standing regarding State charges. The Court also ruled that Ponzi was not facing double jeopardy because Mass. was charging him with larceny, while the federal charge had been mail fraud (even though both charges related to the same swindle).
In October 1922, Ponzi was tried on the first 10 larceny counts. Ponzi, who was officially insolvent, acted as his own attorney and, using the same sophistic arguments, and incomprehensible mathematical presentations, which he'd used to deceive his many victims, the jury found him innocent on all charges. Ponzi was then tried on the five other counts, but, this time, the jury was so baffled that it failed to reach a decision. Ponzi was finally found guilty at a 3rd. trial. He was given 7 to 9 years in prison as 'a common and notorious thief.'
Ponzi (an Italian) never acquired American citizenship even though he'd lived in the United States since 1903. Federal officials failed to have him deported as an undesirable alien in 1922. Amazingly, he was released on bail after appealing his Mass. State conviction. Ponzi immediately absconded to the Springfield section of Jacksonville, Florida where, in September 1925, he launched the 'Charpon (Charles Ponzi) Land Syndicate' offering 'investors' tiny parcels of land (which were actually flooded) and offering '200% profits in 60 days.' Ponzi was indicted by a grand jury in February 1926 and charged with violating Florida trust and securities laws. He was found guilty on the securities charges, and sentenced to a year in State prison. Ponzi again appealed and was released after posting $1500. He ran to Tampa Florida, shaved his head, grew a moustache and tried to skip the USA on a merchant ship to Italy. The ship, however, docked in New Orleans. Ponzi was arrested and sent back to Mass. where he served 7 additional years in prison.
US government investigators were unable to place an accurate figure on how much money Ponzi had actually stolen. They were also unable to trace exactly where most of it went.
David Brear

Mobilising deposits sans RBI permission is illegal

Cheating in the name of real estate was started by Pearls Agro which has still been cheating the gullible for many years. If we go by its fixed deposits it has mobilised from the people all over India, all land in the India sub-contienent is not enough for alloting the promised land to the deposit holders. The Pearls is promising land for all its deposit holders within 90 days of payment and if we look at the history of the company, not a single depositor was ever allotted land. It only promises to refund money, if the company was not able to allot land. Allotment of land was only an excuse to mobilise deposits and the Pearls has clout even in the Prime Minister's Office.

Agri Gold is following suit. It is also collecting deposits all over Andhra Pradesh and it is not sure it had spread its tentacles to the neighbouring States. It is apt to point out here that the head of the Agri Gold is the former employee of Golden Forest which had cheated several millions all over India in the late 1990. Though it has abundant stock of land to sell and repay the depositors it had never done so.

Viswas Real Estate is now enacting the same drama and just started to cheating people. What is more, it is calling for the 'successful' MLM leaders all over the State to join hands to cheat the gullible.

What people have to be reminded is no non-banking finance company is authorised to mobilise public deposits without the permission of the Reserve Bank of India. The Reserve Bank of India way back in 1986 issued a directive to all the State Governments in the country to appoint a Circle Inspector level officer to check the illegal mobilisation of deposits. But the State Governments has neither inclination nor manpower to appoint police officers. That is why the cheating is continued all over the country. We must remember here that Newspaper baron Ramoji Rao is facing criminal charges for mobilising deposits without RBI permission. Mind that he never cheated anyone but repaid every single rupee to all the investors. Still, he is attending the criminal court.

Do not lose your hard-earned money my fellow humans all over world. Let us not allow these crooks to loot our hard-earned money.

If Amway is looting people in the name of product selling, some others are cheating in the name of selling services.

Clueless Tex prefers to remain in darkness

Shyam
Frightening isn't it, how, even after the most-deconstructed of free explanations, severe and inflexible narcissistic oafs like Mr. Scott 'Tex' Johnson, prefer to remain in the stale darkness of their ego-protecting 'Amway' bunker, wasting their time and money whilst lobbing puerile abuse at all free-thinking outsiders, in total denial of the ego-destroying external reality that organizations like 'TVI Express' are all just deceptive copy-cats of the deceptive 'Amway' original.
Unfortunately, it is not sufficient for us just to know from experience that 'TVI Express' is a giant lie - an invitation to commit financial suicide disguised as a 'Wonderful Business Oportunity' -even though the majority of people can deduce immediately that what the organization offers ('total financial freedom') is far too good to be true. However, in order to establish beyond all reasonable doubt in a court of law whether 'TVI Express' is the corporate front for an ongoing major organized crime group running a camouflaged money circulation scheme and allied advanced fee frauds, the same simple test can be applied to its claimed 'commercial' activities, as can be applied to those of 'Amway' (or to any other so-called 'MLM Business,' for that matter).
Since the creation of the so-called 'TVI Express Business Opportunity' exactly what percentage (by value) of the capital assets acquired by the organizations leadership has come from a source, or sources, other than the pockets of its own participants? For without a significant, and sustainable, external source of revenue, no system of economic exchange can be viable for the majority of its contributing participants. They have merely been peddled infinite shares in what can only be their own finite money.
David Brear

Now a real estate firm plans to cheat people

Now a real estate firmed entered the market to cheat the gullible people. The modus operandi of all these companies is same -- to induce the people with easy and quick money only to make them with their hard-earned money.

Viswas Real Estate Private Limited is offering 50 square yards of house-site for just Rs. 30,000 and if they could rope in two more people they would be given a commission of Rs. 3,000. If those two persons could bring in two more each, they would be given an additional commission of Rs 1000. The chain should continue to earn more and more commission.

The question is where do you find so much land to sell to these people. The company claims that it has plenty of land all over the State and they would sell it to the investors. In reality, it is impossible to find that much of land anywhere in the world. This is outright cheating and police are turning Nelson's eye to the problem. They open their eyes only after a sizable number of people are cheated and that would be late.

It is high time, people realised the dangerous intentions of this real estate firm and discourage people from joining such schemes.

The business model of TVI Express sounds familiar?

Clueless Tex wants evidence against TVI Express. Just look at the scheme. Why doesn't he do some search and find out the scheme of the company. It gives you the same 'dream' concept like Amway. Offers easy and quick money and asks its members to enroll members to become wealthy and fulfil the dreams. What more it also offers 'financial freedom' to its members. Not only that the company is also claiming it's doubling each month. You can imagine how much it has been looting every month from the gullible all over world. It also offers a good business opportunity to earn $10,000 per week?

It should sound familiar to Clueless Tex and Masked IBOFB and Baffled Trivedi.

Still the Clueless Tex feigns ignorance and needs 'clues' .

Grow Tex, Grow.

Truth is mortal enemy of multilevel marketing, Masked man

Shyam
Yet again, Mr. 'IBOFB' Steadson is fulfilling his shameful role as 'Amway's' Internet Lord Haw Haw.
Contrary to what Steadson pretends, at no time has Dr. Peter VanderNat ever substantially modified his mathematical and legal analysis (published in 2002) of how to detect a pyramid sales swindle dressed up as a 'Direct Selling Scheme.' Indeed it would be rather difficult for him to do so, since, in order for any system of economic exchange to be viable, it must have a significant and sustainable source of external revenue.
In effect, what the inflexible Mr. Steadson is now arrogantly squawking, is that the billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob should have the absolute right to place themselves above the law and arbitrarily define their criminal activities as 'Business' and their victims as 'Retail Customers.'
However, Steadson follows in a long tradition of twisted little lackeys serving absurd, but nonetheless fabulously wealthy, charlatans. It was Adolf Hitler's particularly vile Minister of Propaganda, Joseph Goebbels (1897-1945) who said:
‘If you tell a big enough lie and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State. '
Goebbels was boasting from experience, and what he said is frighteningly relevant today; for the billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob have maintained their (now global) 'Multitlevel Marketing' lie for 50 years, by shielding the world from the political and economic consequences of it. Similarly, it has been vitally important for the totalitarian State (in microcosm) that is 'Amway,' to use all its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the 'Multilevel Marketing' lie, and thus by extension is the greatest enemy of 'Amway.'
David Brear

TVI Express is a pyramid scheme

Maria Rocheteau from South Africa wanted to know whether she could join TVI Express and expressed doubt that it is a pyramid scheme. Maria has rightly identified the scam and yes, it is pyramid scheme. It has been elaborately written about it several times that it is a money circulation scheme and several hundreds of thousands of people all over world lost money in it. Only the company made money and a few at the top.

If you think you con some more people in joining the scheme you sure could join and make money. But you might risk losing friends and relations for ever. Think twice before taking the decision.

All these pyramid companies take cue from Amway India which is mother of all scams. In the name of selling products and services, all these companies are indulging in money circulation schemes.

