Bank Negara Malaysia would like to again remind members of the public not to participate in get-rich-quick schemes. They risk losing their monies.

Such schemes where the operator accepts monies from members of the public with the promise to repay with or without interest, premium, dividend or any other consideration in cash or kind without a licence under the Banking and Financial Institutions Act 1989 is illegal deposit taking. Illegal deposit-taking is an offence punishable with imprisonment of up to 10 years or a fine of up to RM10 million or with both. In the case of a continuing offence, the penalty is a daily fine of RM10 thousand for each day the offence continues.

On 8 August 2000, Bank Negara Malaysia investigators raided Platinum Lane Sdn. Bhd. to gather evidence for the purposes of prosecuting the operators of an illegal deposit-taking scheme. Bank Negara Malaysia has reason to believe that amongst the activities conducted by the company is illegal deposit-taking. The investigations of the company are still on-going.

While the investigations are in progress, the operators of the illegal deposit-taking scheme are not prohibited from repaying the deposits as agreed with the depositors and are in fact obliged to fully repay the depositors. If they fail to do so, the depositors may wish to institute civil action to recover their monies and to prevent the operators of the scheme from dissipating their funds.

Bank Negara Malaysia is closely monitoring the situation and will keep the public informed of developments.