Wealth Generators (now known Kuvera LLC and Kuvera Global) has been one of the hottest MLM (Multi-Level-Marketing) companies in 2015. They made a lot of buzz, they promised to make everyone rich and they signed up loads of associates (aka distributors) to promote the business to others.
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If you are reading this post in hopes of finding positive information on Wealth Generators then stop reading now. Today I’ll be writing about the dark side of MLM and I’ll be sharing some details about this specific company that the people involved with WG will not like at all.
If you’ve been to my blog before you know that I don’t like MLMs simply because most of them (not all) turn out to be pyramid schemes, stealing money from easily influenced people. However, since I work in the marketing space, I can’t help but be exposed to a lot of news in the industry. This is how I come across yet another shiny promising Network Marketing businesses, the Wealth Generators.
Colombia’s Superintendencia Financiera regulatory body (similar to SEC), claims that the Wealth Generators is a pyramid scheme. The Financial Superintendence of Colombia made this claim against the company on December 16th 2016:
The Superintendency was able to verify that the mentioned company offers to pay “benefits” represented in money, to affiliates that fulfill the requirement of recruiting more people who contribute their monetary resources, which is the only source of money that sustains the pyramid.
The success (of Wealth Generators) depends on the recruitment of more affiliates who contribute money to keep the pyramid growing in geometric progression.
Superintendencia reminded the residents of Colombia that pyramid schemes are illegal in the country and the people participating in such practices run the risk of becoming involved in illegal activity.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is the tipping point.
In this case I got very curious about Wealth Generators because of the people involved in it. You see, some of their top sales people were also involved in WakeUpNow (WUN). WUN worked hard on recruiting innocent people into its pyramid scheme for about 5 years. It ended up falling apart (as it usually does) and since a lot of people were losing money (82% of their members), the top recruiters started leaving the company, blaming the management, blaming each other and blaming pretty much everyone else on the planet except themselves.
Fast-forward a few short months and we started seeing the same people now promoting the Wealth Generators. These salesmen do have a talent at persuading gullible people into joining another over-hyped network by promising incredible riches and a minimum amount of work (if any at all). If you ever tell any of the WG “associates” that the business sounds like a pyramid scheme, they would look all offended and they’ll start yelling: “How can it be a pyramid? Pyramid schemes are illegal!”… more on that later.
WG positions itself as a “proven plan to financial fitness and personal wealth”. Their promotional videos tell you that you don’t need to have any experience in trading or finance for that matter and that you only need to invest 1 to 2 hours per month to achieve financial success. This is the first red flag. Do you really think you can invest 1 hour per month and start trading FOREX (foreign exchange) and make millions of dollars? Top traders on Wall Street spend 60-80 hours every single week working, but Wealth Generators can show you how to do in 1 hour per month… seriously?
However, if you look up any of their team leaders, they will never tell you anything about trading on WG tools. They will explain that the real money comes from selling Wealth Generators memberships to other people. Whenever you enroll new members into the program – you make money. And this is, ladies and gentlemen, the main goal of WG – to recruit as many paying members as possible. So yes, Wealth Generators is a multi-level-marketing company. Like many other similar companies who went bankrupt or got shot down by the FTC, WG uses their “financial tools” as a front for their possible pyramid scheme. They came up with a front-end “product” so they could stay legal in the eyes of the law but it probably won’t last long.
WG offers some basic training on Forex as well as a forex software. They also offer you access to TaxBot, a software that will help you keep track of your expenses and income to facilitate your tax declaration. WakeUpNow also offered TaxBot to their members. Now TaxBot is a legit software, certified by the IRS (as far as I know) and it normally retails at $19.99, it also often goes on sale and you could get it for $9.99.
You also get access to a Forex trading software. This is where it gets more interesting. Their software allows you to trade virtual money (simulation) or you could start trading real money, if you are willing to risk it and the risk is very high. This kind of software has been around for YEARS and most of the time you can get it completely free. Forex software developers give it out for free because they make a commission every single time you trade real money. They don’t care if you lose your life savings or if you turn a profit – as soon as you put real money through the system – they will earn a commission. Maybe Wealth Generators makes money off of your trades maybe they don’t, their main goal after all is to have you enroll more members into the system.
The main concern here is the advice they give you on trading. I have not been able to find any proof that WG reps are certified by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). It is illegal to give any kind of financial advice in the US without being certified/approved by SEC and similar financial authorities in other countries. They might get destroyed by SEC once the commission figures out what WG does, however I am sure that WG has good lawyers to protect themselves (at least for a while).
