English
98366
 Chen Tang, who has limited knowledge and does not know who Satoshi Nakamoto is, was watching the exaggerated performance of Kuaishou brother one second, asking relatives to help "cut a knife" in the family WeChat group, and the next second they plunged into the currency speculator group under the temptation of getting rich overnight, and fell into the fantasy spun by bookmakers and trumpeters. They became evangelists for altcoins and staged a Chinese version of "cyberpunk". Author | Xue Yaping photo | Tu Chong Creative Dogecoin has soared, and 54-year-old Ms. Zhao is ready to invest another 10,000 yuan. Based on past experience, she was prepared to buy again when the currency price dropped slightly. In the WeChat group called "Chaoyue Self", many people, like Ms. Zhao, regard several group administrators as their "most trusted partners." Some people believe in Dogecoin, while others no longer believe it after suffering losses. Chen Tang, 52, who lives in a small county in the 18th tier, came into contact with Dogecoin in 2018. He was "passively cleared" at the end of last year, and all the nearly 80,000 yuan he invested was "wasted." “The slogan "Beyond Bitcoin" is almost a joke, and this experience has become a past event that Chen Tang does not want to mention. She deleted her Moments and WeChat friends, and actively and passively "left the group". His son Nannan said that Chen Tang bought five virtual currencies in the past three years, including Dogecoin, United Coin, Internet of Things central bank digital currency, K-bit coin, and a currency that cannot be named. The routines of these altcoins or MLM coins are the same: attracting people to get rebates in the early stage, and arbitrage in the later stage to attract more people to join the game. Sure enough, although he tasted the benefits at the beginning, Chen Tang was either blocked and removed from the group chat, or the trading platform collapsed or ran away due to thunderstorms, and he lost everything in the end. Chen Tang's currency speculation also made his family dissatisfied. Not only did she vigorously publicize to her relatives and friends that virtual currency is inseparable, she also opened accounts for three of her children to buy coins, which caused many disputes among family members. “During that time, my mother became the public enemy of the whole family. Anyone who told her that it was not good to speculate in stocks would definitely end up unhappy or even quarrel. ”Nan Nan said. Nan Nan tried various methods to keep her mother away from currency speculation, including sending her anti-fraud materials and learning about blockchain and virtual currencies. During the severe period of the epidemic, he once threatened his mother, "If I continue to indulge in currency speculation, I will go back to Shanghai directly." But what confused Nan Nan was that the two people's knowledge structures and ways of thinking were very different, making it difficult for them to understand each other. He taught his mother about Bitcoin and blockchain, trying to prove that what she bought was an altcoin, but Ms. Chen didn’t know this knowledge at all, or even Satoshi Nakamoto, the originator of Bitcoin. She only knew that Bitcoin is very powerful now, and the virtual currency she purchased in the future will surpass Bitcoin because “there is someone behind it.” The so-called "someone behind the scenes" is just a group of scammers. In 2018, the platform where Chen Tang purchased Dogecoin was exposed as suspected of fraud. After Nan Nan showed the news to Chen Tang, she did not believe it and warned her son not to slander others online. There are not a few people who have had similar experiences with Nannan. As children, they cannot stop their parents from falling into the quagmire of currency speculation. This is their common helplessness. 01 Chen Tang, 52, runs a grocery store with her husband. Since becoming obsessed with virtual currency in the summer of 2018, she has spent more than half of her time on it every day. “How can we work hard to make money when facing complex changes at home and abroad? Virtual currency is an investment method that truly allows ordinary people to get fair results...” At 6 o'clock every morning, Chen Tang was cooking while listening to the "teacher" on his mobile phone explaining the virtual currency market for 2 hours. In his free time during the day, whether at the dinner table, in the kitchen or in the bathroom, Chen Tang will open the audio and video materials saved on his mobile phone and WeChat voice to teach himself, and even play it to his family to listen to, and share his thoughts and experiences in the currency trading group. Chatting in WeChat groups, watching videos, and calculating profits with a notebook have become Chen Tang’s daily habits. According to his son Nan Nan, Chen Tang was "as stunned as a demon". In his opinion, those who encourage middle-aged and elderly people to speculate in currencies "lacks morality." He hated these people very much, but his mother trusted them very much. Nannan couldn't understand why his mother, who taught him to get rich with her own hands since childhood, became like this. It wasn't until he saw the news about the currency speculation group that his mother belonged to that he realized that unless his willpower was particularly strong, it would be difficult to block "open and covert attacks." The "teachers" of the currency speculation group will first establish a professional and real persona. The WeChat avatar is a young man in a suit and leather shoes, wearing black-rimmed glasses, with a bright office building in the background.  