When you’re a cash-strapped student, the slick marketing and abundant promise of internet money-making may seem highly attractive. But when it comes to easy money, there’s usually a catch or three. With this in mind, what follows is a word or two of warning.
iMarketsLive was formed in 2013 by Christopher Terry. His company promises quick turnaround on investments and offers a full recruitment programme with rewards for dedicated customers. It is targeting students, and it appears in numerous guises across the internet.
On TradersEmpire.co.uk, one of the latest versions of this programme, there are numerous links through to IML resources. There are also indications of a Ponzi-Pyramid hybrid scheme, e.g. high “getting started” fees, lofty promises and an electric-green residuals system. It’s not a question of whether Traders Empire and iMarketsLive are one and the same, it’s why they go to such lengths to hide the association.
In Belgium, the claims IML is making are actually illegal—including the “rewards for recruitment” style of operation. Similarly, a lot of the “product” behind IML is already outlawed in the USA.
IML claims to provide insight into trading, usually Forex, but the product is secondary to the core recruitment cycle. Those subscription fees and ensuing kickbacks are what keep the scheme going, and the attachment to a product is negligible. It’s telling that there are more details about this recruitment programme than the actual trading services.
On the RealScam forums, user ribshaw quoted the following criteria from the Koscot test to help spot pyramid scams:
(1) Payment of money to the company;
(2) The participant receives the right to sell a product (or service);
(3) The participant receives compensation for recruiting others into the program;
(4) The compensation is unrelated to the sale of products (or services) to the ultimate user.
Any of these sound familiar?
In 2016, business blogger Ethan Vanderbuilt published a “scam warning” about iMarketsLive, detailing the history of its creators, the circumstances behind its creation and the various ways in which people have been ripped off. His article and the associated video are in-depth and informative – highly recommended!
In 2018 the Financial Services and Markets Authority declared that IML exhibits features that are “characteristic of a pyramid scheme”. It advised against responding to recruitment offers, both from IML and the other websites and services in its periphery—including Traders Empire and Global Visionariez, two companies that share members. Their recruitment is key, and as they gain more affiliates, more money is funneled up the chain.
That they are targeting students is unsurprising, but it’s the ways they directly appeal to this demographic through social media, that really gets under my skin. Avoid!
