Silk Road forums
Discussion => Off topic => Topic started by: lesseroftwoweevils on September 24, 2012, 06:51 am
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The price of cocaine in Australia is astronomically high. A very pure kilo that will cost you $1500 in Caracas or Lima will set you back $150,000 for utter crap in Brisbane, or a markup of 10,000%. Clearly, there’s an opportunity for someone to make a lot of money here if you can find a way to get it from South America into Australia.
Although you might get a $1500 bid for a kilo if you have relations with a cartel, I’d suspect that without these connections, you’d be paying a premium. Even then, I think the average gringo could obtain a high quality kilo at the rip off price of $5,000, perhaps avoiding the cartels altogether if they bought in Bolivia/Peru.
Okay great, you decide to start a small, one-man drug operation and buy 4 kilos for $20,000. Now how are you going to get it out?
Two words: drug mules. A key difference between your operation and a cartel’s is that you’d use financial incentives to gain their loyalty instead of fear. Let’s say you guarantee them $25,000 for smuggling a 2/3-kilo each, or about 3-6 years worth of salary of the average worker in a poor South American country.
So all told you’d need:
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+ $20,000 for 4 kilos of cocaine
+ $15,000 in travel expenses for you and your six drug mules
+ $150,000 in buyout fees to six drug mules, or $25,000 a head. This is probably three or four times what drug mules in South America are normally paid. In return for this high price, you’d guarantee their loyalty, even if they do get nabbed (for example, you’d give them 10k upfront and 15k after the job is done, regardless of if they were successful or not).
+ $15,000 for various bribes/help from locals/unanticipated expenses you’d likely come across. You also might want to pay someone to smuggle your coke out of Colombia so that you could fly out of a less suspicious country like Argentina.
Total Cost: $200,000
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Even if only three out of six mules make it through Australian customs, you’ve now made: 2kg x $300,000, or $600,000, if sold by the gram on the Silk Road. If using body packing as your method, a 50% success rate seems very reasonable. You’d then easily monopolize the Australian coke market here with a product that pure and price that good.
You walk away with $600,000, thereby tripling your initial investment without even having to establish connections with a cartel or drug trafficker. Granted, you’d have high start-up costs (at least 100k) and there’s the possibility that everything would blow up in your face, but that’s still a nice potential profit margin for someone who theoretically had half their product seized in customs.
Thoughts? For the record, I would actually try this… although the thought of a DEA agent reading this amuses me.
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All I am saying mate is good luck. Please send us a Christmas card from prison. :)
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Easier said the done my friend!
your mules better have balls the size of melons!
8)
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All I am saying mate is good luck. Please send us a Christmas card from prison. :)
Haha, will do mate. Let me know if you want to dig 50 bags of cocaine out of your feces for 25K, if so I might have a job for you :) .
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All I am saying mate is good luck. Please send us a Christmas card from prison. :)
Haha, will do mate. Let me know if you want to dig 50 bags of cocaine out of your feces for 25K, if so I might have a job for you :) .
Lol....I'm no pack animal son. ;) And I never work for others. 8)
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The price of cocaine in Australia is astronomically high. A very pure kilo that will cost you $1500 in Caracas or Lima will set you back $150,000 for utter crap in Brisbane, or a markup of 10,000%. Clearly, there’s an opportunity for someone to make a lot of money here if you can find a way to get it from South America into Australia.
Although you might get a $1500 bid for a kilo if you have relations with a cartel, I’d suspect that without these connections, you’d be paying a premium. Even then, I think the average gringo could obtain a high quality kilo at the rip off price of $5,000, perhaps avoiding the cartels altogether if they bought in Bolivia/Peru.
Okay great, you decide to start a small, one-man drug operation and buy 4 kilos for $20,000. Now how are you going to get it out?
Two words: drug mules. A key difference between your operation and a cartel’s is that you’d use financial incentives to gain their loyalty instead of fear. Let’s say you guarantee them $25,000 for smuggling a 2/3-kilo each, or about 3-6 years worth of salary of the average worker in a poor South American country.
So all told you’d need:
---------------------------------------
+ $20,000 for 4 kilos of cocaine
+ $15,000 in travel expenses for you and your six drug mules
+ $150,000 in buyout fees to six drug mules, or $25,000 a head. This is probably three or four times what drug mules in South America are normally paid. In return for this high price, you’d guarantee their loyalty, even if they do get nabbed (for example, you’d give them 10k upfront and 15k after the job is done, regardless of if they were successful or not).