More importantly, whether it is a young person in charge, a "chief lecturer" who teaches how to buy coins, or someone who shares his experience of getting rich by speculating on coins, they often include their identity information, some of which are work ID photos, and some of which are ID photos. After having a false persona, the scammers then play the emotional card. In addition to asking for help during holidays, the group owners will also instill poisonous chicken soup to "spur" currency speculators. The owner of a certain currency speculation group is similar in age to Nan Nan, but he calls 52-year-old Chen Tang "sister" and greets her three times a day just to please her. When Chen Tang hesitates, the other party will send a "transfer screenshot" to prove that multiple people have entered the game, with a chicken soup quote: "There is no free lunch in the world. You always think about pie-in-the-sky things. If you have no execution ability, how can there be money waiting for you?" ”He also solemnly declared that "with the guidance of a teacher, you can make money." After the preparation is in place, the scammer begins to "tack on key problems" one-on-one. Chen Tang soon met a "senior currency speculator" in the group. This senior also called Chen Tang "Sister" and sent Chen Tang his experience of making money by speculating on coins, as well as information on opening an account and buying coins. Chen Tang obeyed her words and followed her to speculate in coins. In fact, apart from being able to see his hometown in Hebei on WeChat, Chen Tang did not know any private information about his "senior". “I don't know anything about it, but I trust them very much to bring wealth to me. ”Nan Nan said. On social platforms such as Zhihu, many people face similar problems to Nan Nan: “My mother insists on buying virtual currency and is obsessed with it. How should I persuade her? ”, “How can I stop my family from being addicted to virtual currency scams? ”, "My parents are obsessed with K-bit currency. What kind of currency is this? It is said that the income can be a hundred times, which is not reliable?" ”... After persuading her to no avail, Nannan could only hope that her mother would reduce her investment in currency speculation as much as possible. But every time Nan Nan goes home, she will find thousands of dollars of new transfer information on her mother's WeChat and Alipay. Nan Nan feels that after more than 20 years of mother-son relationship, she is not as good as the person on the phone who makes a hundred yuan a week with her. Of course, currency speculators also believe in Musk, the founder of Tesla and a well-known advocate of Dogecoin. On April 28, Musk called himself the "Godfather of Dogecoin" on Twitter, and was regarded as the "holy word" by many domestic believers. If asked what they think of Dogecoin, they would say: “It depends on what Musk thinks. ” 02 In addition to being deeply involved in it himself, Chen Tang is also trying his best to attract relatives and friends into the currency speculation group. ““Rebates” and “attracting new users” are the methods used by many virtual currency platforms to attract new users. Chen Tang promoted it to his relatives and friends, and when they met, he took out his mobile phone to show off how much money he had made, even his elderly mother. Under Chen Tang's brainwashing and showing off, at least three relatives of similar ages began to speculate in currencies. Several aunts were sitting at home, analyzing how to buy coins. What worries Nan Nan the most is that once those people who were encouraged by her mother to speculate in currencies lose money or are deceived, they will come to her mother for explanation. Once, a certain platform was unable to trade due to some reasons. Several relatives came to Chen Tang with gloomy faces, thinking that the latter needed to be "responsible." In addition, Chen Tang also opened a currency trading account for his children. “If we disagree, she gets angry and pesters you. For the first time, he bought 500 yuan for each of us, saying that it was all property given to us. ”Chen Tang firmly believes in what the "teacher" said, these coins will definitely generate a hundredfold profit.  In 2019, the entire virtual currency industry faced regulatory crackdowns. A platform where Chen Tang bought coins found that "mainland accounts could not log in and trade", which made her and other currency speculators extremely anxious, and the WeChat group also exploded. Although the person in charge gave some solutions, the process was extremely complicated. In the end, the WeChat group was disbanded, and the nearly 10,000 yuan invested by Chen Tang was wasted. But Chen Tang did not learn his lesson. Since the loss was not large and he had tasted the benefits, Chen Tang decided to continue speculating. She downloaded and registered more than a dozen currency speculation software, and even changed her mobile phone to one with larger memory. What surprised Nan Nan even more was that Chen Tang wanted to visit the company behind a certain trading platform and sent him relevant pictures of the company. During that time, Nannan had to repeatedly tell her father to "guard" her mother to prevent her from going. In the photos of the event sent by my mother, most of the visitors were uncles and aunts in their fifties and sixties. 