Since my last 3 posts on investment & general scams which I wrote years ago, it has helped to spread some level of awareness to fellow Malaysians & it reached a point where the company actually emailed me to compensate me for removing the post in exchange for money (which I didn’t accept).
You can check out my 3 posts on the scam-related topics below:1. How To Spot An Investment Scam In Malaysia2. My Recent Encounter With An Investment Scammer
3. How To Avoid Being Scam In Malaysia
Up until today, despite all levels of awareness done by many people & the Malaysian government, we are still seeing Malaysians fall for various scams. Victims usually fall for the scams based on emotions such as fear & greed.
So, how do scammers trigger the fear in you? They usually approach you & tell you something that concerns you. In my years of receiving such calls, I have received calls from “Malaysian Customs”, “Post Office”, “LHDN”, “Bank Negara” & a few others. I nearly fell for it years back when the “Custom Officer” called me as I had an import shipment that was supposed to arrive around that period of time.
As for greed, victims usually give their money voluntarily with hopes that they can earn back more money as per the scammer’s promise. There are so many so-called money games out there. If you are following their news today, how many of them are still active? Years ago, when a money game company called JJTPR was launched, many Malaysians invested in it with the promise of earning an extra 20% each month with an additional 5% referral fee. Early “investors” are able to earn some money out of it while “late investors” lost their money when the company went bust. One of my friends had a similar experience with another money game company called MBI where he only managed to get back RM200,000 from his RM600,000 investment. That is a RM400,000 loss.
Of course, there are also many ways that Malaysians got their money scammed but fear & greed are primarily the reasons why Malaysians got scammed. There are also many internet scams recently, which I also nearly fell for. There was a time when I wanted to buy my first Nike shoes when I saw this Air Jordan model on this particular website. As far as I know, Air Jordan 1 usually sells out quickly upon their shoe launch but that particular website had the same model & the same size for months. I started to wonder, is this website even real? After I did my investigation, I can conclude that the website is not a legitimate website.
In our lives, we will be encountering a group of scammers that will try to take our hard-earned money. We should always remain skeptical of all sorts of deals or calls that are too good to be true. No matter how or when there will always be scams out there. As long as we are careful enough, we are able to potentially avoid all sorts of scams.
Investing in stocks, mutual funds, Robo-advisor, ETF & other investments that are approved by the Securities Commissions of Malaysia may able to provide you with an annual return between 5%-15% depending on where you invest your money. It is a norm that many of us want to maximize our profits from our investment & we will always look for ways to earn higher investment returns or seek a potential investment that provides us with a higher return but do not forget to invest only with companies that are approved by SC of Malaysia. The reason is to ensure that your money & investment is regulated under the act of the Securities Commission of Malaysia which means that your money & investment are protected from any potential scams.
OSS!
You can also check out my latest YouTube video on How To Invest Like Warren Buffett:
