Moneylife » Life » Public Interest » ET Wealth claims it ‘warned’ investors about Speak Asia scam. Really?
ET Wealth claims it ‘warned’ investors about Speak Asia scam. Really?
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| 28/11/2012 05:00 PM |
ET Wealth is claiming it saved its readers from Speak Asia in 2011? Here is a case of a mainline publication that was then running for the advertising buck and now pretending to hunt for the investors!
After the recent arrest of scamster couple—the Khaires—who promoted StockguruIndia (first exposed by Moneylife) which promised 120% returns per annum, ET Wealth—an investment tabloid from the Times group—published an article warning investors not to fall for Ponzi schemes. The 26th November article claimed that it had alerted readers about Speak Asia, a Ponzi scam that duped lakhs of Indians in May 2011. In this article, it claimed that on 9th May 2011 it had pointed out that “Speak Asia’s model was suspiciously similar to a Ponzi scheme. In the weeks that followed, the Speak Asia bubble burst and top functionaries were taken into custody for financial irregularities.” ET Wealth almost seems to claim its article led to Speak Asia’s downfall.
To our shock, far from openly calling Speak Asia a fraud, as Moneylife has done (see links below), the ET Wealth article on 9 May 2011 downplayed the fraud with tentative comments like “It is this feature of online survey companies that makes them appear similar to Ponzi schemes.” However, it provided generous space to Speak Asia Chief Marketing Officer making nonsensical claims like “These surveys are conducted on behalf of our corporate clients and very large market research agencies. The survey results are used in preparing commissioned industrial research reports which are priced at lakhs of dollars.” All these claims were patently false and could have been verified with a few calls or emails. Readers would recall the Speak Asia CMO claiming that Indian corporates who used its survey services were—ICICI Bank, Bharti Airtel, Bata and Nestle.
Here is something more startling. Even after Speak Asia’s COO Tarak Bajpai and other officials were arrested on 29 July 2011, ET Wealth continued to receive and publish the dubious advertisements. The pitch in these latter ones was, “Contrary to popular belief we are not going anywhere except forward. We reiterate that we are not here just to stay, we are here to grow.”
Here are some of Moneylife articles published much before May 2011, which exposed Speak Asia and were available on the internet for anyone who wanted another view. Moneylife was the first to expose the Speak Asia fraud in October 2010, a fact that was acknowledged by the mainstream media after it became clear that the promoters of this Singapore-registered company had transferred over Rs800 crore overseas and it could collapse. http://www.moneylife.in/article/competition-heats-up-in-online-survey-space-with-the-entry-of-domestic-mlm-companies/15827.html
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Comment
240p FLV 6 months ago
Too bad you some people like Pattabhi don\'t like the self-congratulaory tone of the article. Are you people at least Moneylife subscribers or a freeloaders?
As long as your subscription and all the advertisement money goes to the mainstream media, please learn to be a bit tolerant of the other voices, especially when such people are consistently fighting against all odds.
Siddarth 6 months ago
Times Group Chairman has gone on record saying they are an advertising company .News is just an byproduct so it is not fair to expect them to have any sort of integrity anyways. Shysters of the first order.
P M Ravindran 6 months ago
Well, I forgot one more thing. Whether what we refer to as government in this country itself isn't a Ponzi scheme and possibly the biggest of 'em all?
P M Ravindran 6 months ago
Kudos to Sucheta Dalal for taking on the Moghul of the media, long notorious for its mercenary activities! Anyhow, their successful model has certainly reduced the space for honest, reliable media. Wish Moneylife can continue undaunted and lead the charge in the interest of the gullible citizens of this country. While gullibility may be an inadequate term, the question arises whether they are also the greedy and never say learn types also!
Madhur Kotharay 6 months ago
It will be interesting to find out if the Times group had a 'Private Treaty' with SpeakAsia.