Freebay was founded in June 2020 and is a marketing reboot of Karatbars International.
Rather than just be honest about it however, Karatbars has opted to present Freebay as a “partnership”.
A lack of transparency leaves Karatbars’ owner Harald Seiz’s stake in Freebay unclear.
If I had to guess Seiz, with possibly one or more partners, ultimately owns Freebay. Throw in a dozen shell companies to create elaborate banking funnels and corporate secrecy.
Thomas Valet, Karatbars’ Communications Manager, admitted as much in a recent August 31st corporate update call:
[11:07] This heart now gets a refreshment. There will be a new sales company that will be launched, unencumbered, without negative comments, messages, campaigns or targeted misinformations [sic].
The name of this new sales company is … Freebay.
[12:14] Freebay is located in the center of Switzerland. Internationally untouchable, solid, surrounded by international companies, organizations and associations.
On the public-facing side of the company, Freebay is headed up by CEO Jurgen Pulvermuller.
Before fronting the marketing reboot, Pulvermuller worked as Karatbars’ Head of Global Sales.
Pulvermuller appears to have gotten involved with Karatbars on or around 2019. Prior to that he was promoting Neora, and before that Filabe and Visalus.
It is from Karatbars’ sales department that every Freebay executive I’ve seen thus far has originated from; namely Norbert Take and Marius Broening.
Read on for a full review of Freebay’s MLM opportunity.
Freebay’s Products
Freebay has no retailable products or services, with affiliates only able to market Freebay affiliate membership itself.
Freebay affiliate membership provides access to a video library they call “Freebay Academy”.
Topics covered within the library are education and cryptocurrency trading.
There is also a nine-lesson “Trader Academy” module.
Freebay’s Compensation Plan
Freebay affiliates sign up and invest in V999 tokens.
Affiliate membership is handled through Freebay.
- EVO Academy – €50 EUR monthly or €480 EUR annually
- EVO Expert – €190 EUR monthly or €1820 EUR annually
- EVO Life – €480 EUR monthly or €4600 EUR annually
V999 investment happens through their “Genesis Market” internal exchange.
Commissions are paid on recruitment of Freebay affiliates and V999 token investment.
V999 Token Investment Rewards
All Freebay V999 token investors receive a daily share in 0.02% of funds invested through the company.
A residual 0.02% bonus on V999 token investment is paid down ten levels of recruitment (unilevel).
Daily Investor Bonus
Freebay rewards its daily top ten biggest investors (by transaction volume), with 0.01% of company-wide investment volume.
The Daily Investor Bonus is calculated and paid daily.
Freebay Affiliate Ranks
There are twelve affiliate ranks within Freebay’s compensation plan.
Along with their respective qualification criteria, they are as follows:
- One Star Sapphire – sign up as a Freebay affiliate
- Two Star Sapphire – generate €5000 EUR in downline monthly membership fee volume
- Three Star Sapphire – sign up with EVO Academy or generate €10,000 EUR in downline monthly membership fee volume
- One Star Emerald – sign up with EVO Expert or generate €15,000 EUR in downline monthly membership fee volume
- Two Star Emerald – sign up with EVO Life or develop a unilevel leg generating €25,000 EUR a month and €15,000 throughout the rest of your unilevel team
- Three Star Emerald – develop a unilevel leg generating €50,000 EUR a month and €30,000 EUR through the rest of your unilevel team
- One Star Ruby – develop a unilevel leg generating €100,000 EUR a month and €50,000 EUR through the rest of your unilevel team
- Two Star Ruby – develop a unilevel leg generating €250,000 EUR a month and €150,000 EUR through the rest of your unilevel team
- Three Star Ruby – develop two unilevel legs generating €500,000 and €250,000 EUR a month respectively, and €100,000 EUR through the rest of your unilevel team
- One Star Diamond – develop two unilevel legs generating €1,500,000 and €1,000,000 EUR a month respectively, and €1,000,000 EUR through the rest of your unilevel team
- Two Star Diamond – develop two unilevel legs generating €2,500,000 and €1,500,000 EUR a month respectively, and €1,000,000 EUR through the rest of your unilevel team
- Three Star Diamond – develop two unilevel legs generating €5,000,000 and €2,500,000 EUR a month respectively, and €2,000,000 EUR through the rest of your unilevel team
Recruitment Commissions
Freebay pays a commission on recruited affiliate membership fees.
