High-profile financial management expert Dennis Ng died of a heart attack after a three-hour finance seminar at Park Mall. The co-founder of HousingLoanSG.com and mortgage consultancy firm Leverage Holdings is well-known for his media work and best-selling books. His entrepreneurial start-up MasterYourFinance.com, a financial education portal, won the inaugural SME1 Asia Awards Top 5 Award in 2011.

 

Life can be so fragile. May he rest in peace and condolences to his family.

 

At the same time, another trainer got into the news for the wrong reasons, Mr Kelvin Ong.

 

Mr Kelvin Ong Wee Loong, the founder of AristoCare centre, charges a whopping $250 per lesson for parents of primary school students looking to clinch a place in the coveted Gifted Education Programme (GEP). He claimed he attended National University of Singapore, before becoming a teacher in the GEP programme at his alma mater. However, checks by the Ministry of Education (MOE) revealed that Mr Ong was neither ever a pupil nor teacher in the programme. He is not even a qualified teacher.

 

With the kiasu culture of Singapore, many people are afraid of losing and seeking ways to win. Be it winning in their children’s education or their pursuit of money making methods.

 

As a result, some are exploiting this culture and offering secrets to their gifted money making ways. Winning in property investments, automated algorithm trading, forex, technical trading in stocks, trading options strategies, etc. They will claim anything from being an award winning trader, amazing track record, wealth of experience, bestselling author, featured on television programs and a list of astonishing testimonials from their students.

 

Just like the tuition industry, these training industries are not regulated and many “gifted” trainers can claim nearly anything they want without anyone verifying it. Sure, there will be the few who are genuine, state the hard truth and sincerely want to share their secrets. However, they will be drowned out by those who use these advanced sales techniques to let people hear what they want, using catch phrases like, “passive income for life”, “create a second stream of income”, “millions with just hours a day”.

 

With all the astronomical fees these gifted trainers who claim the sky are charging, the biggest secret they do not want to share is that the best source of income is from collecting the training fees. After all, just like all education, results are non-guaranteed and they cannot be held accountable if the students do not perform well in the end.