The US Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Damiam Williams, recently announced the guilty plea of Jeremy Spence in a crypto scam worth more than $5 million. The details shared by the authority outlined that Spence solicited money from over 170 individuals through various illegal crypto funds.
Spence, a crypto trader, made false promises to investors. Moreover, he also touted enormous returns of up to 148% to lure investors. Spence used the new investment to pay old investors in a Ponzi scheme style. He faced massive losses in his actual trading results but lied to investors.
“SPENCE solicited these investments through false representations, including that SPENCE’s crypto trading had been extremely profitable when, in fact, SPENCE’s trading had been consistently unprofitable. For example, on January 28, 2018, SPENCE posted a message in an online chat group falsely claiming that his trading of investor funds over the past month had generated a return of more than 148%,” the Department of Justice said in the press release.
“As a result of this misrepresentation, investors transferred additional funds to SPENCE. In fact, over that same period of approximately one month, SPENCE’s trading resulted in net losses in the accounts in which he traded investor funds,” the authority added.
Crypto Scams
With the growing popularity of digital currencies, global crypto scams have also increased. In February 2021, the US Department of Justice charged Kristijan Krstic, a 45-years old Serbian man, for his involvement in fraudulent crypto schemes. The US authorities also joined a probe into Mirror Trading International, South Africa’s multi-billion dollars crypto scam.
In the recent case, Spence asked investors to transfer funds in the form of Bitcoin and Ethereum for investment. “SPENCE, 25, pled guilty to commodities fraud, which carries a maximum sentence of ten years in prison. The maximum potential sentence is prescribed by Congress and provided here for informational purposes only, as any sentencing of the defendants will be determined by the judge,” the announcement states.
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