"If you watch 5 videos every 3 minutes every day, you can earn 8000+ a year. Six accounts can earn more than 40000 yuan." The reporter of the Beijing business daily noted that on some public social platforms, many users are promoting a platform called "ant Cluster Tourism" to attract users' participation with zero profit and high return. After further investigation, the reporter found that there was a significant difference between the so-called "zero profit" of ant Cluster Tourism and the publicity. Later, it was more necessary for users to make corresponding investments or pull new ones in exchange for "tickets" and realize them.
It is worth mentioning that the platform also claimed to carry out alliance chain related businesses under the banner of blockchain, and "tickets" were once packaged as virtual currencies for trading by the platform.
In the view of analysts, the operation mode of ant cluster tourism has the characteristics of illegal financial activities, and investors should be vigilant.
Draw heads and share profits
Suspected of "marginal" financial business
"Absolutely 0. You can make money with a little advertising. You can get different levels of income through innovation or investment." On May 30, Wang Ping (a pseudonym), a participant of the ant Cluster Tourism platform, introduced the operation mode of ant cluster tourism to the reporter of Beijing business daily.
According to Wang Ping, new users can download the ant Cluster Tourism app and get tickets by watching advertising videos. They can get thousands of yuan by correctly using the tickets given by the platform. At the same time, new users can also be invited to participate to obtain two-level bonus rewards. You can exchange more tasks if you invest in a task package.
Subsequently, the reporter downloaded the ant Cluster Tourism app and experienced its mode. After new users complete the download, registration, real name authentication and other related processes, they can get 10 tickets presented by the platform. These 10 tickets are also the beginning of the platform Party's publicity of "0 roll". Users can exchange 10 tickets for a basic task of game product promotion. For 30 consecutive days, 0.4 tickets will be returned every day. After the task, users can get a total of 12 tickets.
Image source: ant Cluster Tourism app
"Every time you accumulate 10 tickets, you can start a new round of tasks. With repeated operations, you can earn at least 300 tickets in a year, and at least 5000 yuan according to the current market price. If you invite new users, you can get an additional 5% of the new users' income, and the secondary users' income rate is 0.25%." Wang Ping said.
It sounds like "zero capital and ten thousand profits", but in fact, there are many barriers.
According to the actual experience of the reporter of Beijing business daily, users want to cash their tickets, mainly by transferring their tickets to other user accounts at the agreed price through the platform transfer function. However, to complete the donation transfer, the platform needs to have at least 100 activeness. The higher the activeness, the lower the handling fee charged for the donation transfer operation.
The main way to get user activity is to invite active new users and receive high-level tasks. In addition to the basic task of 10 tickets, the platform has also set up other tasks ranging from 100 to 30000 tickets. The return cycle is mostly 70 days or 75 days. For example, the task of receiving 1000 tickets is "advertising product promotion", and the return cycle is 70 days. A total of 1240 tickets can be obtained. To receive more advanced tasks, new users need to pay for the corresponding number of tickets in advance.
During the introduction, Wang Ping also repeatedly mentioned that "if you want to get more income from ant cluster tourism, you'd better constantly invite new users to get graded rewards. If you have enough money, you can also choose to buy tickets first and exchange task packages."
Yu Baicheng, President of zero one research institute, pointed out that in general, many apps will launch some marketing activities in order to activate users and promote consumption. For example, users will give points after completing tasks in exchange for corresponding benefits or income. However, if users need to invest money in order to exchange tasks, they can even obtain high returns through transactions, which is different from the nature of regular app marketing live guests.
Yu Baicheng frankly said that to obtain high returns through investment and trading of points or tickets has the attribute of financial business and needs to be subject to corresponding supervision, otherwise it is suspected of violating laws and regulations.
Users trade tickets by themselves
Promoting new business under the banner of blockchain
The realization of the ticket of ant Cluster Tourism attracted the attention of the reporter. According to Wang Ping, according to the current pricing rules of the platform, one ticket is equivalent to about 18 yuan. Users can agree on the number and price of ticket transactions through the official exchange platform, so as to realize ticket realization.
As for how the "price tag" of 18 yuan came into being, Wang Ping only said that it was confirmed by the supply-demand relationship of the market that the more investors, the less tickets produced every day, the ticket price would rise, otherwise the price would fall.
On May 31, the reporter of Beijing business daily noticed in the "ant chat" app, the official exchange platform of ant cluster tourism, that from time to time, users publish their own demand for buying and selling tickets, and indicate the price and contact information. "Charge 1000 tickets, add ants to chat with friends' notes", "charge 500 tickets, pay online in seconds" and other messages emerge in endlessly.