+ $15,000 for various bribes/help from locals/unanticipated expenses you’d likely come across. You also might want to pay someone to smuggle your coke out of Colombia so that you could fly out of a less suspicious country like Argentina.
Total Cost: $200,000
---------------------------------------
Even if only three out of six mules make it through Australian customs, you’ve now made: 2kg x $300,000, or $600,000, if sold by the gram on the Silk Road. If using body packing as your method, a 50% success rate seems very reasonable. You’d then easily monopolize the Australian coke market here with a product that pure and price that good.
You walk away with $600,000, thereby tripling your initial investment without even having to establish connections with a cartel or drug trafficker. Granted, you’d have high start-up costs (at least 100k) and there’s the possibility that everything would blow up in your face, but that’s still a nice potential profit margin for someone who theoretically had half their product seized in customs.
Thoughts? For the record, I would actually try this… although the thought of a DEA agent reading this amuses me.
For the record, cocaine is astronomically high in Australia, because they have some of the hardest customs in the word to penetrate and because of geographic location. If you've ever watched that Australian customs program, the failure rate is excessively high, and they take no shit from nobody.
And you can't just go to South America and bid $1500 for a key - South America is not Ebay, it's some serious shit! Timing, planning, and speaking Spanish are all necessities. They don't take kindly to gringos, and the cartels are in control. Why would they want to sell to you, the one man band competition, they busted all the mom and pop industries decades back! That's what keeps them on top of this business, and they will do whatever it takes to ensure it stays this way.
I think even your subconscious is suggesting you loosing half your mules, is not a good idea. If I was in this situation, if I lost one, I'd shit myself, not about the money, but about them landing me in it, in exchange for them getting a reduced sentence. Start with one mule and work up, why on earth are you going to start with four? It's like running before you can walk!
If you wish for smuggling to be your chosen profession, work out how to transport to easier countries first. At this moment in time, your plan has more holes in it then swiss cheese. Leave Australia to the professionals! :)
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Point taken, PrincessHIGH. You're most certainly right, as this really was just a hypothetical rough sketch of an idea that I probably wouldn't have the balls to even think of doing. Maybe I've been watching too much Scarface :) .
That being said, I think I addressed some of your criticisms in my original post.
1. "And you can't just go to South America and bid $1500 for a key - South America is not Ebay, it's some serious shit!"
Which is why I said I'd instead pay $5,000 for a kilo. I'm pretty sure a mid-level player would sell a few keys to me if I was willing to buy for 3 1/3 times more than their actual worth. In a sense, I'd LET them fuck me over, and I'm fairly certain they'd be happy to oblige. (This admittedly might end in a bullet to the back of my head if a cartel there found out was I was trying to do.)
2. "If I was in this situation, if I lost one, I'd shit myself, not about the money, but about them landing me in it, in exchange for them getting a reduced sentence."
The cartels currently pay a mule $3000-$4000 per run, IF AND ONLY IF they actually get it through. I'd be giving these same mules 7-8 times that amount, guaranteed. Essentially, I'd be paying them to shut the fuck up and do their 5-10 years in advance. They'd therefore have a strong incentive not to rat me out if captured.
3. "For the record, cocaine is astronomically high in Australia, because they have some of the hardest customs in the word to penetrate and because of geographic location. "
Which is why I based my figures on the basis of half my product getting seized. This is probably the biggest hole in my plan though, as I have no fucking clue what the actual seizure rate is. Essentially I'd be taking a gamble that I could get at least three through. It'd be a huge risk for a huge reward, but maybe worth it, especially if I found a cheap way to get my coke into a neighboring country like Argentina/Chile.
4. "Start with one mule and work up, why on earth are you going to start with four? It's like running before you can walk!"
I WOULD be doing it one mule at a time, and if the first two were unsuccessful, I'd probably eat my losses and go home. The reasoning behind dividing my product with 6 mules in total though is that it would increase the odds of them getting through as well lessen the potential sentences they would face.
This is VERY rudimentary outline of a crazy plan that would probably not work, I admit. The beauty of this plan though is that I'd became both an early wholesaler at the coke's source AND would be able to sell the two kilos in Australia at retail prices. I'd benefit from the built-in networking the Silk Road provides and could amazingly keep this whole operation to myself. There's enough profit here (mid-six figures) for this sort of thing to work, if not by me, than by someone more knowledgeable about South American drug trade.
