What can I say? Finally!

From http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/311286/1/.html

Sunshine Empire under CAD probe
Posted: 13 November 2007 1813 hrs

SINGAPORE: The Commercial Affairs Department (CAD) has begun investigation into the affairs of Sunshine Empire.

A statement from the white collar crime buster said that people who have placed money with Sunshine Empire are advised to wait for further updates by the CAD on the case. More information will be released in due course.

CAD said it might request people who had placed money with the company to come forward to assist in the investigation.

Based at Toa Payoh HDB Hub, the multi-level marketing (MLM) firm has attracted 20,000 people here since it was set up last July.

The man behind Sunshine is Mr James Phang, 48, the founder, director and international president of Empire Group Alliance, a group spanning several Asian countries.

Sunshine is part of the group, but Mr Phang does not own it.

MLM firms, which are legal in Singapore, typically invite people to pay cash for the right to market goods to other people. They also get cash for recruiting other MLM marketeers.

Sunshine was placed on the Monetary Authority of Singapore's investor alert list in September and that of Malaysia's Securities Commission a few months ago.

The regularly-updated MAS list warns people of companies which may be offering products regulated by MAS without authority.

Sunshine denies it is doing anything wrong. But the Trade and Industry Ministry has warned people to take care in dealing with any MLM firm.

Sunshine also operates in Indonesia, Thailand, Hong Kong, Korea and Taiwan, and has 50,000 merchants. - 938Live

Do note, I am very much for the network marketing (or also known as MLM) industry. But you have to realise Sunshine Empire isn't a MLM company. Also, you can see that most reporters are not too familiar with what MLM is. MLM companies are legal in singapore, and they typically invite people to pay cash (usually less than $100 one time or annually) for the right to market goods to other people. They DO NOT get cash for recruiting other people. Instead, they get an over-riding commission on product volume that moves through their organisation of marketers.

Anything that pays cash for the act of recruiting other people is known as a pyramid scheme. Which is illegal in Singapore by the way.

In fact, if you do know people who have done network marketing for more than a year, most of them have a distaste for Sunshine Empire, for various reasons.

I did want to send a letter to CAD myself about 6 months back.. But I was too lazy. Ah well  I hope they bring in some people who knows what they are doing to investigate Sunshine Empire. Else they would probably attempt to skirt the law.

Bye Bye Sunshine Empire.

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