Clueless Tex fails again to comprehend plain English

Shyam
As ever, Mr Scott 'Tex' Johnson completely fails to comprehend plain English. The out-of-context quote which the 'Amway' Lord Haw Haw, Mr. 'IBOFB' Steadson, recently posted on your Blog doesn't come from Dr. Vandernat's 2002 paper. Indeed, neither Steadson nor I claimed that it did. Tellingly, Steadson offers no explanation as to its exact origin.
No matter what he steadfastly pretends, to all intents and purposes, Lord Haw Haw Steadson is merely the omnipresent Internet spokesperson for 'Amway' mob. Self-evidently, no purely-objective observer could be aware of the content of Dr. Vandernat's irrefutable analysis of a mathematically-impossible pyramid sales swindle, and continue to make countless separate claims that 'Amway' is a legitimate 'Direct Sales' company. No matter what label the 'Amway' mob hangs over its victims, for 50+ years, virtually no non-salaried commission agent of the organization has resold any of his/her own purchases to persons who are not non-salaried commission agents of 'Amway'. The impossibe theory of endless chains of recruitment, is to economics, what the impossible theory of perpetual motion, is to physiscs. Without sustainable and profitable retail sales to persons who are not participants in a pyramid sales scheme, reward money can only come from new recruits.
The pernicious global phenomenon of camouflaged closed-market swindles, or money circulation schemes, originated in the USA. The 'American Way Association', later to be known as 'Amway,' was the first such swindle (dressed up as a 'Direct Sales' scheme) to infect America during the late 1960s. Its instigators behaved like Christian preachers and carried a Bible in one hand and the Stars and Stripes in the other. These sanctimonious racketeers used a proportion of their ill-gotten gains to obstruct justice and infiltrate the US government, paving the way for a whole host of copy-cat swindlers. When the authenticity of 'Amway' was first seriously challenged by the FTC, and the American media, in the mid-1970s, an FTC Administrative Judge completely failed to comprehend the potential scale, and criminogenic nature, of the pernicious phenomenon that had been uncovered. Instead of closing 'Amway' down and ordering a major criminal enquiry, the counterfeit company was slapped on the wrists and allowed to continue under apparently tougher federal regulations. The 'Amway' racketeers, pretending that they now had the full approval of the US government, then simply moved their sinister activities abroad to countries without regulations. However, the US regulations were never enforced. Many of the camouflaged money circulation schemes that are currently running riot in India, have their origins in the USA. Had just one FTC Administrative Judge correctly evaluated the potential scale, and criminogenic nature, of this (now global) problem back in the 1970s, then there is a strong probability that India would not be infected with it today.
David Brear

Fellow humans! Do not fall prey to the scams

There are two enquiries --One from Shaik Imran and another from Sunil of Karnataka - to know what to do as they were cheated in an MLM scam.

Shaik Imran lost his money after he was induced to become a member in a company called Aryarup Tourism & Resort Club Private Ltd. He was asked to enrol two more members and earn a lot of money.

Dear Imran, the company is into the illegal money circulation scheme and this scheme is called binary. If you are from Andhra Pradesh, you can approach any police station in your area and lodge a criminal complaint against that company.

Corporate Frauds Watch prevailed upon the Director General of Police to issue a memo to all the police stations in the State to file criminal cases against money circulation schemes. On that memo you can see my name (M V Syam Sundar, secretary, Corporate Frauds Watch) and you can insist upon the station house officer to register a case against that company.

It is sad that a sizable number of people are losing their hard-earned money believing blindly whatever they are told. They should check and verify the veracity of those claims before investing the money in such schemes.

Save your money in the Bank or spend to enjoy your life. Why do you allow these crooks enrich themselves unjustly.

In another case, One Sunil joined in some schem on Internet and lost Rs. 10,000. Now he could not even trace his perpetrator. That is how these crooks are operating all over India.

My dear fellow humans all over world! Beware of crooks who are lurking in every corner to deceive you and vanish with your hard-earned money.

Do not fall prey to these schemes. Even if you fall, go to the police and lodge a criminal complaint against them. If you do not, your neighbour might become victim next time. It may be your friend or relative, do not hesitate to file criminal case against that company.

Clueless, faceless Tex pretends intellectual authority

Shyam
I see that, as ever, your resident (insolvent) 'Business' expert, Mr. Scott 'Tex ' Johnson, is arrogantly making assumptions and pretending absolute intellectual authority in matters for which he is eminently unqualified.
Self-evidently, Mr. Johnson, is hardly in a position to offer opinions about business, since (by his own admission) he has spent 17+ years of his adult life enthusiastically playing a puerile game of 'commercial' make-believe, whilst all the time he preferred to remain blissfully ignorant of the ego-destroying truth that he was just another poor schmuck slaving his guts out for the billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob and their millionaire under bosses.
Mr. Johnson cannot refute the essential identifying characteristics of a closed-market pyramid swindle as being: grossly overpriced products leading to insufficient external revenue. Nor can he refute the published calculations of Dr. Peter Vandernat concerning the percentage of external retail sales which (generally) has to be maintained in order to legitimize any pyramid sales scheme. So what does Johnson do when faced with the unacceptable truth? He systematically excludes external reality by childishly attempting to dismiss Dr. Vandernat as an economist dissociated from commercial reality and myself as a fan of economists.
Far from being a fan of economists, I would say that Dr. Vandernat is almost unique in that he is virtually the only genuinely-independent academic who has published a clear mathematical, and legal, explanation of what constitutes a closed-market pyramid swindle dressed up as a 'Direct Selling ' scheme. Far from being dissociated from commercial reality, Dr. Vandernat has offered a practical test which can be applied by commercial regulators and prosecutors to prove that fraud has been perpetrated.
As for all the less-than-intellectually-rigorous American: journalists, academics, law enforcement agents, judges, legislators, etc., who have failed to recognize how this type of pernicious swindle functions, and allowed it to infect the rest of the world, they should be damn-well ashamed of themselves.
Tellingly, Lord Haw Haw Steadson's intellectually-castrated comment (on behalf of the billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob) regarding Dr. Vandernat and William Keep's paper, merely takes one phrase out of context and completely ignores the rest of what they actually said.
David Brear

Amway adherents programmed to stop questioning their leaders

Shyam
With his usual clarity of thought, Joecool has brought us back to my original point.
Self-evidently (as millions of individuals know from experiece) it is (effectively) impossible for 'Amway' adherents to peddle 'Amway' s' overpriced wampum to non-adherents (with fully-functioning critical faculties). The only reason why current 'Amway' adherents buy it themselves is because they have been programmed to stop questioning their leaders, and to duplicate exactly a 'Proven Business Building Plan' of recruitment and self consumption in the deluded belief that this will lead to total financial freedom in 2-5 years. However, such a pyramid sales scheme (without significant external revenue) is a criminal deception.
Thus, in order to establish once and for all that 'Amway' (no matter what its apologists steadfastly pretend) is operating in India as a criminal deception, the killer question for Indian law enforcement agents to put to the corporate officers of 'Amway India Enterprises' and those of the so-called 'Indian Direct Selling Association,' is:
Since its creation, exactly what percentage (by value) of the products sold (at a wholesale price) by 'Amway India Enterprises' to its non-salaried commission agents has then been resold (at full retail price) to persons who are not under contract to the company as non-salaried commission agents?
Obviously, this question lies at the heart of Dr. Vandernat's simple test.
David Brear

Clueless Tex flaunts his ignorance

Shyam
I observe that Mr. Scott 'Tex' Johnson is now demonstrating his ignorance by challenging the authenticity of Dr. Peter Vandernat's 70% retail sales test for determining the legitimacy of any pyramid sales scheme. Perhaps we should refer Mr. Johnson to the only published academic paper which explains exactly how to evaluate a pyramid scam disguised as a 'direct selling scheme.' This intellectually-rigorous analysis is entitled: 'Marketing Fraud: An Approach to Differentiating Multilevel Marketing from Pyramid Schemes'; it was published in the 21st Journal of Public Policy and Marketing (Spring 2002) pages 139-151. In this paper( which Dr. Vandernat co-authored with William Keep), the irrefutable legal and mathematical reasons for the application of the 70% retail test to direct sales schemes are clearly set out. However, back in the early 1970s, FTC lawyers already knew that exorbitant controlled prices producing a lack of significant external revenue were the essential criteria which identified a closed-market pyramid sales swindle. About 20 years later, Dr. Vandernat (as senior economist at the FTC) calculated exactly what percentage of external revenue was generally required to legitimize a direct sales scheme.
Arrogantly, Mr. Johnson assumes that I have no knowledge of a much-publicized letter of January 14th 2004, sent by James A. Kohm (acting director of marketing practices at the FTC) to Neil H. Offen (president of the so-called 'US Direct Selling Association'). According to many 'Multilevel Marketing' racketeers and their apologists, this letter totally rejects all previous, and long-standing, FTC interpretations of federal law and federal court rulings which made it a fundamental requirement of direct sales schemes to have significant retail sales to persons who are not participants in these schemes. This dubious document is entitled 'Staff Advisory Opinion- Pyramid Scheme Analysis.'
Mr. Kohm's less-than-intellectually-rigorous analysis has been widely-circulated by deluded 'MLM' participants (like Mr. Johnson) to deceive potential recruits into believing that internal purchases made by 'MLM' participants are authentic retail sales.
Obviously, this half-baked rubbish has been spoon fed to Mr. Johnson by his 'Amway' handlers and, typically, he's swallowed it without a second's thought.
David Brear

Amway remains the biggest scandal in American history

Shyam
We should perhaps thank Mr. Scott 'Tex' Johnson (your Blog's resident deluded, unqualified and insolvent, psychological, and financial, expert) for kindly giving us the benefit of his (imagined) great wisdom on all matters moral, legal and intellectual. However, apart from his puerile and abusive (online) temper tantrums, Mr. Johnson's 17+ years of ongoing failure to confront external reality, amply disqualifies him as a truly-objective observer of closed-market pyramid sales swindles dressed up as 'Direct Selling.'
Mr. Johnson steadfastly pretends to know all about something which he calls the '70% Rule,' and, typically of the arrogant fellow (without the slightest attempt to qualify his simplistic opinions), he keeps stamping his little foot and screaming that I 'don't understand'.
In the adult world of quantifiable reality, the 70% test which I have recently referred to, comes from Dr. Peter Vandernat - the US Federal Trade Commission's senior economist during the 1990s. Dr. Vandernat (who is an internationally-recognized expert on pyramid fraud) came up with a blindingly simple method to evaluate, and identify, closed-market pyramid sales swindles.