Ask any professional (and certified) trader about Forex and they will tell you the risk is incredibly high and even people with 20-30-40 years of experience in the field would usually recommend against trading forex as there is no way to predict the outcome.
Wealth Generators membership costs $129.99 per month. However when you’ll be joining, you would be highly encouraged to also pay the one time fee of $249 so you would qualify for coded bonuses (and then keep paying the $130 monthly fee). But hey, if you bring in 3 other members willing to pay $130 each, WG will wave your membership fee. Their membership fees keep jumping around but at the time of writing this that’s the cost of joining WG.
What do you get for $130 per month? A $9.99 tax software and a free forex trading software. More importantly, you get the right to sell the WG opportunity to your friends, family and everyone else around.
If you are working with Wealth Generators a.k.a. Kuvera, you’re probably already on the edge after reading this blog post. I know you want to kick me in the face screaming WG cannot be a pyramid scheme because pyramid schemes are illegal, and I understand you. Selling the “financial tools” as a product actually does make WG legit, at least temporarily. However, I looked through the content published by WG’s top earners and I realized that they never talk about forex, or investing, or taxbot, or anything else beside the recruitment. They train people by showing their compensation plan and by explaining that real money is in the enrollment of new members for Wealth Generators.
Wealth Generators comp explanation videos show us how you will get paid 7 level deep into the system (or pyramid). For example, your sign up 3 people. Each one of them signs up 3 people. Each one of them signs up 3 people. And so on for 7 levels. Here is an image of a 3 level pyramid just to give you an idea.
So how much do you get paid for enrolling new members into the Wealth Generators system?
They will pay you $5 for every active members. Of course many restrictions apply on comp plans and bonus but the general rule is you get 5$ per customer. Also they have this thing called clubs. Club basically means you are getting a guaranteed amount of money every month. For example if you have 12 people in your pyramid downline, you’ll make $500 plus $5 per each member (total $560). Of course people will fall off your line, many will see it as a scam and just quit, many others will be forced to quit because they aren’t making a single dime yet they have to spend $130 monthly to remain a member. The point is, you’ll always have to be pushing this “opportunity” on new members in order to make some kind of money. This is not a business, this is a job which requires you to trick people into wasting their hard-earned money by promising them easy and indefinite riches.
If you look at the Wealth Generators earnings disclaimer, they clearly state that: “Many Wealth Generators are UNABLE to earn ANY commission”. This shouldn’t come as a surprise. Although Wealth Generators is yet to publish an income report for their members you could simply look at any other MLM report to get an idea of income levels. About 0.1% to 0.2% of people in these companies will generate 6 figure incomes. Yes, that’s the very top level of the pyramid. The owners of the company and the few top recruiters. Less than 1% of people will earn around 6-10k for a full year. More than 80% of people will not make a single dime and will actually lose money. I am sure it’s not any different with WG.
Like many other MLM companies, Wealth Generators is registered in Utah. Utah is considered as MLM heaven because of their MLM friendly laws and low taxes. Additionally, the laws in Utah oblige companies to offer a 72 hours full refund to every customer. This time frame is quite larger in all other states. Three (3) days may not be enough for most people to realize they are being involved in a scam. If you look at the donations received by the Republican and Democratic parties in Utah, the top 2-3 companies that donate money are MLM companies (much bigger than WG). There are also several congressmen and women in Utah who are involved in MLM companies and publicly endorse them.
Wealth Generators also promises to refund you TRIPLE of your membership fees if you fail to make money with their Forex software within 6 months. This guarantee sounds amazing and very enticing. However you need to understand that there are very specific requirements to be entitled for this refund. You need to prove that you’ve been following the training to the dot (how can you ever prove that?) and you need to show them that you have done a required number of trades. Needless to say that they will find a reason why you didn’t qualify for their triple refund.
Also, most people who will refuse to become WG associates and will only use the software provided to them will cancel their membership within a month or two, or maybe even three months. People will pay the membership fee of $130 per month, they will realize they can’t make money trading Forex and that TaxBot only costs $10 (when it’s on sale). But if you cancel your membership without sticking around for the whole 6 months (about $800 investment from you), you will also be disqualified from any refunds. As simple as that.
I think Wealth Generators is yet another pyramid scheme. There is a very thin and faded line between the very rare legit direct selling companies and milti-level-marketing pyramid schemes that scam people. Whenever a new MLM appears they need to come up with a “product” in order to disguise their main structure – the pyramid. FTC (Federal Trade Commission) understands this and they often shut down such companies because they understand that the “product” or “service” offered is phony and simply serves as a disguise. However, the bureaucracy and amazing lawyers who are hired by pyramid scheme MLM companies makes FTC’s job very hard and long-lasting.
