sayakchowdhury

"Betting on Zero" is a documentary film about hedge fund manager Bill Ackman's legendary feud with a multi-level marketing corporation known worldwide as "Herbalife".

Herbalife is a public company whose stocks are traded on the NYSE (New York Stock Exchange), they sell dietary supplements and encourage customers to recruit other people into the fold as distributors of their products. The company seems to be big proponents of providing financial freedom to their customers yet most of their customers who are responsible for selling their products and recruiting others people into the Herbalife cause find themselves filing for bankruptcy. This dichotomy reveals a more nefarious modus operandi that is based on preying on the vulnerable, as so aptly put in words by many: "Herbalife in Robin Hood in reverse".

Bill Ackman first became aware of the dubious stats of the company and became interested soon as he realized that this was in all essence a billion pyramid scheme operating in broad daylight. To him the company was a lie so audacious that people had no way but to believe that it was true. So he took it upon himself to drag the company through the mud, to expose it's true colors and to make a neat profit while at it.

Meanwhile there were is another faction on the ground level, away from the machinations of Wall Street, mostly made up of the Latino community, along with a few others who have experienced the harmful effects that Herbalife firsthand. They have lost a lot of money and are dealing with the very real repercussions that come thereafter.

For the most case Bill Ackman and the Latino community, who are hit the hardest by the ill effects of Herbalife, remain in their own separate worlds. They are largely uninformed of each other and have to deal with the problem in their own way. These are two starkly different worlds and have their very differing views of how to deal with the problem. While the Latino community engages in protesting and providing community support while Bill Ackman engages in shorting Herbalife stock. The documentary highlights the key moments in their struggle against Herbalife. The documentary is very US-entric and leaves much of the global operations of Herbalife mostly untouched, save for a brief mention. Although Bill Ackman gets painted in a sympathetic light, the disenfranchised masses are those who retain all sympathies.

The documentary does well to show the corrosive effects that these fraudulent corporations can have on a community the helplessness that comes therein. But even in the face of the dehumanizing effects of these large systems, the community remains resilient. Beaten down again and again till they had someone like Ackman on their side did they have any hope of winning.