Football Index

Reaper

I remember it being discussed on here some time ago but can't find the thread now. If I remember right we were querying where all the money for the dividends was coming from as it didn't add up.

resk

Bit of an update from the Grauniad.
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/mar/11/football-index-customers-money-trapped-after-platform-is-suspended
In which both P-Bombs are dropped.  Scanning Twitter, it's amazing how many people are still talking about their stakes as if they're going to recover some money.  It could be a fertile ground for the follow up "we're going to start a legal battle to get your money back!" scams.  

chucknorris

Malthusian said:

resk said:

Just had a look on Twitter, wow.  Seems like a reasonably intricate Ponzi scheme.

All Ponzi schemes are zero sum games but not all zero sum games are Ponzi schemes. This was the latter.

Nobody can accuse me of being reluctant to call a Ponzi a Ponzi, but every time I saw marketing for Football Index it was always perfectly clear that it was a gambling / fantasy football game and not some kind of investment. Five seconds in the FAQ was long enough to make it clear how the game worked and how money flowed from the punters to the bookie (if you didn't sell your "shares" in time they expired without value). Their advertising was far less misleading than the likes of eToro and the crypto rampers telling you that buying Tesla or Bitcoin will get you rich quick.

The Bitcoin adverts are hilarious, they should win Oscars for story telling, in all the examples that I have seen the price is always going up and people sell and take a profit, so everyone wins, how does that work on such a volatile thing? (I can't bring myself to call it an investment). So everyone who bought won, and everyone who sold won, oh how I wish that I could also live in the land of magic frogs and pixies, where the sun always shines and everyone always wins. It reminds me of 'round my way' that place where all the bears lived, where rents where always cheap and falling, house prices also were always falling. And better still when the even worse inevitable recession happens, it hits landlords so bad that they have to sell cheap, but the bears don't lose their jobs and easily get mortgages to buy up all the cheap property,

csgohan4

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-56401707

Seems it was another scam. A Ponzi scheme

Another reason why volatile 'investment's are dangerous. Although this is more akin to gambling. The poor guy would have had a better chance going into an online casino and betting red or going all in on Tesla 

vacheron

csgohan4 said:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-56401707

Seems it was another scam. A Ponzi scheme

Another reason why volatile 'investment's are dangerous. Although this is more akin to gambling. The poor guy would have had a better chance going into an online casino and betting red or going all in on Tesla 

I read that this morning wincing over the comments from the "investors". 

"The drop in value of my portfolio sets me back a lot. Most of it was savings. I've seen Football Index as my savings account."   

MaxiRobriguez

I struggle to have much sympathy to be honest.

benbay001

vacheron said:

csgohan4 said:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-56401707

Seems it was another scam. A Ponzi scheme

Another reason why volatile 'investment's are dangerous. Although this is more akin to gambling. The poor guy would have had a better chance going into an online casino and betting red or going all in on Tesla 

I read that this morning wincing over the comments from the "investors". 

"The drop in value of my portfolio sets me back a lot. Most of it was savings. I've seen Football Index as my savings account."   

"Most of it was savings" I read as "Some of it was borrowed"

Malthusian

MaxiRobriguez said:

I struggle to have much sympathy to be honest.

Same. And my sympathy threshold for the victims of zero-sum games is way higher than the average. If they hadn't put their "savings" into Football Index they'd've put it into crypto scatcoins or Gamestop.

There does now seem to be a stronger suggestion that it was a Ponzi scheme, in that the payouts being made relied on continuing inflows of new money, and when inflows dried up, the payouts available to existing players collapsed. That potentially changes it from a "fair" gambling game where the risk of loss is known and accepted to an unfair one where the risk of loss is greater than the players have been led to believe. But even if it is, it's a struggle to feel sympathy for anyone who claims they didn't know that gambling could lose their money.

MaxiRobriguez

Paying out "dividends" against a worthless "asset" that generated no profit.

Pretty clear ponzi scheme. Wonder if it had been FCA regulated rather than Gambling regulated whether it would have been allowed to do business?

AlanP_2

MaxiRobriguez said:

Paying out "dividends" against a worthless "asset" that generated no profit.

Pretty clear ponzi scheme. Wonder if it had been FCA regulated rather than Gambling regulated whether it would have been allowed to do business?

Given the FCAs track record what do you think?