Sometimes it takes a few years for the FTC to review a company and prove that a company is in fact operating an illegal pyramid scheme and not a legitimate business. While the investigation goes on, MLM recruiters keep running around screaming “It’s not a pyramid scheme, that would be illegal!”. Earlier this year Vemma MLM company was shut down by the FTC for that same reason. Their reps also ran around in circles calling people stupid for not understanding the amazing opportunity of Vemma. However, when FTC shut it down for running a pyramid scheme most of the reps shut up and moved to yet another MLM scheme (I am sure some of them are now proudly representing Wealth Generators).
That’s because there isn’t an easy way. You can certainly start your own successful business online but get ready to work hard.
About 99% of MLM companies don’t last more than 5-6 years. Some decide to shut down before FTC forces them. Some will declare bankruptcy in order to avoid refunding the members or paying out compensations (while the owners are laughing all the way to the bank) and some others will eventually be shut down by the FTC.
This is of course a speculation on my part but I see WG being shut down before 2018. The easiest way to predict the eventual end of an MLM is by simply following a few of their top recruiters. These people know what’s going on and they are the first to jump ship.
I hope you enjoyed this post and I hope you haven’t lost money by joining the Wealth Generators.
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– Alex
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Thank you for putting this out there Alex. Knowing the financial world I know how much work people put into the analysis of stock exchange/forex/pennystock/etc. I recently attended a WG meeting in LA where they clearly do not educate on the financial side of making money but on the recruitment of other members clearly a pyramid. A couple of friends have been wanting me to join but I refused as it is clearly a business waiting to get shut down. I met a guy at the meeting who was supposed to be one of the "leaders" remembered his name and with a little bit of digging and research I found out he was involved with another company called VEMMA that was shut down a couple of years ago for being a pyramid. Please google VEMMA and read about how that company was shut down. I found A LOT of similarities between VEMMA and WG the only thing changing is that instead of selling juice it is now a software. I really hope I'm wrong and this works out for my friends who are part of it but the history and odds are against them. The reason I write this is because they recruit people similar in age who are in a vulnerable position in theirs lives (college students/ young adults who are about to transition in a stage in life and feel lost) and promise them the stars by making them feel like they are profiting a few bucks every couple of weeks. I would hate to see more of these young minority adults contribute the little money they have with false hope.
Pablo, it is very unfortunate that they're going after vulnerable people who simply don't know any better.
I blogged about VEMMA shutting down in the past.
A few years ago there was another big MLM called Wake Up Now. Several of WUN top recruiters jumped ship when the news of WUN shutting down came out. Guess where these recruiters went? Wealth Generators. And they will eventually jump that ship as well and simply join/open new MLM scheme to keep milking their downline.
Thanks for the info, I've been studying forex for a few months, and here in Mexico I got an invite to subscribe to WG, but as you explained on this post, it is so fishy when they just don't even really seem to earn that much in FX but some of them say they have earned from other people.
that is just sad.
It is sad and it is how pyramids work.
I started WG in December. I don't recruit. I got in for the investment, to be able to make trades. Because I'm in Canada I don't have to physically make the trades. the software does it for me. Since January of 2017 I have made between 4% to 5.5% monthly on the money that I've put in my trading account. I leave the money in my trading account and occasionally add to it. Based on the last four months leaving my money where it is at an average of 5.5% interest compounded daily I will be very wealthy in a few years. You say you've never seen proof. I'd be happy to show you the screen shots of the monthly amounts I've made so far this year as proof.
Will I sponsor anyone? Maybe. I might share the idea with a few people some day, those who are interested in making more that 1.45% interest that bank gives.
I am glad to hear it's working out for you and yes, I would like to see proof of 4-5.5% of monthly interest.
Don't pay any attention to dream stealers. I'm in WG, and one of their products is krypto currencies. I googled it to see what it is about, and found out in four years it will be a 19 Trillion dollar industry. Now is a good time to get in.
Hi, did you mean Crypto?
If so then there are many great resources to learn more about cryptocurrrency. I do own some ETH and BTC however the value of these currencies as well as the value of the industry in the future is just a speculation. If you do however decide to invest yourself in cryptocurrency please do so by using a reliable and trusted service.
