GameStop FOMO inspires a new wave of crypto pump-and-dumps | Ars Technica Interesting how many were identified.
Fear and Greed will always be in the financial markets. That is why Bernie Madoff and his ilk will always have a lot of willing victims, tripping over themselves to hand scammers their monies. The Nigerian Prince scam has been around for a long time yet, victims till to this day are plentiful. People just never learn and they just think they will make tens of millions out of thin air. Not going to happen in this lifetime or even the next one. "If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is."
Speaking of Madoff, I had a friend who was in one of the feeder funds. Getting 8%. I kept on telling him over 3 years that he should consider that a Junk Bond type investment. After 3 years I got him to cash in. It was about 20% of his portfolio. 9 months later, Madoff was caught. The guy with the feeder fund got trashed for 15 Mil or 75% of his portfolio. Remember the 7 day floaters? Those gave about a 1 year warning sign before they went illiquid. Dodged that one too. If it is really good, stay for awhile, but always be ready to jump out. Greed short term is manageable but not "perma-greed"
HYIP's in the 2000's were straight up ponzi schemes and it was exciting, almost like a video game, to partake in. The goal was to cash in and move on to the next one before it went belly up. I believe talkgold.com was the forum for HYIP's.
Just found these after a quick email search. I came out ahead in these things but I bet most lost money. I wouldn't be surprised if I had a bunch of bitcoin that is now lost since that was also part of their ponzi schemes.
What I am getting at is that the pump and dump or ponzi schemes have been around for a long time, before the internet, and they will continue just like smallfil said due to fear and greed.