Sat, November 23

SEC Accuses 11 People for Promoting Crypto Pyramid Scheme

SEC Accuses 11 People for Promoting Crypto Pyramid Scheme Editors News
  • Forsage has collected $ 300 million from millions of investors around the world.
  • The website already has allegations in the Philippines and Montana.

The U.S Securities and Exchanges (SEC) has charged 11 people associated with the Forsage platform on 1 Aug 2022. As per the SEC report, Forsage is a fraudulent Ponzi scheme that collected around $ 300 million from millions of retail investors. The charged people are accused of creating and promoting the crypto pyramid scheme.

The previous records on Forsage were on Sep 2020 by the security and exchange of the Philippines and on Mar 2021 by the Montana Commissioner of Securities and Insurance. Even with all these trials in process, the individuals supported the Forsage while declining the facts.

History of the Forsage

The list of the accused people includes Vladimir Okhotnikov, Jane Doe a/k/a Lola Ferrari, Mikhail Sergeev, Sergey Maslakov, and members of Crypto Crusaders. They launched the Forsage website Forsage.io in Jan 2020. Forsage.io allowed investors to transact using the smart contract mechanism on the Ethereum, Tron, and Binance blockchains.

Through the website, Forsage marketed itself to be a smart contract marketing matrix.

“an international community of the global decentralized ecosystem and the first ever smart contract marketing matrix of the Ethereum and Tron networks”

From their marketing material, it is clear that income for the investors was coming in two forms, selling one or two slots in the smart contract, and the other one is by profit sharing in larger Forsage. Both of these satisfy the definition of the pyramid scheme.

Carolyn Welshhans, Acting Chief of the SEC’s Crypto Assets and Cyber Unit states

“ …Forsage is a fraudulent pyramid scheme launched on a massive scale and aggressively marketed to investors…”

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