But seeing as I don't like bullets to the back of my head and know next to nothing about the drug trade, you're right, I'll leave it to the professionals... for now ;)
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Or do this:
1. Get some powder that looks like cocaine. Wrap it up and leave one real brick unwrapped for tasting purposes.
2. Sell in bulk and trick whoever you're dealing to that its real shit.
3. Get the fuck out of the country and live like a king in some 3rd world country.
This plan has just as much chance of success as your one. ;)
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Maybe you can buy some actual mules for that cash and teach them to long distance swim? Heeehhaaaawww...
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i watched auz customs other day and they only had 4 hours to search a huge fucking cargo ship with unlimited places to hide shit and it had been to all the dodge countries and was a tramper ship which they said was more suspect
this has to be the best way but im sure the ones who will do it already have cartels using them
from just watching that program id say they stop pretty much all south americans and viatnamese etc and at least frisk them at airports
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Firstly, if they don't just take all your money off you in South America and you manage to get your kilos. One thing I believe is sometimes done is; you tip the Australian customs off on ONE of your mules to hopefully allow the other five to get through whilst customs are busy looking out for the fall guy. It's a shitty thing to do, knowing your sending someone down for a long time, but IF it works (and that's still a big 'if') then your almost home free.
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I would believe importing any substantial amounts of narcotics via shipping containers to be the most successful, especially at the busier ports of Australia. Only a small percentage of shipping containers are actually xrayed and searched as it is impossible to open all due to sheer volume and size. I think they use computer algorithms to select cargo at random for screening. I think spending time in countries closer to home, with large inflows of import goods to Aus would be more beneficial. Good quality mdma can go for $250-$300 a gram here on the road, and it can be sourced in amazing quality in Indonesia, UK etc. These are definitely not 'suspect' countries for travel, I guess the hardest part would be again, making contact and organising shipping and planning if the worst would happen. But what the fuck do I know about drug trafficking, absolutely nothing!
In terms of profit, shipping container = 50,000 litres? If you were to get 2kg of mdma that could be sold for $500k @ $250 to the gram, and I would think the risks are a little smaller, rather than trusting mules and dealing with the cartel. If you were to invest ~$50k on a pill press, the 2kg could make 40,000 (50mg) medium dosed pills, which is decent for the Aussie market, in actual fact, your lucky to consume pills with any mdma in them, let alone 50mg, uncut. 40K pills could be sold for $1.2M at retail price or if you sold larger quantities you'd probably only get $16-22 per pill. Food for thought. That was just for 2kg...imagine filling a 1/4 of the container, more risk but fuck you'll be laughing all the way home if it got through undetected.
From memory, the Hong Kong nationals who got caught with 300kg+ of meth amphetamine were only caught via tip off from the DEA, (or some other law enforcement agency abroad). This was concealed in hundreds of clay pots, same with the other Hong Kong nationals who imported 80 odd kilo's of cocaine in lawnmowers. We only here about the tip offs and seizures, I wish I could see what actually got through :P
They say the best hiding place is in plain sight....You know those glass balls that have a colorful mineral placed in the centre, I always wondered if they would be a good smuggling trick. Just think...having a big rock of mdma placed in the centre of the glass ball which is air tight and wiped down with alcohol, no-one would suspect a thing, just another mineral eh? Unless one breaks on the trip over and you have a sniffer waiting at the port, then you'll be fucked. Ahhh, the lengths of imagination ::)
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Whilst on the shipping container subject, this article might be of intrest;
"clearnet warning* http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/opinion/customs-turns-to-intelligence-in-canute-like-battle-to-stem-tide-of-illegal-imports/story-e6frgd0x-1226347237490
"Only 100,000 of the 2.5 million shipping containers - one in 25 - are subject to X-ray inspection while barely 1.5 million - one in nine - of the 13.9 million air cargo assignments are X-rayed. Of the 54 million air freight parcels received through the postal system, only 21 million are X-rayed."
4% chance of your shipping container getting inspected, or 50% chance of a mule getting caught, I know which option I'd take ;)
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I would believe importing any substantial amounts of narcotics via shipping containers to be the most successful, especially at the busier ports of Australia. Only a small percentage of shipping containers are actually xrayed and searched as it is impossible to open all due to sheer volume and size. I think they use computer algorithms to select cargo at random for screening. I think spending time in countries closer to home, with large inflows of import goods to Aus would be more beneficial. Good quality mdma can go for $250-$300 a gram here on the road, and it can be sourced in amazing quality in Indonesia, UK etc. These are definitely not 'suspect' countries for travel, I guess the hardest part would be again, making contact and organising shipping and planning if the worst would happen. But what the fuck do I know about drug trafficking, absolutely nothing!
