Beware! BTCBankGroup has stopped paying! Do not invest there!

Hello everybody! There’s not a great deal of news to report on tonight, and what little there is I had been thinking of saving for tomorrow. I’ve decided to post anyway though, because the new program that was introduced on my blog last night – BTCBankGroup just in case you didn’t read it – has now been moved to Paying Status after I successfully received my first payment from them. In many ways it’s a fairly traditional HYIP in terms of the actual mechanics, though in other ways the program seems to be taking a somewhat different approach. So before what will be a pretty short news section let’s start things off for tonight with a closer look at BTCBankGroup and see what they have to offer us.

I suppose it’s difficult to give a proper description of what BTCBankGroup are all about without first mentioning a topic that’s been popping up in the news more and more recently which is Bitcoin. As I’m sure many of you will be aware, that’s a digital currency that people spend online, and can then convert into real cash. Not just a payment processor now, but an actual currency that rises and falls in value the same way as the dollar, euro, yen, ruble, and so on. The difference is that you can’t physically see or touch Bitcoin as it’s got to be converted into real money first. So why is this important in the context of BTCBankGroup? Well, to be honest I’m not sure that it is all that important, but it will help you understand how the admin is claiming to be running the business. It’s because like I said that the value of Bitcoin can go up as well as down just like traditional currency that BTCBankGroup say they are trading it. It’s much the same way as other HYIP admins like to describe themselves as “ForEx traders” I suppose, and in the same vein as why most of the experienced HYIP investors are unlikely to believe a word of it. I know I certainly can’t prove it for you though it does at least make the whole process a lot easier to understand.

So now that that’s out of the way, let’s take a look at what really brings us here – the investment plans. You’ve really only got the one option to choose from, so it’s a simple case of take it or leave it. It’s been a popular model when used by other HYIPs in the past though, so I guess a lot of you will probably like it.

All investors are treated the same and paid the very same rate of interest regardless of the size of your deposit. Just as long as you can come up with the $20 minimum that BTCBankGroup require to join, then you’re in. What differentiates this plan from the majority of the industry then is that there is no fixed expiry date. That much has to be decided by you the investor. You can stay as long or as short as you like and are free to ask BTCBankGroup for your principal back anytime you like. As long as you stay a member you are offered 1% interest per calendar day. At this point it’s also up to you as to what you think a realistic target is, or what exactly you are hoping to achieve by joining BTCBankGroup. 10%? 50%? Double your money? Ride the whole thing out until it closes? Whatever your hopes or expectations are, you just need to allow 1% per day, and then count the days until you get there. BTCBankGroup have no maximum limit on deposits.

I do think it’s great that plans like this give the investors a degree of flexibility not often seen in other HYIPs. What I’d be worried about though is that offering everybody all of their money back at any time is wildly unpredictable, and with cash flow the single most important driving force behind every HYIP can make things very difficult to plan. What happens if everyone asks for their money back on the same day? Or a more likely scenario, what if more people start leaving BTCBankGroup than joining? What might help there is that you do not necessarily have to take all of your principal out at the same time. Sort of like a bank account (but for God’s sake don’t treat it like one!) you can just take a couple of dollars out when you want something back, and leave the rest to continue earning interest on.

Anyway, it that’s the plan you’re looking for and you think a suitable addition to your portfolio then you’ll need to know about the payment options open to you. As you might expect given the background story BTCBankGroup are of course accepting Bitcoin. For the more traditional HYIP players you still have all the remaining popular providers in SolidTrustPay, EgoPay, PerfectMoney, and HD-Money. Withdrawal requests are processed manually and so must be made by logging into your private members account area. While it doesn’t actually specify this at the moment on the BTCBankGroup website, I can tell you (I know because I asked the admin) that all transactions should be processed within 24 hours of request.

On the security and design side of things I can’t say I was entirely impressed. It’s not a major issue that can’t be easily fixed or anything, but there’s currently no SSL encryption for the BTCBankGroup website. This is kinda surprising, perhaps disappointing even, for a program calling itself a “bank”, don’t you think? Other than that the program is running off a script which is customized and quite original. I know I’ve seen it use before mind, though not more than once or twice and have to say it was solid enough and generally dependable. On the topic of hosting however, the subject is a lot less clear cut. The BTCBankGroup website itself is hosted on a SoftLayer server provided by MonsterHost. DDoS protection is the real grey area though. It’s not that unusual for a website to have different providers supplying the server and the DDoS protection, except in the case of BTCBankGroup the website’s FAQ page states that DDoS protection comes from BlockDos while the admin mentioned BlackLotus in an e-mail to me. At least one of them has to be wrong, and I can’t see any evidence of either so at this point cannot vouch for what, if any, level of protection is being offered to them. If you have any further questions for the admin then you can get in touch either by filling in your details on the online customer support form and submitting it through the contacts page, or else by just writing directly to the listed e-mail address. BTCBankGroup also include a fax number, but as there’s no information about where this machine is located and who’s going to be picking up whatever comes out the other side I would suggest you avoid sending anything confidential.

As for the website content (texts) and business plan to support the whole thing, on one hand it’s all quite original in the sense that it hasn’t been copy/pasted, and that the concept of trading Bitcoin hasn’t (yet!) been done to death by other HYIP admins. Then on the other hand, how different is anything being said by BTCBankGroup really from the thousands of other programs pretending to trade ForEx? You just replace a paper currency with a digital one and continue. I also don’t quite get the notion that if something changes in value every day how anyone can offer you a guaranteed fixed rate of interest every single day. I mean, how is it always going to be the same rate of interest when you have no idea what’s going to happen in the market next week or next month? How do you know if the value of Bitcoin is even going to fluctuate at all? Because if it stays the same value then the admin comes up with the members profits out of his own pocket, and I think we all know about the track record of HYIP admins when that situation arises, as it always inevitably does.

