[tgarma1234]

It is unacceptable to take money from the crowd without making the appropriate effort to deal with demand.

The ponzi scheme aspect of it is this: the cryptocurrencies become more valuable as more people buy them. Very few people can access their accounts to sell them though, and that technical glitch will continue until the value collapses, at which point anyone who bought in will have lost the incentive or desire to sell and be left holding assets at a loss. This is designed into the system as a feature not a bug.

The coinbase status page is practically the definition of a ponzi scheme: https://status.coinbase.com/

In particular they write that while there is no friction whatsoever to putting money INTO the scheme, it is not currently possible to take money out reliably:

"Update - Due to outgoing wire delays, we recommend withdrawing via ACH (bank transfer) instead of wires for faster processing. This applies to withdrawals only. Deposits via wire transfer are not currently delayed."

If this were a real estate scam every red flag imaginable would be raised: you can buy but you cannot sell.

That this is passed off as a technical issue beyond anyone's control is the very nature of ponzi scheming.