词汇释义

词汇释义：

n.Ponzi scheme

例句：

Bernard Madoff was charged with defrauding dozens of investors out of nearly $9 million in what federal authorities say was an elaborate Ponzi scheme.

因涉嫌欺诈众多投资者高达900万美元巨额资金，伯纳德•麦道夫遭到指控。联邦权威人士称他精心设计了一个“庞氏骗局”。

词汇知识：

这个短语中，scheme是“诡计、阴谋”的意思，例如： He planned to steal the money, but his schemes were discovered.（他打算去偷那笔钱, 但他的诡计被揭穿了）。

Scheme最常见的意思是指“计划、安排”，下面这段话可以让我们了解更多关于scheme的用法：

Echo的老板让她lay map /work out a practical scheme（制订出一个切实可行的计划），并且做出a color scheme（色彩设计）。She roughs out a scheme（草拟了一个计划）which is called new investor compensation scheme（新的投资者赔偿机制），但是她的老板却说这是个bubble scheme（空头计划、骗局）。

背景资料

庞氏骗局 Ponzi scheme

A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation that pays returns to separate investors from their own money or money paid by subsequent investors rather than from any actual profit earned.

The Ponzi scheme usually offers returns that other investments cannot guarantee in order to entice new investors, in the form of short-term returns that are either abnormally high or unusually consistent.

The perpetuation of the returns that a Ponzi scheme advertises and pays requires an ever-increasing flow of money from investors in order to keep the scheme going.

The scheme is named after Charles Ponzi, who became notorious for using the technique after emigrating from Italy to the United States in 1903. Ponzi did not invent the scheme, but his operation took in so much money that it was the first to become known throughout the United States.

His original scheme was in theory based on arbitraging international reply coupons for postage stamps, but soon diverted investors' money to support payments to earlier investors and Ponzi's personal wealth.

“庞氏骗局是一个以人名“庞齐”命名的。1920年查尔斯•庞齐夸下海口，称他可以在3个月内使投资者交付他管理的资金翻番增值。庞齐手头其实并没有投资项目，他是用后期投资者交付的资金支付前期投资者，充作高额投资回报。后来资金链中断、“金字塔骗局”败露，投资者蒙受巨额损失，如换算成现行币值，相当于1.6亿美元。庞齐的下场如今似乎不再有人记得，而这类投资骗局从此得名“庞氏骗局”。而此次麦道夫“克隆”的骗局规模之大远超庞齐，因此有人建议将之称为“麦氏骗局”。