UID:
almafu_9959227771402883
Format:
1 online resource (250 p.)
ISBN:
0-19-997722-4
,
0-19-025851-9
,
1-283-57725-9
,
9786613889706
,
0-19-992662-X
Content:
Charles Ponzi perpetrated his infamous scheme almost a hundred years ago. But his method of using new investments to pay existing investors and finance a highflying lifestyle is alive and well: just as much money is lost in the United States today from Ponzi schemes as from shoplifting. Somehow, con artists are able to dazzle wealthy, educated individuals and sophisticated institutions and convince them to hand over huge sums of money. How? This book explores these con artists' fascinating power of persuasion and deception, uncovering the subtle signals that mimic truth and honesty.
Note:
Includes index.
,
""Cover""; ""Contents""; ""Preface""; ""Acknowledgments""; ""Introduction""; ""1. Con Artists At Work""; ""A. Three Stories of Ponzi Schemers""; ""1. Charles Ponzi""; ""2. Bernard Madoff""; ""3. Gregory Bell""; ""B. The Basic Design""; ""1. Drawing Attention to the Offer""; ""C. Gaining Trust and Concealing the Truth""; ""1. Words Can Be Used to Signal Trust""; ""2. Familiar Transaction Businesses and Forms Seem to Make Verification Superfluous""; ""3. Hiding Fraud by Actions: Prompt Payments That Spell Trustworthiness, Low Risk,and Much More""
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""D. Hiding the Vulnerable Part of the Story: Secrecy and Costly Verification""""1. Concealing the True Nature of the Ponzi Business""; ""2. Use of Justified Secrecy""; ""3. Stories That Are Costly to Verify""; ""4. Details That Hide the Truth by Drowning It""; ""E. Con Artistsâ€? Deceptive Friendship and Seeming Vulnerability by Age and NaÃv̄ety""; ""1. Deceptive Friendship and Love""; ""2. Deceptive Weakness of Age and Seeming NaÃv̄ety""; ""2. Selling The Stories""; ""A. Advertising""; ""1. The Importance of Advertising""; ""2. Where to Operate and How to Build a Reputation""
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""3. Showing Generosity""""4. Entertaining""; ""5. Attracting Attention by Engaging in Attention-Drawing Conflicts""; ""B. Recruiting Helpers""; ""1. Cooperation, Competition, and Congregation Among Con Artists""; ""2. Birds of a Feather Flock Together""; ""C. How Do Con Artists Approach Their Victims?""; ""1. From Family and Friends to Institutions and Affinity Groups""; ""2. Technology Has a Growing Impact on the Growth of Ponzi Schemes""; ""D. The Sales Force""; ""1. Collecting and Distributing Information""; ""2. Paid Sales Force""; ""3. A Pure Sales Structure: Pyramid Schemes""
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""3. Con Artists� Behavior Seems a “Normal Usual Behavior�""""A. Humans Have a Natural Ability to Pretend, Lie, and Influence Others""; ""1. Humans�and Even Primates�Have the Innate Ability to Lie Convincingly""; ""2. Signs of Misleading Signals""; ""3. Legitimate Lying""; ""4. Exploiting the Weakness of the Social System""; ""5. The Slippery Slope: From Honesty to Fraud""; ""6. Ponzi Scheme “Businesses� Mirror Respectability""; ""4. A Profile of The Con Artists and Their Victims""; ""A. The Dark Side of Con Artists (and Some of Their Investors)""
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""1. Con Artists Are Different from Most People""""2. On Very Rare Occasions a Con Artist Might Resort to Murder""; ""3. On Very Rare Occasions a Group of Con Artists Can Be Deadly as Well""; ""4. Con Artists Lack Empathy""; ""5. How Do Con Artists Present Themselves?""; ""6. Con Artists� Mechanisms of Ego Protection and Justification""; ""B. The Profile of the Victims: What Kind of People Are the Sophisticated Victims? What Makes Some More Vulnerable to Ponzi Schemes Than Others?""; ""1. The Dark Side of Some Investors: Lacking Empathy Toward Other Investors and Shared Greed""
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""2. Investors in Ponzi Schemes Who Suspect or Know the Nature of the “Investment� Yet Invest""
,
English
Additional Edition:
ISBN 0-19-992661-1
Language:
English
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