"Glazing" is understood as the process of separating and processing rough stones surrounded by a layer of sandstone (a mineral layer that adheres to the outside of the gemstone) to obtain finished gemstone crystals.
It is inevitable that tricks are used, the stones are broken out with nothing but the person who breaks them quickly puts in the gems and lets the broker pretend to win big to stimulate the players. However, when there are real players, they are sure to lose.
Mr. P.D.
Day and night "together" looking for gems
In the past year or so, "pouring jelly" has suddenly become a hot trend on social media, causing "livestreaming platforms" of rock breaking on TikTok to spring up like mushrooms after the rain.
Mr. Nguyen Thanh (name changed), owner of a gem shop in Luc Yen district ( Yen Bai province), said: "This jelly pouring game originated from a few individuals in Yen Bai city, then because of the need to find stones to livestream jelly pouring, this trend spread back to Luc Yen, and is now popular throughout the country."
Day and night, hundreds of TikTok accounts compete to livestream selling many types of stones of different shapes, sizes and colors, priced from several hundred thousand to several tens of millions of VND each. The sellers claim that they are rough gemstones.
At noon on April 9, we tried to join a livestream "pouring jelly". A bright colored stone the size of a fist, weighing more than 600 grams, was being sold for 3M (3 million VND).
On the livestream, the seller fondled the stone: "The market price of this stone must be around 8M (8 million VND - PV) or more, but my brother only gave it to you guys for 3M. Currently, he has 30% of the shares, the remaining 70%, you guys should join the fight!".
Like a game of chance, players spend money to "bet" on stones on the "floor". If lucky, the gem will "explode" and be bought back by the seller at a high price, from which the player makes a profit. In addition to individual purchases, players can "bet together" and contribute "shares" to "open the pot" together.
At that time, TikTok HV said that he had transferred 30% of the price of the stone, encouraging viewers to "follow" him to quickly "hammer" (the process of breaking, cutting and finding gemstones). However, more than an hour had passed and there was still no one "like-minded", this person seemed impatient: "While waiting for this stone, get me the 1.5M stone (1.5 million VND)".
Immediately the seller took out a stone as requested, started "hammering" and shouted "Here it is!". To the amazement of many onlookers, a pink stone believed to be a spinel appeared, weighing 2.6 carats and was collected by the seller for 6M (6 million VND).
TikTok HV announced that he had received a profit of 4.5 million VND and continued to encourage viewers to join the game with him. However, after waiting for another 30 minutes, no one "joined the bet", so the GB Gemstone floor quietly turned off the livestream.
That same evening, another TikTok channel, G. Gemstones, was "opening the pot" of a 22M stone (22 million VND). On the livestream, the crystals believed to be gemstones were sorted into separate plates depending on their purity and integrity.
This person said: "I charge 800,000 VND/carat for defective goods, and for clean goods it depends. If the stone is under 5 carats, it is 1.2 million VND/carat, from 5-10 carats, it is 1.5 million VND/carat, and over 10 carats, it is 2 million VND/carat!".
During the weighing process, this person roughly calculated that the defective goods were 106 carats, equivalent to more than 80 million VND. Plus the clean, good goods were 240 million VND more. The total was more than 320 million VND.
Many viewers saw that the "big" items were released at the beginning of the livestream, which motivated them to "bet" on the stones priced at 2.5M, 8M, 9M, 15M, 20M... lining up on the screen.
However, when all of the above stones were broken, no gemstone crystals were found inside and they were "sank" (crushed to pieces to destroy) right on the waves.
The seller quickly reassured: "The weight of these raw stones is very large, so the inside has not turned into jade yet. There are very few of these stones, many are splinted but many are cracked. Just be happy!"
The clock has struck 1am, but the rock-breaking livestream sessions are still going strong and show no signs of cooling down. The later it gets, the more people join in, the more expensive the rocks are sold, the highest being 60-80 million VND.
Many variations, negatively affecting the reputation of the "jade land"
Mr. Tran Van Khanh (46 years old, name changed), a skilled gem craftsman in Luc Yen district (Yen Bai province), said: "Pour stone can be considered a long-standing cultural feature formed in the stone making world. The nature of this work is to exchange experiences between craftsmen, share risks and profits when cutting a stone, not a story of luck and chance like on TikTok."
According to Mr. Khanh, the stones used to make jelly after being mined from ores are often covered by a very thick layer of sandstone, the craftsmen must meticulously cut them to find gemstone crystals of high purity.
He explained: "No one can 100% examine the integrity and cleanliness of a rough gemstone. When using a light to examine the internal quality of the stone, it must be based on many factors such as light absorption, color perception, cracks, grain, and braces. So if you only look at the livestream screen, how can you evaluate it?"
Mr. Minh Luan (name changed), owner of another gem shop in Luc Yen district, also said: "We hammer high-value stones ourselves to get finished products and do not put them on livestream to sell. The stones used to make jelly online are usually spinel. This stone is not rare, the price is only about 200,000 VND/kg or from 1-3 million VND/piece."
In the gem capital of Luc Yen, the community of stone workers spoke up in unison, indignant at the situation of "jelly pouring" which is being transformed into a complicated trend. Accordingly, many "floors" use all kinds of tricks to "bait" and lure players.
Having lost money playing the online "jelly" game, Mr. P.D. (40 years old, Thanh Xuan district, Hanoi ) thought: "At that time, I played on five or seven floors, lost nearly ten million, then realized that I was scammed. When I watched the livestream, they continuously released gems, but when it was my turn, I didn't get a single one. This type of game is not only gambling but also a scam...".
However, more and more people are attracted to this game, many people have become addicted to "pouring jelly" because the more they win, the more they want to win, and the more they lose, the more they want to rush in to recoup.
According to the report, many online "shops" openly bring stream stones and slag stones (stones of low value) to livestream to sell at sky-high prices. Many stones are only worth a few hundred thousand dong when bought, but on livestream, they are called out for tens of millions of dong, calling for "shares". In this case, customers only need to put in 10-20% for the seller to make a profit.
Many people in the gem industry say that "pouring gems" has now transformed into a game of chance, with a "red and black" nature, negatively affecting the traditional cultural beauty and reputation of the jade land of Luc Yen.
Is it gambling?
Speaking to reporters, lawyer Nguyen Ngo Quang Nhat ( Ho Chi Minh City Bar Association) said that criminals who commit fraud to appropriate property through social networks are increasingly creative with many unique forms and tricks.
Most criminals prey on people's greed and "lucky" mentality to lead them into pre-planned scenarios and games with the ultimate goal of stealing money from the participants.
Regarding the activity of livestreaming online jelly pouring, if the seller clearly knows that there are no gemstones inside the rough stones but still takes advantage of the buyer's lack of knowledge, commits fraud, uses deceitful tricks to sell fake stones, stones of no value at high prices to earn real money, this behavior shows signs of fraud and property appropriation.
According to the Japanese lawyer, depending on the nature and severity of the violation, the act of fraudulent appropriation of property can be subject to administrative sanctions or criminal prosecution with the lightest prison sentence being 6 months and the highest being life imprisonment (based on Article 174 of the 2015 Penal Code, amended and supplemented in 2017).
"Currently, no participants in the online jelly-pouring game have spoken out about the consequences of this trick, and there are no legal documents reflecting the regulations on livestreaming jelly-pouring on the TikTok platform, so to say whether this activity is considered a form of gambling or not, we need to wait for the authorities to intervene, review and clarify," Mr. Nhat added.
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