In terms of profit, shipping container = 50,000 litres? If you were to get 2kg of mdma that could be sold for $500k @ $250 to the gram, and I would think the risks are a little smaller, rather than trusting mules and dealing with the cartel. If you were to invest ~$50k on a pill press, the 2kg could make 40,000 (50mg) medium dosed pills, which is decent for the Aussie market, in actual fact, your lucky to consume pills with any mdma in them, let alone 50mg, uncut. 40K pills could be sold for $1.2M at retail price or if you sold larger quantities you'd probably only get $16-22 per pill. Food for thought. That was just for 2kg...imagine filling a 1/4 of the container, more risk but fuck you'll be laughing all the way home if it got through undetected.
From memory, the Hong Kong nationals who got caught with 300kg+ of meth amphetamine were only caught via tip off from the DEA, (or some other law enforcement agency abroad). This was concealed in hundreds of clay pots, same with the other Hong Kong nationals who imported 80 odd kilo's of cocaine in lawnmowers. We only here about the tip offs and seizures, I wish I could see what actually got through :P
They say the best hiding place is in plain sight....You know those glass balls that have a colorful mineral placed in the centre, I always wondered if they would be a good smuggling trick. Just think...having a big rock of mdma placed in the centre of the glass ball which is air tight and wiped down with alcohol, no-one would suspect a thing, just another mineral eh? Unless one breaks on the trip over and you have a sniffer waiting at the port, then you'll be fucked. Ahhh, the lengths of imagination ::)
You know what, I think you’re right. My plan has too many ways in which I end up robbed, in prison, or in a coffin. The cocaine market has been earned through more bloodshed than I’d care to think about, and the cartels aren’t people you’d want to fuck around with. MDMA, although not nearly as prevalent as coke is, would be the ideal product to sell on the Silk Road. Although not nearly as profitable, you’d still be making bank.
And guess what, you'd already have a bulk supplier right here on the Silk Road in Dutchaanbod! He’s selling a kilo for 13K domestically in Germany. Suppose you acquire 3 kilos for $50,000 a kilo at a time… that’s at least worth $600,000 if sold in relatively small amounts.
Now, I don’t know anything about trafficking illicit drugs into Australia, but I’m sure I could figure it out or find someone who does. The shipping container idea is interesting, seems like it has a really high success rate. Either that or get 10 or so Africans to act as drug mules (even easier than in South America because of their EXTREMELY low wages) for like 20 g's a head. You'd almost be doing a humanitarian act of charity for them, funny enough, as that would be the equivalent of 15 years of wages for them for one run.
I guess my point in all of this is this: if Australian drug mule/shipping container seizures rate are that low, AND you already have your supplier/distribution network set up via the Silk Road, why haven't we seen anyone do this yet? There's a whole ocean of oil under our feets!
My bold prediction: the Silk Road is going to completely change how drugs are distributed globally, decreasing the significance of organized crime syndicates in the process. Right now all we have are computer nerds and small time players acting as vendors; just wait until bigger fish hear about this place.
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I called Aussies as dumb as a sack of hammers in another topic recently.
I rest my case.
( <3 you bogans really)
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<removed>
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My bold prediction: the Silk Road is going to completely change how drugs are distributed globally, decreasing the significance of organized crime syndicates in the process. Right now all we have are computer nerds and small time players acting as vendors; just wait until bigger fish hear about this place.
We've come full circle now. ::) ;)
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I would believe importing any substantial amounts of narcotics via shipping containers to be the most successful,
Bingo....
People don't realize how many shipping containers come off ships at the ports everyday.. Way more stuff passes through the ports then through any mail processing center!!!
were talking mega tonnes of product... it cant all be searched.. its impossible!
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i agree and using mules is crazy a hell in my opinion but if those people are willing to risk it oh well. I thought they were still en-closing kilos in hand made pottery and stuff like that also
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Okay, I admit that the drug mule idea was pretty stupid. It'd be too hard to set up and ensure your safety and you'd be endangering too many lives.
The shipping container idea though.... that seems really feasible. You could even hire someone to put it in their name and pick it up for you, so you'd assume no risk yourself.
If there's a 95% success rate and each kilo of molly/heroin/whatever nets you $100,000+, then I don't understand why people aren't doing this...
