 He claims that his elderly Asian parents have been scammed out of millions and is now trying to warn others. Yeah, this is going viral right now. Eric Zhang, a 29-year-old entrepreneur is seeking donations to help his elderly parents home after they have fallen victim to an online investment scam. This is very controversial. Andrew, some people really believe a story. Some people don't, but I'll tell you this, Andrew. This is without a doubt. Scamming is at an all-time high in 2023 and you need to have a conversation with your older immigrant parents about it. Whether they're immigrants or not, but especially if they're immigrants because they might not know. Exactly, exactly. So we're going to delve into this case, but we're also really just going to talk about how to talk to your parents about scamming. Please hit that like button. Check out other episodes of the Hot Pop Boys. But you know what's not a scam? Smala Sauce is not a scam. It is coming straight to your doorstep. If you order it, guys, it's very delicious. It goes well on everything. Check it out, smalasauce.com. Andrew, we can speak on this specifically. What's up with the scamming in the Chinese community right now? Like WhatsApp, Line, WeChat, text message, hello, old friend. And it's like a very pretty 33-year-old realtor that, like, you don't know who this is, an NPC, an AI bot. Yeah, I'd like to meet up for the coffee on a Wednesday and maybe we can talk about investments. It's really interesting. Well, I get a lot of text messages actually to my WhatsApp and to my iMessage of, like, it has perfect grammar. I don't know the number and it says, like, hello, Jesse, old friend. Uh, can you set up this meeting or, like, oh my gosh, like, hi. Just, like, some kind of just, like, random message and, like, dude, they're just coming out of nowhere and I'm just basically what I'm saying is, like, I've never fallen for the scam. But I know some older people who have fallen for some scams on the internet. Even, like, a pop-up watch subscription or something like that, right? Dude, I mean, honestly, and it's not just, like, old people, like, we did know a guy in college who this was, like, years ago, but he got scammed by, from the emails. Right, right. From the Nigerian Prince emails. I mean, people have been scamming since the 1970s, right, for, you know, selling vacuums, door-to-door and this and that. But it just seems like the scamming is at an all-time high in 2023. So anyways, the point of this video, the actual point of this video is, like, you got to have a conversation with your immigrant parents about scamming and you got to ask them, just ask them a simple question. Hey, mom, dad, even if you don't live by him, text him. Be like, hey, mom, dad, have you been approached about any fantastic investment opportunities from random people? Right. Please do not do them. Talk to me if anybody tries to talk to you about cryptocurrency, especially a guy named Zhang that you've never met before, even though he's asking for advice on how to make it in America. Right. Anyway, guys, make sure you like, subscribe, turn on your notifications. Let's get into the comments section, Andrew. Somebody said, some A-hole scam my grandparents out of their whole entire retirement pension and nothing was done about it. These people are the scum of the earth. It happens, right? And it happens, especially because these scammers, Andrew, I don't know if they're overseas. If they're here, if it's a bot farm or some hybrid use of, like, what? I don't know if they're using AI tools, but they are targeting older people because they seem like they have a higher rate of getting them, right? Yeah, yeah. I mean, I don't know exactly the stats, but I will say this, man, with the rise of technology, there's a lot more ways to make money and make a positive impact, but there are also way more ways to get scammed. And they, trust me, these scammers, they know how to use the internet better than your parents do. Better than you do, okay? Yeah. They are setting things up. They're making fake websites and all this stuff. So it can totally happen. Yo, just send a text to your older parents right now and just ask them, hey, has anybody tried to scam you? Have you got any weird things? Just contact me. Send me screenshots. Let them send them a website of how to even send a screenshot if they don't know how to send a screenshot. Somebody said, oh, damn, well, I got scammed for a pair of Jays on eBay. Can somebody help me out with the 350? Right. So basically people are showing a lack of sympathy, right? Well, there's a lot of people in the comments section and I would say a significant amount who are reading the story with, like, and the story has some details, but not a lot of details. And they're kind of like, oh, well, dude, I mean, I got scammed before, but, like, I'm not running to the internet for a GoFundMe. Obviously, listen, if this is true, Eric's family has been scammed out of a lot of money and it is, it hurt them. Obviously, big time, you know, which is horrible. But also, like, it is, it's true that anybody can have their own opinion about this. Do you think people are GoFundMe out? You know what I mean? There's some, like, fatigue because there's a lot of GoFundMes for a lot of things and it does seem like, hey, by the way, guys, it's a horrible situation. But I'm just saying, compared to somebody getting killed randomly, it doesn't really compare. Yeah, it's tough because this one is kind of like, you still had to get tricked yourself. It's like, it's kind of like saying, hey, help my family out because we got tricked. Listen, man, if it compels you by all means, do your due diligence. Feel free to donate, man. I'm not making a judgment either way because we don't know. Somebody said, yellow on yellow cringe. Man, I can't believe this is so sad that this happens a lot more in the immigrant Asian community than you think. Yes, it does. It does. And it's not just Chinese scam and other Chinese. We're talking about, like, any specific subset of Asian to another subset, right? Because especially the older generation, they're more likely to give the trust to somebody from the same tribe, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And there's so many ways to build trust. And basically, you've got to just be wary of people that you don't know. Right, right, right. Other people are saying, I don't know if I really want to help out somebody who already had millions to begin with, even though they lost millions. Like we said, man, everybody's in a different situation. Obviously, it's not as easy as some of the other cases that I've seen to empathize with. Listen, there's a lot of details that I would like to know about. I'd like to know what the fake cryptocurrency exchange was that scammed them. I'd like to know, like, how they were able to get back into his bank account and pull out more money. Or, I mean, there's a lot of things that