Recruitment commission rates are based on how much a Freebay affiliate pays when they sign up:
- One Star Sapphires earn a 7% recruitment commission rate
- Two Star Sapphires earn a 15% recruitment commission rate
- Three Star Sapphires (or sign up with EVO Academy) earn a 21% recruitment commission rate
- One Star Emeralds (or sign up with EVO Expert) earn a 23% recruitment commission rate
- Two Star Emeralds (or sign up with EVO Life) earn a 25% recruitment commission rate
- Three Star Emeralds earn a 26% recruitment commission rate
- One Star Rubys earn a 27% recruitment commission rate
- Two Star Rubys earn a 28% recruitment commission rate
- Three Star Rubys earn a 29% recruitment commission rate
- One Star Diamonds earn a 30% recruitment commission rate
- Two Star Diamonds earn a 31% recruitment commission rate
- Three Star Diamonds earn a 32% recruitment commission rate
Note that these rates are coded, meaning 32% is paid on all Freebay affiliate membership fees paid.
The coded nature of the commissions allows higher ranked affiliates to receive the difference when lower ranked affiliates recruit new affiliates.
E.g. if a Two Star Ruby recruits a new affiliate, they are paid their 28% commission.
This leaves 4% remaining to be paid out. The system searches upline for a Three Star Ruby or higher to pay the remaining 4% out to.
If a Two Star Diamond was found first, they’d receive 3%, leaving 1% payable to the first upline Three Star Diamond.
Note that nothing is passed upline when a Three Star Diamond recruits someone. Three Star Diamonds receive the full payable 32% recruitment commission rate.
Residual Recruitment Commissions
Freebay pays residual recruitment commissions via a binary compensation structure.
A binary compensation structure places an affiliate at the top of a binary team, split into two sides (left and right):
The first level of the binary team houses two positions. The second level of the binary team is generated by splitting these first two positions into another two positions each (4 positions).
Subsequent levels of the binary team are generated as required, with each new level housing twice as many positions as the previous level.
Positions in the binary team are filled via direct and indirect recruitment of affiliates. Note there is no limit to how deep a binary team can grow.
Residual recruitment commissions are paid based on volume generated on recruitment of Freebay affiliates.
Volume (GV) across the binary team is generated as follows:
- EVO Academy monthly payment = 2 GV
- EVO Academy annual payment = 24 GV
- EVO Expert monthly payment = 5 GV
- EVO Expert annual payment = 60 GV
- EVO Life monthly payment = 10 GV
- EVO Life annual payment = 120 GV
For every 25 GV matched on one side of the binary team against 50 GV on the other (a pair), a residual recruitment commission is paid out.
The more pairs generated in a week, the lower the commission paid on each pair:
- the first ten pairs pay €25 EUR each
- pairs 11 to 25 pay €20 EUR each
- pairs 26 to 50 pay €18 EUR each
- pairs 51 to 100 pay €17 EUR each
- pairs 101 to 150 pay €16 EUR each
- pairs 151 to 200 pay €15 EUR each
- pairs 201 to 700 pay €14 EUR each
- pairs 701 to 2100 pay €13 EUR each
- pairs 2101 to 4500 pay €12 EUR each
- pairs 4501 to 10,000 pay €11 EUR each
- pairs 10,001 to 30,000 pay €10 EUR each
- pairs 30,001 to 80,000 pay €8 EUR each
- pairs 80,001 to 180,000 pay €5 EUR each
Residual recruitment commissions are calculated weekly and capped at 180,000 matched volume pairs.
Matching Bonus
Two Star Sapphire to Three Star Sapphire ranked affiliates receive a Matching Bonus on personally recruited affiliates of the same rank.
