U.S. to sell $56M in cryptocurrency to compensate victims of BitConnect Ponzi scheme – By Darryl Coote (UPI) / Nov 17 2021
Nov. 17 (UPI) — The Justice Department said it will sell off some $56 million worth of cryptocurrency it seized from a massive Ponzi scheme that defrauded U.S. and international investors of more than $2 billion.
The department announced the liquidation in a statement Tuesday, stating the cryptocurrency it will be selling off “is the largest single recovery of a cryptocurrency fraud” by U.S. authorities to date, and the money will be used to compensate the victims.
The money was seized in connection to a Ponzi scheme titled BitConnect, in which conspirators mislead investors about its technology being able to generate substantial profits when in fact they just paid earlier investors with money from those who joined later.
On Sept. 1, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced it had filed a complaint against BitConnect’s founder, Satish Kumbhani, 35, and its top U.S. promoter, Glenn Arcaro, 44.