In general, unless at least 70% of all the purchases of participants in any pyramid sales scheme are being resold to non-participants at a full retail price, then that scheme has insufficient external revenue to pay its participants legitimate commissions, and that scheme is, therefore, inherently a deception.
For it is a self-evident truth to state that all forms of counterfeit commercial schemes based on the mathematically-impossible proposition of easy income from endless chain recruiting are fundamentally, and universally, unlawful. In a closed-market pyramid sales swindle (without sufficient profitable retail sales to non-participants), the money to reward its participants can only come from one source: fresh recruits. Insufficient authentic and profitable retail selling is, therefore, the essential indentifying characteristic of any closed-market pyramid sales swindle dressed up as 'Direct Selling.'
Before 1980, pyramid sales swindles were not that widespread in the USA. During the 1960s, this updated version of an age-old of crime was controlled by various successful prosecutions brought by individual States (particularly, California). In 1975, the US Federal Trade Commission moved-in to kill-off the first really pernicious pyramid sales swindle, Amway', which (although once only virulent in the 'Bible Belt') was beginning to infect the nation. FTC attorney's had discovered that 'Amway's' banal, but outrageously over-priced, products were (effectively) unsaleable on the open market. From this evidence, they had then worked out that 'Amway' offerred a classic, mathematically-impossible, endless chain pay plan, and that the attractive income claims offered by 'Amway' were a fairy-tale, because the overwhelming majority of 'Amway' participants could never hope to make a profit. Therefore, the FTC decided that the time had come to charge 'Amway' with being inherently deceptive and a menace to the American public.
Considering what was at stake, why a rigorous criminal investigation was not launched under the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations Act 1970, remains a mystery. Indeed, since the bosses of the 'Amway' mob were employing known economic, and psychological, warfare tactics on millions of their fellow Americans, why they weren't charged with treason (as defined by the US Constitution) also remains a mystery.
Almost thirty five years ago, the FTC quickly proved its case that 'Amway' fixed prices and offered false income claims. However, in 1979, after 4 years of sophistic legal arguments (many of which are still being employed to obstruct justice by the 'Amway' Ministry of Truth), an FTC Administrative Judge decided to bring a halt to these costly and exhausting proceedings. He handed out a derisory fine and ruled that if, henceforth, 'Amway' agreed to respect new tougher federal regulations requiring that commissions would be paid primarily on retail sales to non-participants, rather than from sales to new participants, then the company could remain in business. Since that time, due to the Reagan administration's policy of de-regulation and the corrupting of senior Republican politicians (who later installed 'Amway's' de facto agent, Timothy Muris, to head the FTC), the 'Amway' mob has been allowed to ignore the FTC's requirement, and (in the face of domestic media exposure) has also been allowed move their organization's main racketeering activities outside of the USA. Under the Bush administration, Dr. Vandernat was actually moved from his FTC post.
The whole 'Amway' affair remains potentially one of the biggest scandals in American history. Not surprisingly, very few people in the American establishment want to open this particularly repulsive can of worms.
David Brear

Amway apologists completely missed the point

Shyam
As ever, your little flock of resident, intellectually-castrated 'Amway' apologists are completely missing the point.
Indian criminal law concerning money circulation schemes, was drafted in such an intellectually-rigorous way as to attempt to deconstruct this type of pernicious and complex fraud. However, the Indian legislation, although well-conceived, could still be made even more effective. Thus, after examining the evidence, and using some essential indentifying characteristics of a money circualtion scheme established in Indian criminal law, Indian judges have already concluded that 'Amway India Enterprises's' own glowing (but ultimately incomprehensible) description of its activities, and what this demonstrably-counterfeit corporate structure has actually been doing, are completely different. However, 'Amway India Enterprises' hasn't yet been prosecuted for criminal fraud. The organization only came under the scrutiny of Indian Judges, because its attorneys had foolishly filed a malicious writ in a centrally-directed attempt to obstruct investigation of ongoing major racketeering activities.
Once you know how the trick is pulled, the loophole in US commercial legislation concerning money circulation schemes (which the bosses of the 'Amway' mob have always exploited and lobbied to perpetuate), is rather obvious.
If a US citizen sponsors a pyramid 'investment' scheme in which he/she asks members of the public to pay him/her $200 per month, and to recruit their friends and relatives to do the same, on the pretext that 'anyone who exactly duplicates this proven plan can retire from work within a few years,' then that citizen would be in breach of US commercial legislation concerning mathematically-impossible money circulation schemes. However, if the same US citizen sets up the identical, counterfeit commercial scheme, but arbitrarily, and falsely, defines his/her victims as 'Distributors', 'Business Owners', 'Customers' , etc., rather than 'Investors', and gives them some (effectively) worthless wampum in exchange for their monthly $200 payments, then, apparently that citizen would be in the clear. Around 25 years ago, economists at the Federal Trade Commission finally worked out that in any pyramid 'sales' scheme, if (over an extended period of operation) less than 70% of the scheme's revenue could be proved to be coming from a source, or sources, other than the pockets of its own participants, then that scheme was a swindle. Mysteriously, no independent mechanism has ever been set up by the US admistration to verify that pyramid 'sales' schemes have sufficient external revenue. Similarly no agency of the federal government exists to educate about and, thus, protect citizens from this type of fraud. That said, in every democracy ruled by law (including the USA), a fundamental principle exists:
Lying to people in order to take their money is fraud, which is a form of theft.
In other words, for more than half a century, the toothless US commercial legislation concerning money circulation schemes, could have been easily bypassed by US prosecutors simply by charging the billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob with criminal fraud.
David Brear

Money circulation scheme banning enactment is applicable to Amway

Trivedi stated that there is enrolment in the Amway business model and Raja Naren has enrolled a group of IBOs.

Now let us look first at the latest judgement of the Hon'ble Supreme Court of India {(2008) SCC 708}. Under the provisions of the Prize Chits & Money Circulation Schemes (Banning ) Act, 1978, it is a money circulation scheme if it provides for (i) making of quick or easy money and (ii) if it is dependent upon an event or contignecy relative or applicable to the enrolment of members into the scheme.

A member would be entitled to earn substantial income only after his enrolment and after enrolment of additional members by him into the scheme. The second ingredient such payment of money is dependent on the "event or contingency relative or applicable to the enrolment of emmbers into the scheme" is thus very much present.

Both the ingredients are present in the Amway business model and that is why it is illegal money circulation scheme.

The Hon'ble Supreme Court also pointed out the 'mathematical impossibility'. The Apex Court stated that the promoters of the scheme very well knew that it is certain that the scheme was impracticable and unworkable making tall promises which the makers of the promises knew fully well that it could not work successfully. It could work for some time in that "Paul can be robbed to pay Peter" but ultimately when there is a large mass of Peters, they will be left in the lurch without any remedy. If it is so, it could be said to be a case for application of Section 420 (cheating) read with section 34 (joint liability) of Indian Penal Code.

Cluleless Tex, Masked IBOFB and baffled Trivedi: Great trio defending Amway

Trivedi is a funny fellow. No need to sell products and no need to enrol members. Still it is a good business opportunity. Who said about any thing about compulsion. Everyone wants to make lots of money and it is sufficient inducement to earn lots of money by enrolling members. That is the crux of the issue. If you can earn five lakh rupees a month can you resist the temptation as it is not compulsion. You keep on pestering people whoever you come across be they are your relatives or friends. That is what was pointed out by the Andhra Pradesh High Court. The whole idea behind the enrolment and exorbitant prices is the money circulation scheme. Product sales is only a camouflage activity. Trivedi conveniently forgets that the mentioning of the case of Raja Naren who is making lots of money without selling any products but on the purchase of his downline members. That was pointed out by the Andhra Pradesh High Court.

The hooded fellow has come out with another myth. The products he mentioned were available not over the counter but only through internet. That is another racket. All the products I mentiioned were avilable over the counter anywhere in the country.

The same old argument these crooks hide behind is the myth of 'quality'. The quality of Amway products is questionable.

Clueless Tex points out that the Rs. 16 of the Glister toothpaste is only manufacture price. Laugh Out Loud. Nobody pays tax to the Sales Tax department on manufacture price. It is the sales tax.