Image source: ant chat app
Earlier, it was also reported that the ant cluster tourism had set up an ant cluster market exchange on the real-time price of tickets. Tickets were once packaged into virtual currency, and users can speculate and trade through this platform. After the central bank further regulated the speculation of virtual currency in September 2021, the relevant trading platform of ant Cluster Tourism went offline.
On May 31, the reporter of the Beijing business daily repeatedly called the Yicong tourism phone for interviews on the authenticity of the news, the specific pricing mechanism of the platform tickets, and how to treat the users' self trading tickets. No one answered the phone. However, after the reporter of Beijing business daily indicated the interview demand, the platform's manual customer service only pointed out that the company had no trading platform, and the tickets were mainly used to give away friends, receive reward tasks, exchange scenic spot tickets, etc. after that, they would not reply.
On the other hand, in addition to the ticket linked virtual currency, ant cluster tourism also launched the "Tourism Alliance chain" app in March 2022, focusing on blockchain + new tourism ecology. However, the overall setting of the platform is the same as that of ant cluster tourism. Compared with ant cluster tourism, the return cycle of Tourism Alliance chain app is shorter and the income is higher. For example, for a shopping mall task that requires 1000 tickets, the return cycle is 30 days, and users can get 1250 tickets.
Image source: Tourism Alliance chain app
The "Tourism Alliance chain" app with higher revenue has also been strongly recommended by relevant users. As for how blockchain, alliance chain and other concepts are reflected, the reporter of Beijing Business Daily also learned from ant cluster tourism, but as of press time, no reply has been received from the other party.
According to suxiaorui, senior analyst of Analysys analysis in the financial industry, the above operations of the platform take advantage of the psychology of some users who have a little knowledge of such new concepts but do not understand their operating principles, and hope to obtain high returns through speculation. In fact, there are multiple hidden risks.
Suxiaorui pointed out that, on the one hand, such fund scams have no formal fund channel guarantee, and the operators may cut off the network at any time, take the app off the shelf and run away with the money; On the other hand, the pricing of the so-called "tickets" set by the platform side is unclear, and there may be problems such as inflated prices and foam. Once no one takes over or plummets in the follow-up, it will be difficult to get back the funds invested by the previous users.
Guard against fraud in illegal financial activities
Avoid blind participation
According to public information, Yicong tourism belongs to Chongqing Yicong Technology Co., Ltd. and the platform was launched in September, 2020. According to the introduction of Yicong tourism, the tourism business is carried out based on the Internet. Users can further exchange platform consumption points through the platform ticket task, and exchange scenic spot tickets and travel tickets on the platform.
Photo source: ppt screenshot of the official website of Yicong Tourism
However, in the communication with Wang Ping and in the communication group of many ant Cluster Tourism users, the reporter of Beijing business daily noted that the main purpose of users' participation in ant cluster tourism projects is to obtain high returns through receiving tasks, which is also one of the key contents of ant Cluster Tourism in various offline publicity meetings.
In fact, in recent years, such "investment rebate" models have appeared from time to time, including the purchase of investment and financial products, consumption rebate and other forms. Through the development of offline layers, new users' funds are used to pay short-term income to old investors, until the capital chain is broken, the operation is convenient and traceless.
This is the case with the "qubu" project, which has attracted much attention before. It claims that the nickname is supported by blockchain technology, uses the gimmick of "0 investment" to attract users, and then tempts users to spend money to buy "candy" to develop offline. "Candy" can be used to exchange for commodities or so-called ght coins, which can then be converted into cash. In October, 2019, "qubu" was investigated by Changsha Municipal Department of industry and Commerce for its illegal activities such as pyramid selling, illegal fund-raising and financial fraud.
Suxiaorui said that the operation mode of such platforms has typical characteristics of illegal financial activities: first, it involves capital activities such as investment and return; Second, he is good at taking return, 0-roll and other scripts as bait; Third, the operating entity has not been approved by the financial department, or even has no clear operating entity.
"It is necessary to intensify the efforts to crack down on such illegal financial activities, continue to increase the publicity and popularization of such illegal activities, integrate them with the current more mature anti fraud work, and improve the vigilance of the people." Suxiaorui added.
Yu Baicheng further stressed that investors should be vigilant, especially for projects that require capital investment and obtain high returns, avoid blind participation, and consult relevant financial regulators or anti fraud agencies if unsure.