The Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) has placed two funds named "9M AI" on its alert list, a move that is not uncommon. However, viewing this as an isolated regulatory action is a misreading of the deeper logic of the market. The essence of the event is not simply a "regulatory crackdown on scams," but rather reveals a more fundamental dilemma in the current crypto market: in the context of rapidly evolving technological narratives, the combination of regulatory lag and market speculation creates a perfect breeding ground for "narrative arbitrage" scams. The SFC's warning is less an end than a belated confirmation that the new narrative of AI has indeed become a new scythe for harvesting market liquidity.
Narrative Arbitrage: A Carefully Packaged Capital Scam
The core of the event is very clear: two funds, operating under the banners of "AI strategy" and "AI stability," offered investment products to the public in Hong Kong without any authorization. The SFC's intervention is a fulfillment of its most basic duty to protect investors. However, the real conflict occurs at a deeper level: this is a game of cognitive packaging using cutting-edge technological concepts (AI quantification, crypto trading) against the backdrop of information asymmetry with investors. The builders of the scam are not selling a financial product but rather a "story" that cannot be falsified.
When ChatGPT ignited global interest in artificial intelligence, the capital markets quickly internalized it as the hottest investment theme. The combination of "AI + Crypto" naturally possesses dual appeal for retail investors: AI represents extraordinary profitability and technological barriers, while Crypto promises high volatility and wealth effects. The destructive power of this narrative lies in its construction of a "black box" that ordinary investors cannot and do not wish to verify. Project teams do not need to showcase complex code or audited transaction records; simply repeating the concept "we have advanced AI trading algorithms" is enough to attract capital. This is essentially a form of "narrative arbitrage"—using the market's fervent pursuit of new narratives and its lack of understanding to achieve illegal capital transfer.
The Game of Power: The Three-Way Game of Regulation, Scams, and Investors
In this game, the roles of each party are clearly defined, with distinct demands, but the power dynamics are uneven.
The "Chase" of Regulation: Regulatory bodies like the SFC play the role of "after-the-fact cleanup crew." Their toolbox mainly consists of public warnings, blacklisting, and subsequent investigations. This model inherently determines their natural lag. In a decentralized, borderless market, projects can be launched anonymously and quickly, while regulatory investigations and enforcement processes are lengthy and geographically constrained. By the time a warning is issued, early investors may have already suffered losses. The role of regulation here is more about curbing the further spread of scams rather than preventing their occurrence.
The "Guerrilla Warfare" of Scams: Operators of projects like 9M AI are typical opportunists. They are well-versed in market psychology and adept at exploiting information asymmetry. Their core advantage lies in extremely low startup costs and high maneuverability. Setting up a website, writing a white paper, and conducting a round of marketing on social media can establish a seemingly professional fund. When regulators intervene or market sentiment shifts, they can quickly shut down the project, disappear, and re-emerge when the next hot topic arises. This is a classic "hit-and-run" guerrilla warfare.
The "Cognitive Dilemma" of Investors: Retail investors are the most vulnerable link in this game. They generally face a dual dilemma: on one hand, the anxiety of missing out (FOMO), and on the other, a lack of ability to discern the authenticity of projects. For technical black boxes like "AI trading," the vast majority of investors lack the capacity for due diligence. Their decision-making is often based on marketing hype, community enthusiasm, and a desire for high returns. This irrational decision-making environment makes them prime targets for being harvested.
The Transmission Mechanism from Narrative to Scam
The path from a popular narrative to a harvesting scam is clearly visible. First, a grand and difficult-to-understand technological concept (such as AI, ZK, DePIN) emerges and is widely accepted by the market. Second, speculators package it as a financial product, promising returns that far exceed the market average in "stability" or "high yield." Due to the opacity of its internal mechanisms, external observers cannot assess the truthfulness of its promises. Finally, using social media and KOLs for viral dissemination, they attract a large amount of risk-seeking capital looking for short-term high returns. The operation of the entire system relies not on value creation but on the continuous inflow of subsequent funds.
The SFC's warning acts on the end of this transmission chain. It cuts off the trust link between the project and potential new funds, leading to a depletion of capital inflow, making it difficult for the scam model to sustain itself. However, this intervention does not address the root cause. As long as the market continues to chase the myth of getting rich quickly, and as long as technological narratives can effectively shield external scrutiny, similar scams will continue to be reborn under new guises. Today's protagonist is "AI," and tomorrow it could be "quantum computing" or any other sufficiently cutting-edge and attractive concept.
The "Original Sin" of Decentralization and the Rebuilding of Trust
This incident once again exposes the core contradiction of the crypto industry: decentralization and permissionless innovation, while invigorating the industry, also significantly lowers the threshold for wrongdoing. Anyone can anonymously issue tokens, deploy smart contracts, and create investment plans, making the cost of fraud extremely low while the cost of accountability is very high. The licensing system, information disclosure requirements, and strict audits of traditional financial markets, while sacrificing some efficiency, indeed build a basic trust barrier.
The SFC's actions can be seen as an attempt by centralized power to forcibly inject order into this chaotic decentralized world. However, merely relying on external regulatory "blockades" is far from sufficient. The long-term healthy development of the industry must rely on endogenous trust mechanisms. This means that the market needs to evolve more effective self-purification capabilities. For example, more transparent on-chain data analysis tools, widely recognized third-party smart contract audits, proactive reserve proof (Proof of Reserves) by project teams, and an ecosystem of KOLs capable of conducting in-depth technical analysis to pierce through false narratives.
Industry Insights: Saying Goodbye to Narrative Dependence and Returning to Value Verification
The SFC's warning to the 9M AI fund serves as a wake-up call for the entire industry. It indicates that as the crypto market becomes increasingly intertwined with mainstream society, regulatory penetration will also deepen. For project teams, the era of relying solely on a compelling story to raise funds is coming to an end. Future competition will be a comprehensive contest of technological strength, business models, and compliance capabilities. Any attempts to engage in arbitrage in regulatory gray areas will face increasingly high risks.
For investors, this incident is a costly lesson in risk education. It reminds us that in the highly information-asymmetric market of crypto, abandoning independent thinking and due diligence is tantamount to handing over one's wealth to others for management. When faced with any technical black box promising extraordinarily high returns, the most rational attitude is not fervor but skepticism. Demanding that project teams provide verifiable data and accept independent third-party audits should become a prerequisite for investment decisions.
Ultimately, a mature market is marked by its ability to effectively distinguish between "narrative" and "fact." The SFC's blacklist is merely an external filter. The true maturity of the industry requires every participant—from developers to investors—to establish their own internal filters, learning to penetrate the fog of narratives and verify the core of value.
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