Did you lose money in FrancSwiss?

James Ryan Jonas

Earlier last week, a news reporter from a major TV channel emailed Pinoy Money Talk and asked if we can recommend people who would be willing to sit for an interview to talk about their losses in the online investment program FrancSwiss.

Our reply, at that time, was that it might be difficult to find those people because FrancSwiss is technically still not a scam because it has not stopped paying yet. Our opinion was that investors would not badmouth a program they think has not done anything wrong.

Fast forward several days later, and FrancSwiss was declared a Ponzi and a scam-waiting-to-unfold by the Philippine SEC, BSP, and media channels. No sooner than that, all FrancSwiss websites went down, the operators were nowhere to be found, and no investor received payment in the last few days.

FrancSwiss being officially declared a scam is now starting to sink in to most people. Investors have started telling their own FrancSwiss stories — including stories of financial losses, of distrust in the people who referred them to the program, and of deception, hopelessness, and confusion.

Here are some of these stories, taken from the Comments section of the article Is FrancSwiss a scam? and the HYIP: FrancSwiss discussion thread. True or not, these stories are surely something FrancSwiss investors can relate to.

Read on.

jny wrote:

Wow! I was misled. Honestly, when a friend invited me to invest, I wasn’t convinced but when i went online I believed it. At first, I was wondering why can’t we use a credit card to pay for it. What convinced me was they said they were able to encash and it’s happening everyday. I issued a check to someone else’s name. I most likely want to make bawi of it sana. Nasabi ko na lang, kilala ko naman siya, siguro hindi naman siya nagsisinungaling. Later did I know that hindi rin pala sila nakaka-encash.

Wow! Like me, biktima din pala sila. Nabawi nila investment nila, however, kasi may recruit sila. The e-points that they have can actually be used for new recruits. That is what they are trading to get their money back. For me who just relied on the interest, lost in no time.

This is truly my biggest learning. Whew! I never had ask them about it.

Just yesterday I sent an SMS [to my friends who invested] on what is their plans now. Well, a friend said, “groping in the dark.” Kawawa naman siya. Well, life is what we make it. It is indeed pitiful to focus on our mistakes to lead us to nowhere.

josie08 wrote:

[I invested] also but unfortunately [I did not expect this] to last for only two months and I lost my money. [The fact is] inutang ko pa ang pera with high interest. It’s sad to say but mahirap habulin naman ang upline and file a complain. Abala lang yan. [There’s] due process in court, matatagalan, at the same time, magkakasamaan lang kayo ng loob. WALA naman may gusto malugi. IT’S ALL OUR FAULT. Naghangad tayo. So wala na lang sisihan. The best thing to do, let’s start again and make the day worth for us.

Baon sa utang wrote:

Sana bumalik p ang FS… Di p nmin nbabawi ang ininvest nmin…
UTANG PA YUN SA 5/6…

Mga hinay*pak na upline yan pinagtataguan na kmi..

coldfire wrote:

kami po nangutang pa para lang makapag-invest sa francswiss but pagkapasok (July 3) kinagabihan pinalabas sa tv patrol yung warning. ngayon kahit singko wala kaming nakuha, di ko alam san kami pupulutin ngayon, may utang pa kami. sana ‘wag magsuffer mga anak namin, i have a new born baby pa naman. ano po pwede namin gawin, may habol po ba kami sa francswiss o sa nagrecruit sa amin?

If you have your own FrancSwiss stories to share, post them in the Comments section below or in the HYIP: FrancSwiss thread. We’ll be reading.

Further reading:

James Ryan Jonas teaches business management, investments, and entrepreneurship at the University of the Philippines (UP). He is also the Executive Director of UP Provident Fund Inc., managing and investing P3.2 Billion ($56.4 Million) worth of retirement funds on behalf of thousands of UP employees.