Hooded IBOFB puts forward the most absurd offering

Shyam
I think it must be perfectly obvious (to anyone with fully-functioning critical faculties) that the billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob seek to maintain an unofficial presence on any Website that challenges the authenticity of their counterfeit 'commercial' activities.
Curious, isn't it, how the provocative 'Amway' Lord Haw Haw, Mr. Steadson, finds it so important to keep appearing on your Blog and to continue to try to character- assassinate us. He has now surpassed himself. For obvious reasons, despite all circumstantial evidence to the contrary, Steadson is still steadfastly pretending that he acts independently of the 'Amway' mob. His latest little intellectually-castrated offering on your Blog is perhaps the most absurd, but nonetheless arrogant, defence of racketeering I've ever encountered. It makes me wonder which dunce with a diploma at the 'Amway' Ministry of Truth fashioned this particular linguistically- inaccurate bullet for Steadson to shoot into his own foot?
I'm not imagining this, am I Shyam? Steadson really does ask us:
'If 80-90 % of the people purchasing Amway products were customers why would you continue to find fault with it?'
When translated into plain English, the masked character-assassin is accepting that he cannot refute all the evidence which proves that, for more than half a century, virtually none of the capital assets which the billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob have acquired absolute control of, have come from a source, or sources, other than the pockets of the tens of millions of transient contributing participants in their mathematically-impossible so-called 'Business Opportunity,' whom they have arbitrarily, and falsely, defined as 'Distributors' and 'Independent Business Owners.' Thus, Steadson's latest crackpot position is to suggest that I'm being unreasonable for refusing to accept that 50 + years of racketeering should now be completely ignored, because the 'Amway' mob are graciously offering to stop calling the victims of their swindle 'Distributors' and 'Independent Business Owners,' and, instead, rechristen them 'Customers.'
Like I said before, when you know the scale of human misery that has been inflicted behind all this reality-inverting 'Amway' jargon, it's enough to make any decent person want to vomit.
David Brear

Amway never sells its products at lower price and never do away with enrolment

Trivedi conveniently forgets nowhere in the Amway India's website it was mentioned how much products one has to sell. But it was clearly mentioned that IF the IBOs enrol so many he would earn so much amount. The crux of the Amway India's business model is enrollment. Without enrollment there is hardly any business in Amway.

Anyway, you claim that you could earn as much amount by selling products. That is also the 'IF'. IF you could sell the products. All the Amway products are unsaleable and that is why they are not sold in the market.

In such case why Trivedi is not selling the products to earn a sizable money instead of meagre sum of Rs. 2000 per month. Because he could not sell the products to people. Nobody buys these exorbitantly priced products.

It is not necessary to prove anything on paper, Trivedi. Just prove it by selling Amway products and earn Rs. one lakh or six lakhs without going for enrolment.

Clueless Tex time and again asks if the products are sold half the market price, would it be still money circulation scheme. Just ask Amway India to implement the plan to sell the products at half the price and see for himself whether it would still be money circulation scheme.

Anyway Clueless Tex should say which half of the market price. The market price of Amway products is already ten folds as is shown in the case of Glister toothpaste. The actual price is Rs. 16 and sold at Rs. 120. If it is sold for Rs. 60, it is still four times the original cost.

For the sake of our enlightened readers the prices of some of the products are reproduced here.

Amway's G&H body lotion 250 ml. Rs. 310

Nivea Lotion 250 ml. Rs 110

Amway's Satinique (shampoo and conditioner) Rs. 250 ml. Rs. 314

Sunsilk (shampoo and conditioner) 250 ml. Rs. 85

Amway's Dishdrops (1 litre=4 litres) Rs. 420

Godrej Concentrate (1 litre=4 litre) Rs. 64

Amway's SeaSpray concentrate (1 litre=4 litre) Rs. 290

Colin Glass & household cleaner, 4 litres Rs. 252

Amway Zoom concentrate 1 litre, Rs. 299

Robin Cuffs N Collars 1 litre, 128

Even if they are sold half the price, they are above the market price of similar products.

Masked IBOFB continues his squawking

Shyam
Still no one officially representing the 'Amway' mob has ever dared to put in an appearance on your Blog. Meanwhile, the masked 'Amway' Lord Haw Haw, Mr. 'IBOFB' Steadson, steadfastly pretends that he is acting independently of 'Amway'. He arrogantly continues to assume that I am addressing him directly, when it remains perfectly obvious that I am only addressing you Shyam, and your free-thinking readers.
Steadson's latest intellectually-castrated little offering on your Blog turns out to be an absurd gaff from the 'Amway' Ministry of Truth. Typically, though, Steadson continues to follow blindly his training in 'Scientology'-style provocation tactics; addressing me in a familiar way whilst seeking to invert what I previously stated.
In reality, once the right questions are asked by law enforcement agents, it will be for the courts to examine the evidence and decide who has been repeating the same scripted lies for more than half a century in order to take money from tens of millions of people around the world. The billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob, and their millionaire under-bosses, whom Steadson serves like a little cur, have spent decades repressing all dissent whilst steadfastly pretending that they are 'compassionate capitalists' who 'sponsor a viable 'Business Opportunity' based on the 'Christian principle of helping others to succeed.' When you know the scale of the misery they have willfully inflicted on their fellow human beings behind this sanctimonious act, it's enough to make any decent person want to vomit.
Completely contrary to what I have previously stated (in unambiguous English), Steadson now arrogantly pretends that I am suggesting that if, henceforth, the billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob, and their millionaire under-bosses, suddenly stop arbitrarily, and falsely, defining the victims of their closed-market swindle, and related advanced fee frauds, as 'Independent Business Owners,' and start calling them 'preferred customers,' then I will be ready to absolve these little fakes from half a century of racketeering.
I look forward to the day when, exactly like Bernie Madoff, the entire grinning leadership of the 'Amway' mob are hounded by the press, stripped of all their stolen wealth, locked up and the key thrown away. We should thank Lord Haw Haw Steadson for bringing this day a little closer each time he squawks.
David Brear

Masked IBOFB should consult contracts he signed with Amway

Shyam
I notice that young Trivedi is still inviting you to come and play with him in his controlled world of 'Amway' make-believe. The poor little lad insists that you ask him serious questions about the mind-numbing mathematical detail of 'Amway's' version of Bernie Madoff's absurd 'split strike conversion' fairy-tale.
Lord Haw Haw Steadson, has posed an ambiguous question:
What makes someone an agent of 'Amway' ?
We could of course answer: vulnerability, stupidity, ignorance, desperation, group pressure, greed, etc., but I presume your resident, masked character-assassin means: what defines an agent of 'Amway'?
Perhaps Steadson should simply consult one of the many contracts which he has signed with the 'Amway' mob.
For 50+ years, 'Amway' contracts have arbitrarily and falsely defined their dependent signatories as 'Distributors' and 'Independent Business Owners' (except in the UK where this particualr, reality-inverting jargon has recently been prohibited). In legalistic terms, any participant in a pyramid sales scheme, is a non-salaried commission agent of the scheme's sponsors. If (over a period of time) the pyramid sales scheme is proved to have insufficient external transactions (i.e. authentic retail sales to persons who are not the non-salaried commission agents of its sponsors), then it is an illegal money circulation scheme camouflaged by (effectively) unsaleable products, and/or services; for, no matter how the scheme's finite revenue is divided, it can never pay the overwhelming majority of its contributing participants an overall profit.
In a desperate attempt to escape from being held to account for running a global racket (comprising an illegal money circulation scheme and related advanced fee frauds), the billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob (via their de facto agent, Lord Haw Haw Steadson) would now have the world believe that all the tens of millions of individuals who have been churned through their so-called 'Business Opportunity' down the years, were really 'authentic retail customers of Amway' rather than the dependent operators of non-salaried commission agencies maliciously designed never to produce an overall profit.
David Brear

Trivedi limply insists on merits of Amway business strategy

Shyam
There is an ancient Chinese proverb which says:
'When a wise man points at the moon, the fool looks at his finger.'
It's no wonder the sanctimonious bosses of criminogenic groups like 'Amway' and 'Scientology' thrive, when there are inflexible fools like Trivedi in the world for them to prey on. The poor little lad still limply insists that he is discussing the merits of an authentic business strategy, when it has been clearly explained to him that, without sufficient external revenue (from a majority of authentic retail sales to persons who are not agents of 'Amway'), the entirety of the so-called 'Amway Compensation Plan' is merely complex pseudo-economic hocus-pocus - maliciously designed shut down the critical and evaluative faculties all less-than-intellectually-rigorous observers (including: journalists, law-enforcement agents, judges and legislators).
Sadly, the rather obvious comparison which I made between Bernie Madoff's miraculous (but demonstrably fake) 'Split Strike' strategy and 'Amway's' own miraculous (but demonstrably fake) 'Multilevel Marketing' strategy, has passed completely over Trivedi's unquestioning head.
Whilst virtually every observer was bedazzled by multi-billion dollar figures and reams of hypnotic jargon in Madoff's fake 'hedge fund's' fake 'offering memorandums', his deluded victims were completely incapable of confronting the more simple truth that the only money Madoff controlled was their own. Although the 'Amway' fraud has a different external presentation, and its many deluded core-victims are persons without vast capital assets tied up in it, essentially there is no difference between it and the absurd closed-market swindle perpetrated for more than a decade by Madoff.
No matter what their external presentation, in all closed-market swindles the one vital question that should be asked of their perpetrators to determine exactly what is occurring, remains the same :
Since its creation, exactly what percentage (by value) of the capital assets which you control (and have controlled) has actually come from a source, or sources, other than the pockets of participants in your scheme?
Until this concept (fundamental to the understanding of the 'Amway' swindle of which he is a victim) sinks into Trivedi's castrated mind, all further discussion with the poor little lad is a pointless excercise.
David Brear