you're just like, yo, I need to know more and that's actually going to help me. Because I think if they release more details, then it's actually going to help more people. Like, what were the chats like? Like, what was the message like that opened up? Say, like, so that we could send it around to our parents and be like, hey, mom, watch out for this message. Right, right, right. Somebody said high returns usually mean high risk. Extrapolate this to scams and fraud where the investor is expecting unrealistic returns on investment. But this is the appeal, right? Somebody contacts you and they butter you up. In Chinese, there's a term called pig butchering because you're fattening the pig. I'm talking you up. Hey, Amos, can you tell me what your assimilation process to the US journey was like? You did such a good job. Oh, well, and then you're like flattered, right? Because nobody's asked you that question before. Right, right, no. And honestly, that is like, that's a good way to open up if you're trying to trick somebody because you gain their trust and you build them up and you make them feel good about themselves. And yeah, I mean, let's say you hurt, like, let's just say this Amos, the older father, he had heard of a lot of people making money off cryptocurrency, which there were a lot of people who did make money, but a lot of people also lost money off cryptocurrency. More people lost money. Yeah, and a lot of people got rug pulled on and like pretty much got tricked in a different way. And alt coins and ish coins and all these coins and stuff like that. So I can see the desire, man. What I'm trying to do is I'm trying to empathize with the desire to make human money there. And you're just like, well, all right, I'll give it a shot. You know, right? And it seems like this opportunity is falling into your lap because they're contacting you guys. Listen, 99.99999% of the time it is a scam. Somebody said, listen, guys, it's easy to roast his parents for messing up their entire life savings. But listen, we all need to better prepare for the changes to our mind and body once we hit the 70s, 80s and 90s. And somebody was like, yeah, my mom is 82. And I just do not trust her to invest in anything at this point. It is true though, right? It's difficult. But apparently in your 80s, you're still fit to be the president of the United States. Right, right, right. But probably not. But just that's just how it works out. You can be. Somebody said children really need to get involved into their older parents' finances. But this also means that the children have a self-responsibility to up their own personal financial education because how are they going to watch out for their parents if they don't have a high IQ in the finance world? And there's a lot of good websites, right? A lot of good YouTubers. Yeah, there's a lot of great podcasts, a lot of great YouTubers that will give you safe financial advice. Not tell you how to get rich easily, guys. Right. Take him, Graham Stephens. Those guys are slow growth guys that like to mitigate risk. Rameed Sethi. I mean, there's so many that are not trying to guarantee you like crazy gains. You know, like anybody who guarantees you easy money, you have to look at that with like basically scammer goggles. Listen, guys, use Reddit, use Quora. Don't just use it for funny memes. Subscribe on Instagram or whatever social platform that you prefer to spend a lot of your usage rate on. Subscribe to like some good, well reputable financial education channels. You know what I mean? Like, don't just follow fun stuff. You got to, you know, up your brain points. All right. Just index funds, guys. That's the easiest, safest way. Ultimately, Andrew, what are your takeaways? Because this situation, it got a lot of people worried, right? Because this is almost somebody's worst nightmare come true from these pig butchering scams, from these WeChat scams, WhatsApp scams, etc. So I'm going to tell you this, whether or not you personally buy into this story, whether you are not, whether or not you're going to donate to the GoFundMe, this is just a lesson here. Scamming does happen and they are reaching everybody. And it's at an all-time high in 2023. They're going after you. Guys, I just pulled up a statistic. Federal Trade Commission data shows that consumers reportedly lost $8.8 billion to fraud in 2022. Okay? And there's probably a lot more money than that that people didn't report. So just ask your parents, have they been approached by any great investments? Are they trying to get in cryptocurrency when they don't know about it? Do not let them. Do not try and don't scam your own parents. Oh my God. It's a little bit like a jumpy defender that is like playing really hard but has no idea how to play basketball and you're playing against somebody with really good handles. The chances are if you reach for it and you try to get the steal, you're going to get shook eight to nine, ten times in a row and have your ankles broken. But in this case Andrew, it ends up being your financial life savings ankles. Honestly, if your parents are saying that they're going to invest in anything but like an index fund or actually like have like the house property or these things that are like established that you know that they understand. Like don't let your parents invest in anything you know they don't understand. Just because like they have a PhD in computer science or applied physics or applied mathematics, that doesn't make them like a Warren Buffett or a Charlie Munger. That's like a whole different lane of you know intelligence and knowledge. It's not transferable over and I think that that is a common misconception. Exactly. Your parents can be educated and academically educated. Your parents could have worked an engineering job for 30 years. Crunch the most complex algorithms in their brain. And they can still get scammed in the most ridiculous, stupidest, easiest way. It's a lot of scamming. Let's be honest, Andrew. It's emotional. It's emotional. So have that conversation with your parents, guys. That's all I can say. That's the main message I have from all this. I messaged my parents right after I saw this article. Whether you believe this specific story or not, I was like whoa. Just text them. Just text them and just say, hey mom and dad. Have you been approached with any fantastic investments lately? Please. By the way, this is a message out to YouTube if anybody from YouTube is watching. You guys got to do an even better job, you know, vetting the comments section. I'm not saying you guys haven't been improving over the last couple years, but you know, just the spamming and the scamming is out of control. Let us know of some of the ones that you have heard of in the comment section below. Let us know any stories of anybody, you know, relatives, aunties, extended, good or bad so people can learn from them. And until next time, we're the Hop Hop Boys. We out. Peace.