Alex
I took pictures of the proof, but didn't have a way to post it here so unless you give me a way to show you I can only tell you, March 1 - March 31 $1000 deposit in my forex account - profit for the month $75.10 from April 1 to April 30, on that same $1000 deposit - profit $75.56 and for June 1st to June 10 (with another $2000 deposited into the account to bring it up to $3000 deposited by me in the account) - profit so far this month $33.21
Hi Tabatha. You can upload screenshots to IMGUR or similar sites. I would also like to see your long-term profits (over 6monts - 1 year).
Also I would be interested in hearing why you need a WG membership and can't use any other free trader software (as there are plenty).
Alex
Hello Alex, what about the acquisition of Wealth Generators from InvestView, now WG is going public for the stock market. Whats your opinion about that? There`s any background with other MLM companies doing the same thing?
Hi Lucio.
I haven't looked into InvestView and have no opinion about this at the moment.
What I'd like to remind you is the company called Enron. They are often referred to as one of the biggest scams in the recent U.S. history. Their stocks caused a loss of $78 Billion to investors and a lot of folks lost their life savings, retirement funds, houses and so on. Just because the company is publicly traded doesn't necessarily mean that everything is legit.
Alex
I am curious what does Wealth Generators have to do with Enron. Since those days there have been law like the Sarbanes-Oxley Act and other fail government agencies that regulate these types of businesses heavily. I have done personal research into this company and find no real fault in them. Also they are publicly traded and have an A+ rating with the BBB for over 4 year. Better than most banks in America.
So before you start a blog and deceive people do your research sir....
Hi ML.
The reference to Enron was to simply prove a point that even a huge corporation trusted by millions can be a scam. Sure there have been new regulations added. However, many publicly trade companies are still getting fined and shut down consistently. It takes time to prove a company's wrong-doing, sometimes it takes years. So the simple fact that it's "out there" does not actually prove the legitimacy.
Unfortunately your BBB reference is also of no help. This next bit comes from Time.com :
"The investigation showed extortion-type practices applied to local businesses: Those that paid annual dues to the BBB were handed accreditation and A ratings, while those that didn’t play along were given subpar grades, even if they hadn’t received complaints."
The A+ rating on BBB is achieved by simply paying BBB's membership fees. It's as simple as that.
Good luck to you,
Alex
Please I will want to know more about TCC (Trade coin club) How real is the business or is it a scam. Is the company registered in the USA to actually trade on coins like Bitcoin and the rest.
Hi Onny,
I haven't heard of Trade Coin Club and I will look into it.
From a quick look it seems like TCC doesn't have a good reputation so I would recommend not giving them any money before doing more research.
The company also seems to be registered in Belize (offshore) and not in the US.
Dear Alex
You are an angel. Please do keep up the good work.
I would like to become more familiar on how to make
some legitimate income and the affiliate marketing sounds good. Been pondering over how it is does.
I had been approached by some individuals who call themselves legitimate.
I am happy to hear you found this post helpful Lisa.
A little while ago I did a very detailed explanation on Affiliate Marketing model, feel free to check it out here.
Alex
Very int resting reading all the comments and seeing some refer to Wealth Generators as a Pyramid Scheme. So what is a pyramid - it is where one at the top makes all the money or takes the decisions. Every business is therefore a pyramid and even the US Government with the President at the top of a team which goes down through the ranks to the people.
I was happy to join Wealth Generators and being in UK was able to open an FX Multiplier account which has generated 3.4% monthly over 8 months. This definitely beats what I'd get in a bank.
Wilson a pyramid scheme is a business model that recruits members via a promise of payments or services for enrolling others into the scheme, rather than supplying investments or sale of products or services. As recruiting multiplies, recruiting becomes quickly impossible, and most members are unable to profit; as such, pyramid schemes are unsustainable and often illegal.
Any regular business doesn't recruit it's buyers asking them to recruit multiple layers inside the same business. Besides, you end up with a product that you actually need and use. How many WG members actually use the (useless) FX Multiplier? Pretty much none. WG members make money by selling the dream to new members who in their turn sell the same dreams to even more people. Hence the pyramid.
The good thing is that WG is starting to get shut down in some countries. It might take longer for UK and US but it will happen soon enough.
Alex
They are live in 74 countries and just added crypto mining to their product line. I too used their A.I. driven Forex trading platform and have earned about %3 monthly return. They are also monitored by a 3rd party. Just saying. Their not getting shut down in any countries. Just launched in PNG. Also, Vemma didn't get shut down, they were investigated and was allowed to stay open.