Trivedi only regurgitating thought-stopping Amway mantra

Shyam
We are now witnessing the rather unedifying spectacle of young Trivedi regurgitating his thought-stopping 'Amway' mantra on your Blog. Unfortunately, the systematic reaction of all deeply-deluded cult adherents (when challenged over the authenticity of their beliefs) is to retreat behind a wall of their group's complex, pseudo-scientific hocus-pocus, and then steadfastly pretend that anyone who can't understand it, must be stupid.
Interestingly, Bernie Madoff used essentially the same tactic when challenged by free-thinking journalists.
At the beginning of 2001, Madoff had acquired absolute control over 6 - 7 billions dollars. Most financial journalists believed Madoff to be managing these capital assets on behalf of wealthy individuals. Indeed, this part of his operation was (then) officially listed as 'being amongst the world's three largest hedge funds.'
According to a May 2001 report in MAR Hedge (a respected trade publication). 'What's more, these private accounts, have produced compound average annual returns of 15% for more than a decade. Remarkably, some of the larger, billion-dollar Madoff-run funds have never had a down year.' When, in 2001, Madoff was asked by a free-thinking Journalist exactly how he accomplished these 'remarkable' returns, he smiled knowingly and said:
'It's a proprietary strategy. I can't go into it in great detail.'
Jeffrey Tucker, partner and co-founder of Fairfield Greenwich (a New York City-based firm that marketed Madoff's funds) was equally evasive:
'It's a private fund. And so our inclination has been not to discuss its returns.'
One of Fairfield Greenwich's most sought-after funds was 'Fairfield Sentry Ltd.' (managed by Bernie Madoff). 'Fairfield Sentry' declared assets of '$3.3 billion.' One of its glossy 'offering memorandums' described Madoff's strategy this way:
'Typically, a position will consist of the ownership of 30-35 S&P 100 stocks, most correlated to that index, the sale of out-of-the-money calls on the index and the purchase of out-of-the-money puts on the index. The sale of the calls is designed to increase the rate of return, while allowing upward movement of the stock portfolio to the strike price of the calls. The puts, funded in large part by the sale of the calls, limit the portfolio's downside.'To options traders, that is what is known as the 'split-strike conversion' strategy. In simple terms, it means Madoff claimed to be investing primarily in the largest stocks on the S&P 100 index (like General Electric , Intel and Coca-Cola). At the same time, he claimed to be buying and selling options against those stocks. For example, Madoff would claim to have purchased shares of GE and to have sold a call option on a comparable number of shares (i.e. an option to buy the shares at a fixed price at a future date). At the same time, Madoff would claim to have bought a put option on the stock, which gave him the right to sell shares at a fixed price at a future date. Madoff's 'remarkable' strategy, in effect, claimed to build a protective boundary around a stock, limiting its upside while at the same time protecting against a sharp decline in the share price. This so-called 'market-neutral strategy' was supposed to produce positive returns no matter which way the market went. In 2001, using this 'split-strike conversion strategy', 'Fairfield Sentry Ltd' claimed only to have had four down months since its creation in 1989. In 1990, 'Fairfield Sentry' claimed to be up 27%. In the following decade, the fund was supposed to have returned no less than 11% in any year, and sometimes as high as 18%.
In the adult world of quantifiable reality, Madoff wasn't actually buying any shares at all. He was merely selling his victims 'infinite shares' in what could only be their own finite cash. The glossy 'offering memorandums' of 'Fairfield Sentry Ltd. ', which fooled almost everyone (including some of the world's most-respected financial journalists), were complex pseudo-economic hocus-pocus.
David Brear

No racketeering law in the UK

Shyam
I observe that 'Amway's' masked, Internet Lord Haw Haw, Mr. 'IBOFB' Steadson,' has returned to your Blog.
Mr. Steadson and his fellow travellers know full-well that the billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob, after maliciously obstructing all form of investigation in the UK for more than 30 years, succeeded in keeping the only enquiry (to date) into their UK activities limited to civil regulators (who are prohibited by the UK Companies Act from making criminal enquiries).
As part of an overall pattern of racketeering activity, two cult advice associations (registered as charities) in the UK, 'Catalyst' and the 'Cult Information Centre', have been co-opted by the 'Amway' mob. Since the early 1990s, the unqualified directors of these two organizations, Graham Baldwin and Ian Howarth, have been paid to act as 'consultants on cultism' by 'Amway UK Ltd.' This has comprised them persuading anyone complaining to their organizations, that 'Amway' is not a cult and that they should take any dispute with 'Amway' back to the organization for 'Internal Arbitration' rather than to law enforcement agents, jounalists, legislators, etc.
In 2007, after truck loads of damning company records were seized which proved 'Amway UK Ltd.' to be the perpetually-insolvent corporate-front for a mathematically-impossible money circulation scheme disguised as a 'business opportunity', which itself was merely the entrance to an extremely-profitable advanced fee fraud, the reluctant decision was taken by senior officials in the Company Investigation Branch of the UK Dept. of Trade and Industry (now the Ministry for Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform), under the advice of the Treasury Solicitor, to attempt to have 'Amway UK Ltd.' closed down merely for being in breach of civil laws concerning trading schemes and lotteries. Off the record, at least one senior official at CIB described 'Amway' as a grotesque fraud and compared the organization to the 'Ku Klux Klan' in the 1920s. At the time, the best the UK government could do to protect UK citizens, was to file a civil bankruptcy petition on the premise that 'Amway UK Ltd.' should be made liable for decades of unlawful registration payments, thus, forcing the company into automatic closure, because it could not pay its multi-million pound debts. It was assumed that, after closure, a full criminal investigation of what lurked behind 'Amway' would ensue.
However, 'Amway' escaped closure in the UK by employing Eversheds LLP, including Peter Kiernen (former Deputy Director of the UK Serious Fraud Office). These slick attorneys first tried to persuade CIB officials to drop the bankruptcy petition against 'Amway' by pretending affinity. To this end, all manner of attractive promises were made to the UK government, including the full-declaration of 'Amway's' derisory average annual earnings (or rather lack of earnings) amongst its agents, the dropping of registration fees, the dropping of the term 'Independent Business Owner', the prohibition of the sale of publications, recordings and tickets to meetings, the lowering of prices, the expulsion of 'Diamond Distributors' Jerry Scriven and Patrick Gregory (who had been running the 'Tool scam' in the UK on behalf of Dexter Yager in the USA), the temporary suspension of 'Amway's' recruitment activities in the UK, etc.
For obvious reasons, CIB officials refused to drop their bankruptcy petition, and the civil case went to trial where again the same attractive promises were made to the Judge. Although UK government lawyers described insolvent 'Amway' adherents as deluded, at no stage, was any evidence shown to the Judge or, subsequently, to three Appeal Court Judges, that 'Amway UK Ltd.' is, in fact, just one, expendable corporate structure out of countless others which comprise a vast organized crime group. In isolation, 'Amway UK Ltd.', appeared to these Judges to be more absurd than dangerous, as it has never declared an annual trading profit - apparently losing many millions of pounds during the last 30+ years. Consequently, in total ignorance of the wider picture, the UK High Court, and Appeal court, took the blinkered view that 'Amway UK Ltd.' should be allowed to continue, because the undertakings its attorneys had made to the court (if maintained) would bring its activities within UK civil law. Amazingly, after more than 30 years flouting the law, no punishment was handed out and no independent mechanism was created to verify that 'Amway UK's' undertakings would be maintained. I presume that the UK Judges assumed that once 'Amway's laughable average earnings were declared, the organization would simply vanish for lack of recruits; and this (despite what Lord Haw Haw Steadson pretends) appears to have happened.
To add insult to injury, a company officer of 'Amway UK Ltd.' and one from the so-called 'UK Direct Selling Association' were allowed to get away with comitting perjury. They gave false declarations to the UK High Court in which they steadfastly pretended their respective organizations to have been completely unaware that any problems had existed with 'Amway UK Ltd.' Yet, more than 10 years previously, when I tried to draw the attention of the officers of both these corporate structures to very same problems which they subsequently pretended to be completely unaware of, the attorneys of 'Amway UK Ltd. ' maliciously attempted to discredit me in the eyes of UK government officials and threatened to take legal steps to silence my complaints. These acts, designed to obstruct justice so that US citizens can continue to commit fraud, were in breach of US federal anti-racketeering legislation.
UK law enforcement agents (at the Serious Fraud Office) have been informed of all these acts, but (mysteriously) no criminal investigation has been pursued. However, there is no anti-racketeering law in the UK.
David Brear

It is easy/quick money in the Amway business model: AP High Court

Trivedi innocently says that there is no compulsion to recruit people or purchase products in the Amway business model. And he also says that the High Court judgement did not say that Amway business model is illegal.

Let us look at the 28th and 29th para of the AP High Court judgement which goes like this...

