Chinese police arrested 230 people suspected in financial pyramid creation

Almaty. July 31. Silkroadnews – Chinese police have arrested 230 members of a suspected pyramid scheme, the Singapore-headquartered Straits Times reported.
“Chinese police have arrested 230 members of a suspected pyramid scheme, a week after a rare demonstration in Beijing protesting a crackdown on the group. On Sunday (July 30), the Guangdong public security bureau said on its official social media account that 230 members of the scheme had been arrested, with 142 facing criminal charges. It added that 55 companies suspected of involvement in the scheme have been put under investigation, and pledged to “maintain the high pressure crackdown”, the report said.
According to the publication, Shanxinhui was registered in the city of Shenzhen in 2013 as an organization partaking in “cultural activities”. The official Web resources of the organization have been blank since last week, but a cached version of the Shanxinhui website described the organization as an investment group founded in 2013 with the goal of forest conservation and poverty alleviation.
According to China National Radio, as of June, up to 2.3 million participants in the pyramid have not received the promised payment of billions of yuan.
The founder of the pyramid Zhang Tianming and several employees were arrested suspected of defrauding “a huge amount of property” “under the guise of helping the poor and achieving common wealth”.
On July 24 in Beijing there was a mass demonstration demanding to stop the investigation against Shanxinhui and free Zhang Tianming and other leaders of the organization.
It is reported that financial pyramids have become increasingly popular in China in recent years actively promoting through the social media networks. According to the Ministry of Public Security, in 2016 police investigated 2,886 financial pyramids cases, which is 20% more than in 2015.