End-Times Preparedness Scam

End-times preparedness scams pair genuine eschatological beliefs held within many faith traditions with a commercial sales pitch, framing a purchase as necessary preparation for prophesied upheaval. Sellers may market survival food supplies, precious metals, off-grid property, or specialized 'crisis-proof' financial products at prices well above comparable market alternatives, justified by manufactured urgency ('the window to prepare is closing') that discourages price comparison or research. Some variants combine this with investment fraud, describing a fund or asset as immune to a coming economic collapse that conventional investments supposedly cannot survive.

The scam is distinguished from ordinary emergency-preparedness commerce by its reliance on manufactured religious urgency to short-circuit normal consumer skepticism, its markup relative to non-apocalypse-branded equivalents, and often a specific date, sign, or event tied to the seller's own prophecy claims. Because doubting the prophecy can feel like doubting the underlying faith, believers may keep purchasing preparedness products or investments from the same seller for years despite the predicted event never materializing.