28. As is evident......... Supposing the sponsor member at the top does not introduce any member and if he merely sells the products given to him, he gets an income of Rs. 12,420. If he sponsors only six people and they in turn do not sponsor any member, then he will get an additional income of Rs. 23, 760. If those six members who he sponsored again sponsor four members each, he will get a further income of Rs. 1,14,480 and if the 24 members sponsor three members each, and he will get a further sum of Rs. 6,83,300. Thus the money which the member at the top of the line gets depends upon the members whom he enrolls or the members enrolled by him enroll.

29. In Para 21 of the counter affidavit of respondent No 6, the example of Raja Naren is cited and the petitioner (Amway India) did not dispute the averment relating to the income he earned in a year. The said instance is illustrative of a person earning fabulous income without doing anything after he accomplishes his task of enrolling the required number of persons as members into the scheme.

30. From the aforementioned discussion, it is proved that the scheme provides for easy/quick money to its distributors.

Is it not sufficient inducement for any mortal to go for enrollment when such huge amount is offered as commission?

Clueless Tex pretends to be acting independently

Shyam
It is interesting to note some of the latest comments posted on your Blog by Mr. Scott 'Tex' Johnson.
Although Johnson steadfastly pretends to be acting independently of 'Amway,' his comments reflect the same pattern of racketeering activity which the 'Amway' mob has used to obstruct justice.
Back in the mid-1990s, when I first openly contacted both 'Amway UK Ltd' and the so-called 'UK Direct Selling Association' to inform their senior officers that 'Amway' was the front for a form of Ponzi scheme and a secondary advanced fee fraud, and that I would be making complaint to the UK government's Dept. of Trade and Industry, the reaction of the 'Amway' mob was to get their UK legal representatives (Baileys, Shaw Gillette LLP) to send me a threatening letter.
At this time, I was informed by an unnamed 'Amway' attorney that copies of a letter written by my brother (who was a core-adherent of 'Amway') had been sent to various individuals in the UK, including politicians and DTI officials. 'Amway's' unamed attorney falsely claimed that this letter proved all my accusations against 'Amway' to be 'foolish notions' invented as part of a 'vendetta' against my brother. I was warned that if I continued make my accusations to UK politicians and government regulators, legal steps would be taken to silence me.
Officers of 'Amway UK Ltd.' and those of the so-called 'UK DSA' managed to obstruct a UK DTI investigation of 'Amway' until 2007. When this investigation was finally launched, it was discovered that all my accusations were, in fact, true. Furthermore, 'AmwayUK Ltd.' had been a permanently insolvent corporate structure since its creation in 1973. However, hundreds of millions of dollars had been secretly syphoned out of the UK by churning at least 1 million persons through 'Amway's' sustainable closed-market swindle and peddling them exorbitantly-priced 'Tools' (i.e. books, recordings, tickets to meetings) using (apparently independent) corporate structures to dodge investigation and isolate the bosses of the 'Amway' mob from liability.
'Amway UK Ltd.' escaped closure under civil bankruptcy regulations (by promising the UK High Court that it would reform its activities) and (as a result) no criminal investigation of 'Amway' has ever been conducted in the UK.
David Brear

Madoff also made large donations to charity like Amway

Shyam
Naive young Trivedi seems to think that giving money to good causes is a mark of honesty. The following is just part of a list of donations made by Bernie Madoff and his wife to numerous charities in the 10 years prior to his arrest.

Name of Donor ---- Minimum Confirmed Amount------ Recipient Name ----Year
Bernard L. Madoff------ $2,500-----American Liver Foundation-2003-2003
Ruth and Bernard L. Madoff $10,000 Brandeis University

National Women`s Committee 1999-2000
Bernard L. and Ruth
Madoff Foundation $10,000 Center for Jewish History 2006-2006
Ruth and Bernard L. Madoff $10,000 City Harvest 2005-2006
Bernard L. Madoff $10,000 Educational Broadcasting
Corporation 2006-2007
Mr. and Mrs. Bernard L. Madoff$10,000 Fountain House 2005-2006
Ruth and Bernard L. Madoff $25,000 Girls Inc. 2005-2006
Ruth and Bernard Madoff $2,500 Global Camps Africa 2007-2007
Mr. and Mrs. Bernard L.Madoff $5,000 God`s Love We Deliver 2004-2004
Ruth and Bernard Madoff $10,000 Hillel Foundation for
Jewish Campus Life 2006-2007
Ruth and Bernard Madoff $10,000 Hofstra University 2005-2006
Ruth and Bernard Madoff $1,000 Jewish Federation of
Palm Beach County 2006-2007
Ruth & Bernard L. Madoff $10,000 Learning Leaders 2004-2005
Bernard L. Madoff
Investment Securities LLC $5,000 Lower East Side Name
Tenement Museum 2006-2006
The Madoff Family Foundation $1,000,000 Lymphoma Research
Foundation 2007-2007
Bernard L. Madoff $40,000 Metropolitan Museumof Art 2007-2008
Bernard L. Madoff $2,500 Museum of Name
ModernArt (MOMA) 2005-2006
The Bernard L. and Ruth
Madoff Foundation $25,000 New York Public Library 2002-2002
Ruth and Bernard L. Madoff $10,000 New York University,
Harris Obesity Prevention
Effort (HOPE) 2007-2007
Mr. and Mrs. Bernard Madoff $1,000 North Shore - Long Island
Jewish Health System 2003-2003
Bernard L. Madoff Investment
Securities $10,000 Pace University 2002-2003
Bernard Madoff $250 Police Athletic League
of New York 2001-2002 Bernard L. Madoff $25,000 Prostate Cancer Foundation 2007-2007 Bernard L. & Ruth
Alpern Madoff `61 $25,000 Queens College , City
University of New York 2006-2007
Bernard L. Madoff $5,000 Ronald McDonald House
of New York, Inc. 2007-2007
Ruth and Bernard Madoff $1,500 Wildlife Conservation Society 2006-2007

It is also interesting to note, that (exactly as in the case of Bernie Madoff) any money given by the 'Amway' mob to charity, has actually first come from the victims of a fraud.
David Brear

Why Amway is silent on CFW blog?

Shyam
It is highly revealing that no one officially representing the 'Amway' mob, has ever put in an appearance on your Blog or attempted to challenge the authenticity of what we have posted on it. Thus, the billionaire bosses of the organization do not openly seek to refute our analysis of their Indian operation as being part of an overall pattern of major racketeering activity. Indeed, any attempt to silence your Blog, would merely confirm our analysis.
In the face of another Indian State High Court ruling which recognises 'Amway India Enterprises' to be operating an illegal money circulation scheme disguised as a 'Business Opportunity,' currently, the only persons attempting, but failing miserably, to put up a defence of the organization on your Blog, are a puerile and abusive, middle-aged American (Scott 'Tex' Johnson) and a naive, young Indian (Trivedi). Neither of these unqualified persons officially represent 'Amway.'
For an organization which steadfastly pretends to be 'One of the Worlds Largest Direct Selling Companies,' the complete incapacity of 'Amway' itself to produce anyone who is prepared to speak on its behalf on your Blog, requires no further comment.
David Brear

Amway model is illegal money circulation scheme camouflaged with sale of products

Mud headed Tex thinks that if the products are sold at the half price there would not be any money circulation scheme. The whole thing revolves around enrollment and that is where the money is. If the prices are slashed where would money rain from except from enrollment. Amway makes money from enrollment, compulsory purchase of products to be able to claim commission, renewal of contract every year for a fee and selling products at exorbitant prices.

When so many cunning ways are involved in the dubious good business opportunity of Amway, Clueless Tex pulling an innocent face, asks "what if the products are sold at half the price."

If you do not have anything to say just call everyone idiot, seems to be the policy of Clueless Tex.

Baffled Trivedi asks us to believe 'paid news', but he would not accept the decision of the learned justices of Andha Pradesh High Court.

People are reading these comments and try to be balanced in writing such things Trivedi.

Cluless Tex still asking senseless question

The Clueless Tex keeps on asking the most absurd and stupid question time and again. It has been answered more than once. As long as there is a scheme of enrolling members it is the illegal money circulation scheme. When the whole point is illegal money circulation scheme to dupe the gullible all over world, mud-headed Tex keeps on asking selling of products at half the price. When it was pointed out that the writ petition filed by the Amway India's IBOs was dismissed, Tex felt uncomfortable and queries whether the writ petition filed by Amway India was not dismissed.

And our pitiable lamb, Trivedi is more baffled than before at the usage of words. He could not make out what exactly he has been asked. I hope the latest post of David Brear would give him a clear picture. If he still could not make out what he has been asked, nobody could help him.

The funny Trivedi once again showcases a 'paid news' article in a newspaper and claims that the sale of Amway products have gone up.

These cunning and dishonest companies which filed writ petitions and obtained stay orders, have been cheating my fellow Indians for the last several years and it is high time, the CID of Andhra Pradesh police initiated criminal proceedings against all these companies. Six more such writ petitions are still pending and Corporate Frauds Watch is looking forward for the day these writs are also dismissed.

My fellow humans all over world! Kindly open your eyes and throw these cunning companies from your respective countries. You have nothing to lose but these criminals.

