The Central Bank identified 2,176 financial pyramids in 9 months – 47% more than in 2022

The Central Bank identified 2,176 financial pyramids in the nine months of 2023, 47% more than in the same period in 2022. The growth by 2021 was 250%.

The share of pyramids among illegal companies and fraudulent schemes exceeded 50%, the Central Bank reported “Izvestia”. Almost all of them operate on the Internet (98%). The rest are illegal lenders, professional participants in the securities market, operators of investment platforms, as well as false insurers.

Many pyramids are small anonymous pseudo-investment projects, information about which is distributed in Telegram channels. As the Central Bank notes, pyramids “give the opportunity to earn money only to those who were the first to enter the project.” No individuals were included in the list of pyramids, but information about them was transferred to law enforcement agencies.

The Bank of Russia associates the growth in the number of financial pyramids with the growing interest of citizens in investments and the search for additional income, including against the backdrop of the situation in the economy. The regulator also notes that it constantly updates its monitoring system, which affects the number of identified illegal resources. The Central Bank admits that blocking helps in the fight against pyramids “is not yet very effective,” Izvestia writes. In response to restrictions, clone projects are created.

About the fight against financial pyramids in the Russian Federation – in the column of Maxim Builov “Pyramid builders will be given status”.

Leonid Uvarchev