As financial literacy is growing, people are moving towards investing more and more. However, not a lot of people do not have the correct knowledge about it, so they seek help. And that’s what scammers are using now to find their new targets. A new case has surfaced online where a man in Mumbai lost about Rs 90 lakhs to an online investment scam.
The victim was added to a WhatsApp group. The admins of the group promised the members of the group some crazy returns through stock training. The victim was fooled into believing that the group was run by foreign experts who were sharing expert advice and strategies to help members make significant profits in a short time.
The victim thought that the group was legit and he started to interact with the members of the group. The scammers persuaded him to open an “Institutional Trading Account”. For this, they sent him a mobile app link. The app was available on the Play Store and it seemed credible. The victim then deposited Rs 90 lakh into a broker company’s bank account to start trading.
The victim initially also saw a virtual profit of Rs 15.69 crore in his account, so he even trusted this. He realised that all this was a scam when he tried to withdraw the funds. The scammers demanded a “Profit Sharing” fee of 10 percent, amounting to Rs 1.45 crore. But it was too late till he realised all this, by then he had lost his Rs 90 lakhs.
These scams are getting pretty common by the day and my only advice to you is that do not fall for anything that feels even minutely fishy. Stay safe!