pyramid scheme

noun

: a usually illegal operation in which participants pay to join and profit mainly from payments made by subsequent participants

Example Sentences

Recent Examples on the Web

Yet, a creator program that users have to pay to use hasn’t been done before and has some users comparing it to a pyramid scheme. —Kylie Robison, Fortune, 3 Feb. 2023

Authorities say OneCoin was a pyramid scheme that defrauded people out of more than $4 billion as Ignatova convinced investors in the US and around the globe to throw fistfuls of cash at her company. —Faith Karimi, CNN, 22 Jan. 2023

In 2019, AdvoCare disagreed with the FTC’s characterization of its multilevel marketing business model as a pyramid scheme. —Dallas News, 5 May 2022

The lawsuit against Cuban follows a $258 million suit against Tesla CEO Elon Musk in June in which a Dogecoin investor accused him of running a pyramid scheme. —Dallas News, 11 Aug. 2022

The result was a pyramid scheme, which Scheper-Hughes says is common to kidney markets around the world. —Yudhijit Bhattacharjee, Discover Magazine, 12 Aug. 2010

Law-enforcement agencies, meanwhile, have prosecuted some of the worst actors - unveiling charges in August, for example, against 11 individuals allegedly involved in a $300 million pyramid scheme. —Tony Romm, Anchorage Daily News, 17 Nov. 2022

Ignatova, meanwhile, is accused of spearheading a pyramid scheme that defrauded investors of over $4 billion, one considered to be among the largest in history. —María Luisa Paúl, Washington Post, 1 July 2022

But instead, the plan operated like a pyramid scheme, with people earning money by recruiting new customers into the service, the SEC alleges. —Aimee Picchi, CBS News, 1 Aug. 2022

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Word History

First Known Use

1949, in the meaning defined above