Once again, the number of countries in which an MLM operates does not mean anything. I can build a blog in 5 minutes and agree to take orders from 150 countries - does that mean my business is credible and honest?
Please do let me know who is that "3rd party" that monitors WG. I am curious.
You are right about Vemma tho. They aren't completely shut down. However after they agreed to restructure the company in order to get rid of the illegal pyramid scheme aspect they had going on a few things changed. According to TruthInAdvertising.org here are just a few changes that Vemma went through:
In short, it means that once they got rid of the pyramid aspect the whole business went down and it seems like it's only getting worse. No surprise there, a pyramid scheme can't be profitable once you take away the pyramid aspect from it.
Hi Alex,
Blogs are good tools for people. Better when clear and informed. Is recruitment a requirement of WG... or another form of potential income if somebody wants to explore that?
Doesn't every investment have risk and should that be disclosed clearly? Does WG hold people's money or is it deposited into reputable brokerage accounts outside of WG?
I have personally seen the multiplier and it has performed better than any bank.
Are you aware that WG is part of a public Co now? Time will tell and always keep a close eye on any investment.
Blogs are good but should be checked and verified just like the companies they look at.
All members are highly encouraged to recruit. In fact many "top-recruiters" within WG will explain that the real money comes from recruiting new members and not from using FX Multiplier.
Every investment has a risk and there is no way to guarantee a profit of any kind. WG reps often claim incredible profits however they aren't able to back these claims. As far as I know WG says that recruiters shouldn't make any kind of monetary promises but they don't really enforce or control the recruiters.
The money that people deposit go through the brokers. I have not been able to find any proof that these brokers are certified. Many online "brokers" are not certified and several are simply illegal. However they exist simply because it's incredibly hard to control that online.
You also claim that you have personally seen the multiplier performance. Have you seen some "graphs" from a recruiter or are these your personal results with your own money? I am asking this because I have been approached by several Wealth Generators reps and they all say how they have "seen amazing results" however none of them was able to show me their own results... strange, isn't it?
Hi Alex.
Wealth Generators is not a pyramid scheme, it is a legal MLM. And so whatc if I have to recruit 2 new people every week? You have to go to work everyday, what's the damn difference.
This is precisely the difference. When you go to work you just do the work, you don't need to recruit any paying members in orders to make money (off of them). That being said, I haven't had a job since 2007 because I've been making a full time income online. A real business makes money off of a product and not from new paying members from the "downline". I have yet to see a single WG member who can show they are personally making bank from WG's products and not from recruiting. There is a reason for that.
I want you thank you very much for this article. A coworker of mine is trying to get me to join WG, but when he started to talk it immediately made me think of a pyramid scheme. Thank you so much!
Always trust your instincts people. Even when saying "no" would probably make it a little awkward in the workplace (for me), at least I didn't lose time and money.
Hi Karen, I am happy to hear you found this article helpful.
It is "uncomfortable" to simply say no in certain situations but it needs to be done. You can simply say you're into too many projects and simply do not have the time for it.
Whenever I am approached by an offer such as this one I often ask for proof. Since the rep is promising I'll make loads of money I simply ask to see their account so I could understand better if it's for me. Every single rep failed to show me such proof. They all claim that they aren't making money yet but the upline of their upline is super rich. Another thing I do sometimes is ask them to pay for my membership and I'll reimburse them since I am guaranteed to make money. Well guess what, they aren't excited about that idea either. No wonder...
Alex
Hi Alex
Thank you so much for writing this. I literally was about to join WG and decided to do more reading and came across this blog.
No chance that I'm joining now.
Thank you
Emile
I am glad to hear you found this article Emile.
Hey interesting review. What do you think of Amway?
Hi Fernando.
I remember looking at Amway earnings disclaimers where over 90% of their distributors didn't make any money and most actually lost money.
There is a very simple explanation of the industry in this famous video: Multi Level Marketing Enjoy ;)
Man Alex I thank you for your honesty and due diligence. I am currently joined in Amway and WG and feel like I've got duped.
Hi Ivan.
I think it's rather clear from my posts that I dislike the idea of MLMs in general. Even when an MLM company is 100% legit, their products are often overpriced and extremely hard to sell.
For example I do use some products from Yves Rocher - because they are of great quality and very reasonable price. Yves Rocher started as a mail order company however for many years now they have lots of physical stores retailing the products. And I do not need to become a "distributor" in order to be able to buy from them. I believe any legit company with great products allows the sale of these products through regular retail channels. If a product cannot be easily purchased by normal customers then there is something fishy going on.
Alex