My point is that I don’t see any difference in essence between BTCBankGroup and pretty much any other new HYIP launching today. I must admin the Bitcoin angle does put an interesting spin on things as admins struggle to come to terms with and come up with some fresh ideas in the post LibertyReserve world, so kudos to this one for sticking his neck out and trying something different. But I still wouldn’t back down from the same advice offered to those on the verge of joining any other online HYIP – set yourself a sensible spending limit that you can afford to lose, and if you’re going to press ahead with BTCBankGroup then at least consider using them only as a smaller part of a wider more diverse portfolio.

DAILY NEWS FROM THE INDUSTRY

EMPIREFINANCEGROUP – DEPOSITS ENABLED AGAIN

The most important news today came from EmpireFinanceGroup (reviewed here) – a program with over a three year history of instant payments already. From now on deposits are enabled again to the following plans, all with principal back on expiry – 1.3% for 45 business days, 1.5% for 80 business days, 1.7% for 100 business days. It’s hard to believe that EmpireFinanceGroup, being online for that long, managed to survive the recent LR demise and even converted investors deposits into PerfectMoney which it currently accepts with EgoPay. Regarding the enabled deposits as of today I remind you that EmpireFinanceGroup does this on quite a regular basis, disabling new deposits for a few days before turning them back on again. I guess the trick worked fine for them so far, and possibly the main reason for employing it so often is the desire to stand alone from other HYIPs that actually need some constant cashflow in order to maintain the payouts. Of course that’s just an illusion the admin is trying to seed in investors’ minds, and in actual fact EmpireFinanceGroup is not much safer than any other risky online investment program. Except in this case nobody can deny that for the three years online the program made rich a lot of lucky investors. Here’s the latest news from the program:

“We resume accepting new deposits – EmpireFinanceGroup
Dear customers, we resume accepting new investment deposits. Thank you for active cooperation with EmpireFinanceGroup. For questions or suggestions regarding service, please contact our Support department through Live Chat or phone number 1-800-6056204.
EmpireFinanceGroup Support Department”.

PUREINCOME – TRYING TO LOOK LIKE THE REAL DEAL

It looks like the admin of PureIncome is trying to use exactly the same tactics to persuade investors that the program has nothing to do with the HYIP industry. Well, in my opinion, nothing can be ruled out as a Ponzi if it accepts either LibertyReserve (now defunct) or PerfectMoney which PureIncome gladly does alongside EgoPay. Yes, it’s true the program managed to escape the LR crisis and even those who originally deposited in PureIncome using LR saw their deposits converted into PerfectMoney. That’s certainly a great thing about PureIncome, but it doesn’t prove that the program is any different from the rest of the HYIP world even if the admin Mark is clearly trying to sway investor opinion to the opposite. The investment process where PureIncome tries to impress with different types of shares, bonds and even companies, also will never be able to prove how on earth the program manages to pay variable interest up to 2.9% daily (where many offline banks don’t offer that in a year!) and yet promising to return initial deposits on expiry of the 180 calendar day investment term. Of course making his program different from others the admin Mark managed to impress some investors, but overcoming the emergency with LR certainly doesn’t make PureIncome different from other programs monitored on MNO. Arguably better maybe, but essentially not that much different. Below is the latest from PureIncome (reviewed here) in full:

“Official Newsletter from PureIncome
I hope you are doing well and enjoying your stay with PureIncome! We are pleased to inform you that our company has almost recovered the losses triggered by the Liberty Reserve shutdown and keeps evolving and making profits. Following the recent marketing research I noticed that many users do not understand how PureIncome works. Let me clarify this for you.
PureIncome is a successful online business which has nothing common with HYIPs. The company’s revenue relies upon losses the customers have on virtual shares of Companies 1-5, and the bid/ask spread difference of these shares. That’s how we payoff our short-term and long-term obligations on PureIncome bonds and shares. We have also created a stabilization fund where we transfer a certain percentage of our profit each day. This fund exists in order to maintain the stability of PureIncome shares and bonds in case of any unforeseen circumstances. It is due to the fund we were able to get over the Liberty Reserve shutdown which dramatically diminished the number of customers buying/selling Companies 1-5 shares, but fortunately did not undermine the payouts on PureIncome shares and bonds.
I often come across various questions related to the company’s sustainability – ” What will happen if customers stop speculating in Companies 1-5 shares? How will you be able to provide a stable growth of PureIncome shares and bonds?” My answer – that’s not going to happen as our company is evolving dynamically and has already hit major challenges. Liberty Reserve can be one of them. Some of you think that Companies 1-5 shares trading is a game. Yes, it is the game that we turned into a perfect business where you can either gain or lose. On the other hand PureIncome shares and bonds investment is a sustainable business that does not depend on external factors and recessions but helps our investors get outstanding returns all year long!
Best Regards, Mark Cobe
Marketing Director of PureIncome”.

GET PAID REPORT FOR 11/06/2013

Here is the list of the programs from my monitor that paid me for the last 24 hours:
From MNO Sticky list: –
From MNO Premium list: MalaysianINC, EuroStar, RonWards, EmpireFinanceGroup, SilverOz, WunevAssets, ProfitBuzz, BTCBankGroup (the first payment received).
From MNO Standard list: PureIncome.
From MNO Basic list: InvestmentCapital, FiamaCorp, MagicInvest, TheInvestmentBank, CycloGroup, ProfitHome, CapitalALimited.

That’s all for tonight guys, and I hope to see you on MNO again very soon! Thanks for reading and good luck with your investments!