Trivedi is a lamb amongst a pack of wolves

Shyam
As you are aware, I (like you) have a certain pity for young Trivedi who is obviously a naive little lamb amongst a pack of cunning wolves. He, apparently, still cannot comprehend plain English. Tellingly, if we use 'Amway's' own thought-stopping jargon, Trivedi can immediately understand.
I'll try, once again, to explain in accurate, deconstructed terms why the 'Amway' mob's 'multi-billion dollar sales figures' are complex, economic drivel maliciously designed to bedazzle the economically-illiterate.
The vital factor determining whether (for more than half a century) 'Amway' has been a legitimate business opportunity (with sufficient external revenue/income to pay the majority of its participants a profit), or just the front for a pernicious closed-market swindle or money circulation scheme, is the percentage (by value) of its products which have ultimately been sold by its agents (i.e. persons under contract to 'Amway' as so-called 'Independent Business Owners') to non-agents (i.e. persons not under contract to 'Amway' as so-called 'Independent Business Owners').
During the previous 50+ years, each time 'Amway' has been rigorously investigated by independent financial regulators, it has been discovered that 'Amway' s' own agents (i.e. persons under contract to 'Amway' as so-called 'Independent Business Owners') are virtually the only final customers of 'Amway', because they had been taught (by their 'leaders') that, 'if they want to make big money, selling products is a waste of time,' and anyway they were unable to sell 'Amway' products to free-thinking members of the public due to their banal quality and exorbitant prices. Thus, virtually the only cash which has been proven to be flowing into the (effectively) closed 'Amway' market has come from its own agents (i.e. persons under contract to 'Amway' as so-called 'Independent Business Owners') which has made it a mathematical impossibility for the overwhelming majority of them to receive an overall profit.
Put in the most simple terms, if ten people each place ten coins on a table, it is impossible to divide up the resulting one hundred coins so that each contributor receives more coins than they started with. This logic applies whether you have ten contributors, or ten millions. Thus, in reality, the fiercely complex 'Amway Compensation Plan' has been childish nonsense, because it was a precise, but meaningless, mathematical formula for dividing up what could only be 'Amway' participants' own coins.
Sadly, the great strength of the 'Amway' swindle has been that it was maliciously designed to be beyond the understanding of not just its victims, but also beyond the understanding of most journalists, legislators and judges. Trivedi's chronic incapacity to understand how he is being defrauded, is itself evidence of the fraud.
The clarity with which Indian judges have again seen through 'Amway's' camouflage is remarkable.
David Brear

Learned Indian judges rightly pointed out Amway's criminal activities

Bravo Shyam Sundar and Corporate Frauds Watch!
Thanks to your efforts , more clear-thinking, senior Indian Judges have been able to deduce that 'Amway India Enterprises,' and its shifty clones, have been operating a form of pernicious money circulation (or Ponzi) scheme, albeit in an ingenious disguise. The Indian courts (in their wisdom) have paved the way for a rigorous criminal enquiry into the 'MLM' virus? This has been maliciously obstructed in the USA, and UK, by the billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob, for decades. Indeed, when the wider evidence is examined, the tactics used by the corporate officers, and legal representatives, of 'Amway India Enterprises' are revealed as being part of a pattern of racketeering activity as defined by the United States Federal Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, 1970.
Perhaps the Indian police will now put the same questions which I advised young Trivedi to pose to his 'Amway' handlers and which American, and British, law enforcement have (mysteriously) never asked. I think it would be rather interesting to be a fly on the wall when Indian investigators arrest the corporate officers of 'Amway India Enterprises' and those of the so-called 'Indian Direct Selling Association' and demand:
- Since 'Amway India Enterprises' was created , what percentage (by value) of the organization's published 'Multi-Million Dollar Sales' have actually been to persons who are not agents of the organization?
- Since 'Amway India Enterprises' was created, what has been the overall attrition/ drop-out rate amongst its non-salaried commission agents ?
- Why has this information been kept secret?
- When a so-called 'MLM' or 'Direct Selling' company obliges its non-salaried commission agents to offer products, and/or services, which are sub-standard , and/or banal, yet so exorbitantly priced as to render them (effectively) unsaleable to persons who are not agents of the company, where exactly does all the money come from to pay all, but a tiny minority, of its non-salaried commission agents a profit?
Sadly, the corporate officers of 'Amway India Enterprises,' and those of the so-called 'Indian Direct Selling Association' probably have neither the intellectual capacity nor the courage to face up to the fact that they've been used to front a cult and a fraud. The sanctimonious little gang of charlatans who have raked-in the lion's share the profits from the 'Amway' racket are not Indian citizens. However, the Indian government, or even Corporate Frauds Watch, would be perfectly within their rights to file a private prosecution against the billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob in the USA, for violation of the RICO Act. I'm pretty sure that if the DeVos and VanAndel Clans thought that this might happen, they would call a halt to their criminal activities in India immediately, rather than risk being held to account at home.
David Brear

AP High Court dismisses Amway distributors' writ petition on Feb 4

February 4 was a great day for Corporate Frauds Watch. The Andhra Pradesh High Court on Thursday dismissed a number of writ petitions filed by several dishonest companies and individuals paving way for criminal action against them by the police. The modus operandi of such fraudulent companies is that they file writ petitions in the High Court and continue their dishonest business deceiving lakhs of people all over country. If anybody files a complaint against them, the police do not take any action against on the pretext of the writ petition pending in the High Court.

As a remedial, Corporate Frauds Watch has chosen to file implead petitions in all these writ petitions. It has already filed such petitions in as many as 14 instances. On February 4th, a number of writ petitions came for hearing and our Advocate Mr Mastan Vali represented the views of Corporate Frauds Watch. The division bench comprising Justice G Raghuram and Justice Ramesh Ranganathan dismissed seven writ petitions and transferred a writ petition to the Delhi High Court.

The writ petitions filed by M/s Vennela Shopping & Marketing Private Limited, M/s Maheswari Getit Marketing, Sri Sai Empower Marketing, M/s Bodela Technologies & Marketing, M/s V-Can Network, M/s QuestNet were dismissed.

Another writ petition filed by six distributors of Amway India -- Sistla Raviteja of Vijayawada, Tirumala Raja Naren, Tirumala Anjali Naren both from Tirupati, Ummakonda Sreeti Reddy, Ummakonda Ashok Reddy both from Hyderabad and Miss Turaga Radhika Ramani -- was also dismissed. The Division Bench stated that it is a money circulation scheme beyond doubt.

Now, the Corporate Frauds Watch would take up the matter with the CID of Andhra Pradesh Police Department seeking action against the accused companies.

The Division Bench has transferred the writ petition filed by Team Life Care Insurance Private Limited to the Delhi High Court on the plea that another writ petition was pending there.

Amway figures are complex pseudo-economic drivel, Trivedi

Shyam
We now know that Bernie Madoff's so-called 'Hedge Fund' had absolutely no external source of revenue. Although he steadfastly pretended that he was making billions of dollars of legitimate profits on behalf of his investors, Madoff's company was merely the cover for an ingenious, but nonetheless pernicious, money circulation (or Ponzi) scheme in which victims had been peddled infinite shares of what could only be their own finite money. Prior to 2008, Madoff succeeded in maintaining an absolute monopoly of information about his absurd activities. Some of the world's most-respected financial publications published Madoff's fantastic fiction as fact, and he used these (apparently independent) reports to sustain his crimes. He followed the old advertizing maxim:
If you want to hide something, then make as big as you possibly can.
The fact that Madoff pretended affinity with financial regulators and was never rigorously investigated, also convinced many of his victims that he was legitmate.
With financially illiterate regulators and journalists, and naive fellows like Trivedi, in the world, it is no wonder that enormous criminogenic groups like 'Amway' and 'Scientology' exist to dupe them. Sadly, it's not just Trivedi who cannot understand the vital question which I advised him to ask his 'Amway' handlers?
Over the last several years, what percentage (by value) of 'Amway's' published 'Multi-Billion Dollar Sales' have actually been to persons who are not agents of the organization? (i.e. does the 'Amway' scheme have sufficient external revenue to pay the majority of its participants a profit, or is it just another Madoff-style scam hiding behind a wall of complex pseudo-economic drivel?)
In his favour, Trivedi has politely asked us to explain, but how is it possible that he still insists that 'Amway' should be compared to legitimate manufacturers - who wholesale their products to genuinely-independent businesses (which have a vast choice of other manufacturers) to retail them to the public (who have a vast choice of other retailers)?
In simple terms, the profits of all legitimate businesses derive from an external source and they have no reason to be evasive.
Tellingly, 'Amway's' non-salaried commission agents have been arbitrarily defined in their contracts as 'Independent Business Owners' (although this reality-inverting term has recently been forbidden in the UK). However, these same contracts prevent them (on pain of summary excommunication from the organization) from offering 'Amway' products on the open market (in traditional retail outlets) or from offering the products of other manufacturers.
In simple terms, 'Amway' agents are obliged by their contracts only to buy their stock from 'Amway' and to offer no other products.
In reality, so-called 'Amway Independent Business Owners' are completely dependent on 'Amway'. The organization retains absolute control over all the most important factors of any real business, price, quality, nature, etc. of the products being offered.
Each time 'Amway' has been investigated, it has been revealed that due to the banal quality and exorbitant prices, the so-called 'IBOs' are (effectively) the only people buying 'Amway' products, and that the so-called 'Amway Business Opportunity' is, thus, merely the cover for an ingenious, but nonetheless pernicious, money circulation (or Ponzi) scheme in which victims have been peddled infinite shares of what can only be their own finite money. However, for decades, the 'Amway' bosses have escaped criminal prosecution by pretending affinity with regulators - holding up their hands and promising to reform their activities. Prior to these reforms, according to Trivedi, for years, 'Amway' was allowed to publish misleading 'sales figures' that were deliberately exaggerated by more than 30%. In other words, the organization pretended that all its products were being retailed to the public. Trivedi now says that 'Amway's sales figures' only represent 'wholesale' transactions between itself and its own agents.
In plain English, 'Amway' figures are complex pseudo-economic drivel (in the style of Bernie Madoff), for they do not reveal if the 'Amway' scheme has sufficient external revenue to pay the majority of its participants a profit.
David Brear

