Why celebrities are often involved in investment scams
This will save you time, and most importantly millions from celebrity scam businesses
Neri Naig was arrested due to syndicated estafa charges on November 27, 2024.
Rufa Mae was served an arrest warrant due to SEC violations on December 3, 2024.
39 complainants allegedly got scammed amounting to almost 90 million pesos in investments!
There are more people in this country struggling to fend for themselves but here we are talking about a potential 90 million large-scale estafa.
What is a large-scale estafa?
A form of fraud or swindling under Philippine law, where the amount involved is substantial, often affecting multiple victims.
It falls under Article 315 of the Revised Penal Code of the Philippines, which outlines the crime of estafa (fraud).
That’s the legal or dictionary description but I’d like to explain it further from a business perspective because (you guessed it) this is a business newsletter.
In the simplest form I can do, here’s a visual representation:
That’s why this case is a difficult one, the biggest difference between two businesses is the ‘intention’.
The legit business wants the investment money to grow faster and later earn more;
While the estafa business wants the invested money to go directly to Louis Vouiton as a weekly bag gift for their wife.
If how it started is the same, why don’t they just turn it to a legit business?
Short answer: because doing business is hard
Long answer:
Imagine you’re a “fake businessman” and someone wired 50 million pesos to your bank.
It’s easier to: use the money to buy things with the intention to impress social media users and fake friends while;
It’s harder to: Put it back to the business, work your ass, grow it to the point of profitability, and give some profit back to investors.
Business is hard, people telling you otherwise are lying.
It annoys me to see these celebrities and influencers flaunting their “CEO Badge”.
Destroying this profession in two ways:
Making it look like it’s easy: young ones who enter don’t get to last a year because they expected an easy path rather than a trecherous one.
Making real entrepreneurs look stupid.
As a rule of thumb: “If they became an influencer or celebrity first, before being a business owner, 9 out of 10 times DO NOT INVEST”