The im.B platform, which advertises as a matchmaking lending and investment platform, was actually involved in defrauding NT$9 billion with fake claims, and packaged it into a "Ponzi scheme" with the help of celebrity endorsements or photos, causing thousands of victims across Taiwan. The Taipei District Prosecutor's Office indicted the mastermind Tsang Yaofeng, his girlfriend Zhang Shufen and more than 30 people last year (2023) on the basis of the Banking Act and other crimes. After a trial, the Taipei District Court sentenced Zeng Yaofeng to 16 years and six months in prison on August 1. The verdict can be appealed.
The establishment of im.B platform involves attracting nearly NT$9 billion in funds
Taiwan Jinlong Technology Company uses its im.B platform to attract investors in the name of real estate debt and coupon debt. The platform salesperson falsely claimed that annual interest rates of up to 6% to 13% were guaranteed to attract a large number of people to invest. According to the verdict, the platform attracted a total of 8.34439326 yuan from June 29, 2016 to May 2 last year.
Court ruling: Person in charge Zeng Yaofeng and co-defendants
The Taipei District Court sentenced Zeng Yaofeng to 16 years and six months in prison for violating banking laws and money laundering, and his girlfriend Zhang Shufen was sentenced to 12 years and two months. They also confiscated 7.12535 million yuan in criminal proceeds. In the same case, Chen Zhenkun, a former consultant to the Executive Yuan, was accused of helping Zeng Yaofeng out of business and was sentenced to one year in prison for money laundering, suspended for four years; Taiwan Jinlong Technology Company was sentenced to a fine of 100 million yuan. The remaining 27 defendants, including Zeng Yaofeng's father Zeng Mingxiang, They were sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment of one to eight years, and seven of them received suspended sentences. All defendants may appeal.
Tsang Yaofeng and Zhang Shufen are still in custody. Tsang Yaofeng had four arrest warrants before his arrest, including the pending execution of his sentence in the gun case. During the trial, the judge refused to post bail for Zeng and did not agree to change his status from a defendant in custody to a prisoner to prevent him from escaping. Chen Zhenzhong posted a bail of NT$1.5 million during the trial, but was sentenced to eight years in prison and required an additional bail of NT$2 million, with restrictions on his residence and travel abroad.
im.B platform scam: fake claims on real estate
Zeng Yaofeng, who calls himself "Zeng Guowei", founded a real estate debt matching platform in 2016, and later set up the im.B lending matching and mutual benefit platform website, claiming to provide P2P online lending platform services. However, since 2019, in order to continue to attract money, Zeng and Zhang Shufen relisted or divided the settled real estate claims into several claims, and even used fake claims to attract investors to continue investing.
Illegal money-making: illegal business model
The collegial panel held that Taiwan Jinlong Technology Co., Ltd. operates on the basis of "paying back money to support front-end money". The interest paid to investors actually comes from the principal of other investors, which constitutes illegal money-drawing behavior. The investment returns promised by Zeng Yaofeng and others were several times higher than the lending rates of legitimate financial institutions. The returns were obviously not equivalent to the principal, resulting in a large amount of money being attracted.
(Endorsers are immune! The JPEX platform attracted NT$16.3 billion globally, Chen Lingjiu’s endorsement case was not prosecuted, and partner Tigger was prosecuted)
This article Taiwan Jinlong Technology Company im.B money-sucking scandal: the person in charge was sentenced to 16 years in prison in the first instance first appeared on Chain News ABMedia.