- Two Star Sapphires receive a 5% Matching Bonus
- Three Star Sapphires receive a 7% Matching Bonus
- One Star Emeralds receive a 10% Matching Bonus
Ranks higher than One Star Emerald receive the Generation Bonus (see below).
Generation Bonus
Freebay pays a Generation Bonus to Two Star Emerald and higher ranked affiliates.
The Generation Bonus is paid via a unilevel compensation structure.
A unilevel compensation structure places an affiliate at the top of a unilevel team, with every personally recruited affiliate placed directly under them (level 1):
If any level 1 affiliates recruit new affiliates, they are placed on level 2 of the original affiliate’s unilevel team.
If any level 2 affiliates recruit new affiliates, they are placed on level 3 and so on and so forth down a theoretical infinite number of levels.
Freebay caps the Generation Bonus at seven unilevel team levels as follows:
- level 1 (personally recruited affiliates) – 1%
- levels 2 and 3 – 1%
- levels 4 to 6 – 2%
- level 7 – 3%
Automated Trading Returns
Freebay’s EVO Expert and EVO Life affiliate memberships provide access to passive returns.
- EVO Expert provides access to four passive return investment options
- EVO Life provides access to eight passive return investment options
Joining Freebay
Freebay affiliate membership is available in four tiers:
- Free – no cost but must rank qualify to earn MLM commissions
- EVO Academy – €50 EUR monthly or €480 EUR annually
- EVO Expert – €190 EUR monthly or €1820 EUR annually
- EVO Life – €480 EUR monthly or €4600 EUR annually
Membership fees can be paid monthly or annually.
The more a Freebay affiliate spends on membership fees the higher their income potential.
Conclusion
Karatbars International started off as a simple gold-themed pyramid scheme. When that ran its course, Harald Seiz jumped on the cryptocurrency bandwagon and rebooted Karatbars as an investment opportunity.
This was initially announced at KaratBank Coin in 2018, however things didn’t really go anywhere until Seiz rebooted again with KaratGold Coin.
Through KaratGold Coin, Karatbars managed to dupe a bunch of affiliates to invest in their worthless KBC shitcoin.
By mid 2019 the hype machine was in full-effect, with many expecting promised riches on Karatbars’ “Independence Day” event.
At the center of the marketing pitch was Harald Seiz’s promise that 100 KBC could be converted into 1 gram of gold.
Independence Day came and went, KBC dumped 62% and the 1 gram of gold promise was predictably exposed as a lie.
Wholly abandoned, KBC today has a public trading value of 0.2 cents.
It is against this backdrop that once again Karatbars is hyping up another shitcoin, V999.
V999 is at the center of Freebay, although currently is it the education package nonsense being pushed.
Through V999, once again Karatbars is committing securities fraud by offering a passive investment opportunity.
The MLM side of the business is a return to Karatbars’ pyramid scheme roots.
It’s worth noting that Jurgen Pulvermuller was part of Karatbars’ marketing team throughout most of the company’s crypto misadventures.
To what extent Pulvermuller orchestrated Karatbars’ crypto fraud is unclear. What is clear however is that he’s knowledgeable enough to front a reboot.
One need really only look to KBC to see where Freebay will wind up.
You have the same “backed by gold” rubbish, where in reality V999 is just a token Karatbars generates on demand – same as the previous two coins its launched.
Wary of KBC’s embarrassing (but inevitable) failure, V999 is locked behind an internal exchange.
Whether Karatbars goes for the abrupt shutdown or public exchange exit-scam remains to be seen.
Either way, the majority of Freebay affiliates will lose money. The pyramid side of Freebay isn’t’ sustainable. And neither is the V999 token Ponzi scheme.
Given the regulatory heat Karatbars took on its failed KBC venture (Namibia, Germany, South Africa, New Zealand), there’s also a chance regulators are in play.
Don’t count on it though, as a new company name and banking channels typically means regulators will take another few years to cotton on.
All of this is of course by design, and why Seiz isn’t directly fronting Freebay. It’s also why we have the “partnership” charade.
A gold pyramid scheme, failed KaratBank Coin, failed KaratGold Coin and now Freebay reboot with V999.
You know how this ends.