I'm not saying it's not bad. I'm not sure under which US law you'd be claiming it's illegal. Should Beanie Babies have been illegal? Were Beanie Babies a ponzi

I'm not saying it's not bad. I'm not sure under which US law you'd be claiming it's illegal. Should Beanie Babies have been illegal? Were Beanie Babies a ponzi scheme? If you answer yes to those questions, just understand that your evaluation of how the US legal system should work is not even in the same ballpark as where it currently stands, regardless of merit. But those are all totally irrelevant to whether it meet's a specific set of criteria to be a Ponzi scheme. I'd be curious for you to lay out your specific definition of a ponzi scheme under which specifically both this and madoff are ponzi scheme but doesn't include every other asset that is in a bubble and doesn't involve your subjective assessment of if it is good or bad. To be blunt I don't think you can do it.