03 Middle-aged and elderly currency speculators like Chen Tang, although they lack discernment and professional knowledge and are easily deceived by scammers, have made no secret of their dream: to surpass Bitcoin and achieve their dream of getting rich. In 2018, after "beating" Wall Street capital giants in the gold market in 2013, the "Chinese Aunt" once again entered the international stage through currency speculation. In April of this year, a blockchain summit with tens of thousands of people was held in Macau, China, and a Chinese aunt appeared with a "V" hand in her hand. Subsequently, Chinese aunts also appeared at blockchain conferences held in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and Paris, France. Their "inspirational" stories were then repeatedly exaggerated and spread by currency speculators. Chen Tang envied the glorious moments of the aunts, which became one of her magic weapons for self-hypnosis. However, Chen Tang, who has a junior high school education, knows very little about virtual currency and blockchain technology, and is limited to basic concepts such as “mining” and “tokens”. This has also become the ideological foundation for her and other currency speculators to believe that altcoins will surpass Bitcoin based on blind listening and blind faith. For example, Chen Tang once purchased K Special Coin, and the slogans of the relevant WeChat group were "K Special Coin beats Bitcoin", "One K Special Coin is worth 20 grams of gold", etc., which was full of pyramid schemes. Sometimes, she will also use famous figures and companies such as Buffett (in fact, Buffett has always been staunchly opposed to virtual currencies), the Rothschild family, and Google to defend her purchases of virtual currencies. During that time, Chen Tang and her son became "enemies." Nannan discovered that he and his mother seemed to be talking about different things. “Do you know Satoshi Nakamoto? ” “have no idea. ” Once he touches a knowledge blind spot, Chen Tang’s next sentence is always: “You don’t know, the founder of that coin has taken a photo with a certain big leader, and it will be listed in the next three years, and its market value will be hundreds of millions. ” Chen Tang is still immersed in the dream of getting rich through currency speculation, but the sickle to harvest leeks has been raised. In the fall of 2020, Chen Tang anxiously sent a picture and asked Nannan to help check a company.； At the same time, Chen Tang's currency speculator group also exploded. The dealer ran away. During the video call with his son, Chen Tang was heartbroken. In fact, Nannan had already sent the relevant news to Chen Tang, but Chen Tang still didn't believe it until he couldn't withdraw cash. Chen Tang has encountered many scams before, but has never been able to wake up. In 2019, Chen Tang purchased more than 2,000 yuan of central bank digital currency for the Internet of Things, but nothing happened.； I bought tens of thousands of dollars of Unitedcoin and Dogecoin, but all wasted. “"Tao Mouyang" changed from her favorite to the person she hated the most. When he became ill and sought medical treatment, Chen Tang listened to the advice of some "lecturers" and transferred his coins to another platform. The latter claimed that "one becomes three", and Chen Tang's 40,000 coins turned into 120,000 coins, but the cash could only be withdrawn after reaching a certain amount. However, the trading platform collapsed before Chen Tang reached the withdrawal limit. Scams like this are not new. CCTV Finance previously exposed, “In a group of 100 people, 99 are stooges. ”The trading platform is actually a banker, and the investment masters are just liars, working together to harvest leeks.  In the past few decades, the investment style of middle-aged and elderly people in China has tended to be conservative, and time deposits are their favorite. However, as the actual rate of return on bank deposits continues to decline, more and more middle-aged and elderly people are beginning to seek new financial management channels. At the same time, they lack the necessary vigilance and professional knowledge, which provides opportunities for scammers. Especially after the rise of currency speculation, the environment of lagging policies and difficult supervision has made the currency circle a paradise for scammers to openly take advantage of and harvest brutally, and the life savings of middle-aged and elderly people have become the targets of hunting. Chen Tang, who has limited knowledge and does not know who Satoshi Nakamoto is, was watching the exaggerated performance of Kuaishou brother one second, asking relatives to help "cut a knife" in the family WeChat group, and the next second they plunged into the currency speculator group under the temptation of getting rich overnight, and fell into the fantasy spun by bookmakers and trumpeters. They became evangelists for altcoins and staged a Chinese version of "cyberpunk". After suffering successive blows and losing nearly 80,000 yuan, Chen Tang finally left the currency speculation circle. Some of the other people she pulled in at that time left, while others still came to consult Chen Tang from time to time. Chen Tang talked about his experiences and lessons, but some people still insisted on going their own way. When they left, they still lowered their heads and poked at the mobile phones in their hands. In the currency speculation circle, they have met more other like-minded people. (Chen Tang, Nannan are all pseudonyms) The article comes from the public account alphabet list (ID: wujicaijing). The END  Recommended reading  No.1 The mother of Lin Moumou, the deceased at Chengdu No. 49 Middle School, said: She is still waiting for news from relevant departments. No.2 The misjudged demographic situation of South Korea No.3 The results of the seventh national census are released: the national population exceeds 1.41 billion and the birth rate hits a new low in 2020 No.4 Pinduoduo and Meituan were interviewed due to product quality and misleading marketing No.5 The Ministry of Environment reported 7 cases of fraud in sewage discharge monitoring, 3 of which involved persons only being detained administratively Remember to scan the QR code to follow  WeChat ID | eeojjgcw Sina Weibo | @ Economic Observer |
|
|
|
|
|