Trivedi could not comprehend plain English

Shyam

Imagine, if Bernie Madoff had been challenged by his victims in the exactly same way that I advised young Trivedi to challenge his 'Amway' handlers? Imagine, if they'd all got together and demanded that Madoff answer the following, simple question:

Over the last several years, what percentage (by value) of 'Madoff Investments' perpetually-expanding , multi-billion dollar Hedge Fund' have actually derived from persons who are not investors themselves?

In reality, Madoff was challenged by a few of his victims just before he confessed to federal law enforcement agents that the only cash that there had ever been in his miraculous 'Hedge Fund', was secretly that of his victims. In the months prior to his arrest, Madoff was still confidently spouting the same precisely-worded lies and pointing to a long list of 'independent sources' (including The Wall Street Journal) to back him up. In reality, for more than a decade, a whole flock of (apparently well-educated) financial journalists had simply repeated Madoff's 'multi-billion dollar' fairytale (without the slightest qualification). Apparently, it never occurred to these dunces with diplomas to dig deeper and ask the mercurial Mr. Madoff for some proof that he was, in fact, telling the truth.

Trivedi again fails to comprehend plain English. Self-evidently, I didn't ask him any questions at all, because we all know that he doesn't have the beginnings of clue what the answers are. I merely suggested that the poor little lad put his hand up and ask his 'Amway' handlers some vey specific questions which, just like Bernie Madoff, they cannot answer directly. However, Trivedi has revealed that he accepts that 'Amway' makes no distinction in its published 'multi-billion dollar sales figures' between internal ('wholesale') transactions and external ('retail') transactions. This is rather remarkable, considering the fact that, in 1979 (in order to avoid criminal prosecution), 'Amway's' lawyers promised the US Federal Trade Commission that no 'Amway' commission agents would qualify to receive bonus payments unless they could prove that they were retailing the overwhelming majority (by value) of their own purchases on to persons who were not agents of 'Amway'. At this time, the FTC (with a naivety that beggars belief) trusted the bosses of the 'Amway' mob to put their own shifty edifice in order.

David Brear

Real friends always tell truth Trivedi

Shyam

A wise friend of mine (who has been following your Blog with great interest) has made a good point. She wants to know how Trivedi can continue to believe the 'Amway' Ministry of Truth, when it is obviously in the financial interests of the organization to lie him? Yet Trivedi refuses to believe us when we have no financial interest in lying to him.

This brings me back to what I have already told Trivedi:

In life, it is your real friends who continue to tell you the truth (no matter how painful this might be) whilst your enemies tell you attractive lies.

David Brear

Trivedi should ask his handlers why secrecy?

Shyam
Your free-thinking readers are now witnessing how schoolboy Trivedi still prefers the pretty 'Amway' fairytale ('Billions of Dollars of Sales via Millions of Prosperous Distributors') to the ugly reality (massive attrition/drop-out rate due to universal insolvency) lurking behind it.
Typically of a cult, the 'Amway' Misistry of Truth has made a damn good job of alienating Trivedi's from the truth and destroying his trust in all external sources of information. He remains convinced that 'Amway's figures' are authentic, and the fact that these have been widely-repeated (without any qualification) by ill-informed third parties does not help. Unfortunately for Trivedi, 'Amway's' so-called 'sales' only represent the size of the (effectively) closed-market (i.e. the amount of money which is flowing into the hands of the billionaire bosses of the 'Amway' mob from their adherents). Tellingly, the 'Amway' Ministry of Truth has steadfastly boasted 'Billion Dollar Annual Sales,' but it has deliberately never made any distinction between authentic retail sales (to persons who are not agents of the organization) and internal transactions. In the same way, the 'Amway' Ministry of Truth has steadfastly boasted 'Millions of Independent Business Owners', but it has never revealed that only a tiny minority of these people remain in 'Amway' for more than 5 years.
Fortunately, all Trivedi has to do to discover that he is being manipulated by some very evil people, is put the following questions to his 'Amway' handlers:
- Over the last several years, what percentage (by value) of 'Amway's' published 'multi-billion dollar sales' have actually been to persons who are not agents of the organization?
- Over the previous 5 year cycle, what has been the overall attrition/ drop-out rate amongst non salaried 'Amway' commission agents ?
- Why have these figures been kept secret ?
There is no way that Trivedi will get intelligible answers from 'Amway.'
David Brear

Poor lad Trivedi still lamely asks how Amway is surviving

Shyam
Dealing with Trivedi, is like dealing with a stupid schoolboy. Even now, after it has been clearly explained to him, the poor lad still lamely asks how 'Amway' survives if the company has a 100% drop out rate?
Given the quantifiable evidence, any free-thinking person can see that 'Amway' continues to survive, because each year (by the organization's own figures) around 3 millions individuals sign contracts, but of these 3 millions, only around 1.5 millions are existing contributing participants. Around 1.5 millions 'Amway' failures are vanishing each year, to be replaced by 1.5 millions more wide-eyed dreamers. The hidden attrition/ drop-out rate on a 5 year cycle (2000-2005) for the so-called 'Amway Business Opportunity' was calculated at a massive 95% by external financial auditors with full-access to 'Amway's' own internal accounts.
In simple terms, this means that for every 100 ill-informed persons (like Trivedi) who get involved with 'Amway' falsely believing it to be a viable marketing scheme, after 5 years, only 5 remain. The number who remain after 10 years, is a fraction of 1%. Thus, 'Amway' is a vast snowball which has always had an (effectively) 100% overall, rolling, attrition/drop-out rate. The few persons who are constantly depicted as shining examples of 'Amway Success,' are merely schills whose wealth does not, in fact, derive from their so-called 'Amway Businesses' at all.
The 'Amway' Ministry of Truth (exactly like its 'Scientology' equivalent) steadfastly pretends the organization to be stable and to comprise millions of happy, healthy and prosperous adherents, when, in reality, the overwhelming majority of these persons are merely transient customers, contributing participants in an economically-unviable closed-market.
As for Trivedi's continued belief that 'Amway' s' kosher wampum represents good value. How does the poor lad explain the fact that masses of it is available all the time (and untouched) on e-bay, at a fraction of its original controlled price?
David Brear

The MLM is a marketing fraud

A new essay recently posted on the False Profits Blog addresses a question many of you have raised. Why are multi-level marketing pyramids and financial ponzis able to ensnare so many people today? What is the power behind this Main Street epidemic? This question goes beyond the lack of law enforcement, the failure of the FTC and SEC, or the difficulty of grasping "exponential expansion."

The False Profit Blog ventures an answer: It is that pyramid schemes, operating as multi-level marketing, are a new form of fraud that public awareness and law enforcement have not caught up to. This new form of fraud is called "marketing fraud." Marketing fraud evolved from the earlier stages of "product frauds" and "financial frauds." It uses bogus or overpriced products and deceptive money transactions like older models of fraud do, but that is not the heart of this new fraud.

The power of this fraud is in marketing. It employs the most powerful tools of business today -- branding, positioning, community and identity -- to swindle. Like all powerful marketing, fraudulent marketing promises to fulfill basic and crucial needs, much more valuable than just money or the hyped up benefits of products. The needs that these pyramid marketing scams claim to fulfill address people's deepest longings and their greatest fears. The sophistication of the marketing program, complete with Washington DC lobbyists, trade association, "education" foundation, gifts to charity, celebrity endorsements, sports sponsorships, national conventions, and church affiliations – prevent many in the media and government from grasping the extraordinary deception or to accept the devastating financial consequences they inflict on millions of people.

Even many of the victims cannot believe they were defrauded by an organization of such benevolent outward appearance. Many choose instead to take on personal blame for their misfortune rather than face this reality. Powerful marketing, whether in the employ of legitimate business or pyramid frauds, has the ability to transcend verifiable reality and hard cold facts with its own fictional narrative. The blunt instrument used by marketing frauds to carry out their theft is the "endless chain" or "closed market" a.k.a. pyramid scheme.

This is a classic swindle but is now carried out within a marketing program so powerful it leads the victims not only to fall into the financial trap but to to support the perpetrators against exposure and to enroll their closest friends and relatives into the scam as well.

I will appreciate your comments and thoughts on the Blog.
Robert L. FitzPatrick