I'm storing this in my "FUCK IT, I'M GOING ALL IN!" file...
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Okay, I admit that the drug mule idea was pretty stupid. It'd be too hard to set up and ensure your safety and you'd be endangering too many lives.
The shipping container idea though.... that seems really feasible. You could even hire someone to put it in their name and pick it up for you, so you'd assume no risk yourself.
If there's a 95% success rate and each kilo of molly/heroin/whatever nets you $100,000+, then I don't understand why people aren't doing this...
I'm storing this in my "FUCK IT, I'M GOING ALL IN!" file...
Too bad they pulled the Cyanide thread. you could have used a little pill if you tried yourself and failed!
:o
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Point taken, PrincessHIGH. You're most certainly right, as this really was just a hypothetical rough sketch of an idea that I probably wouldn't have the balls to even think of doing. Maybe I've been watching too much Scarface :) .
That being said, I think I addressed some of your criticisms in my original post.
1. "And you can't just go to South America and bid $1500 for a key - South America is not Ebay, it's some serious shit!"
Which is why I said I'd instead pay $5,000 for a kilo. I'm pretty sure a mid-level player would sell a few keys to me if I was willing to buy for 3 1/3 times more than their actual worth. In a sense, I'd LET them fuck me over, and I'm fairly certain they'd be happy to oblige. (This admittedly might end in a bullet to the back of my head if a cartel there found out was I was trying to do.)
2. "If I was in this situation, if I lost one, I'd shit myself, not about the money, but about them landing me in it, in exchange for them getting a reduced sentence."
The cartels currently pay a mule $3000-$4000 per run, IF AND ONLY IF they actually get it through. I'd be giving these same mules 7-8 times that amount, guaranteed. Essentially, I'd be paying them to shut the fuck up and do their 5-10 years in advance. They'd therefore have a strong incentive not to rat me out if captured.
3. "For the record, cocaine is astronomically high in Australia, because they have some of the hardest customs in the word to penetrate and because of geographic location. "
Which is why I based my figures on the basis of half my product getting seized. This is probably the biggest hole in my plan though, as I have no fucking clue what the actual seizure rate is. Essentially I'd be taking a gamble that I could get at least three through. It'd be a huge risk for a huge reward, but maybe worth it, especially if I found a cheap way to get my coke into a neighboring country like Argentina/Chile.
4. "Start with one mule and work up, why on earth are you going to start with four? It's like running before you can walk!"
I WOULD be doing it one mule at a time, and if the first two were unsuccessful, I'd probably eat my losses and go home. The reasoning behind dividing my product with 6 mules in total though is that it would increase the odds of them getting through as well lessen the potential sentences they would face.
This is VERY rudimentary outline of a crazy plan that would probably not work, I admit. The beauty of this plan though is that I'd became both an early wholesaler at the coke's source AND would be able to sell the two kilos in Australia at retail prices. I'd benefit from the built-in networking the Silk Road provides and could amazingly keep this whole operation to myself. There's enough profit here (mid-six figures) for this sort of thing to work, if not by me, than by someone more knowledgeable about South American drug trade.
But seeing as I don't like bullets to the back of my head and know next to nothing about the drug trade, you're right, I'll leave it to the professionals... for now ;)
Points taken back ;) Your last sentence is the most logical conclusion for you, for now. In the meantime, if this is your wish, begin by learning how to speak fluent Spanish, that's your most important foundation, if your going to be doing business with South America.
Whilst on the shipping container subject, this article might be of intrest;
"clearnet warning* http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/opinion/customs-turns-to-intelligence-in-canute-like-battle-to-stem-tide-of-illegal-imports/story-e6frgd0x-1226347237490
"Only 100,000 of the 2.5 million shipping containers - one in 25 - are subject to X-ray inspection while barely 1.5 million - one in nine - of the 13.9 million air cargo assignments are X-rayed. Of the 54 million air freight parcels received through the postal system, only 21 million are X-rayed."
4% chance of your shipping container getting inspected, or 50% chance of a mule getting caught, I know which option I'd take ;)
Very insightful thank-you for sharing. How were these figures concluded? Cannot read the full report as it requires a login.
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I called Aussies as dumb as a sack of hammers in another topic recently.
I rest my case.
( <3 you bogans really)
" dumb as a sack of hammers"?? WTF!! Sack of potatoes maybe, but a sack of hammers. Seems Aussies aren't the dumb ones after all.
I rest my case.