Gary Gensler's SEC sues Crypto Influncers and posts on his Twitter as propaganda

[Hispo]

If a project, token or security is actively being promoted by someone famous on social media, then that should be considered to be a red flag. Period.

I believe the settlement is not big enough to deter other shady people on internet to continue pushing these scams to their naive followers, in my opinion, instead going against legit tokens and coins like Bitcoin and BUSD, the SEC should step up their efforts to get "influencers" accountable if they do this.

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[FanEagle]

I agree that this is a good thing to do. This isn't some "be aware" story or scary thing, this isn't some witch hunt, these people promoted some shit stuff for money, making others lose, just so they could profit, and that is illegal.

You can't do that with gold, you can't do that with stocks, so you shouldn't be able to do it because it would cause others to lose so much money and not only unethical but it is against the law at the same time. On the other hand, if you come out and say "this project paid me to promote it" and then do it, that's fine, just like having an "advertisement" logo somewhere or something, allows people to see you got paid for it, otherwise what's the point.

[arwin100]

Glad there government is serious about sueing up those famous and rich people promoting scam since this could serve a warning to many influencers to not try to promote any crypto scams to their followers also with other celebrity to use their fame and take advantage just for their own personal gain.

I believe the settlement is not big enough to deter other shady people on internet to continue pushing these scams to their naive followers, in my opinion, instead going against legit tokens and coins like Bitcoin and BUSD, the SEC should step up their efforts to get "influencers" accountable if they do this.

The amount is not huge and those big celebrities can pay that so there should be more to make them accountable so that this could serve a good reminder not to go on illegal promotions.

[Hispo]

I believe the settlement is not big enough to deter other shady people on internet to continue pushing these scams to their naive followers, in my opinion, instead going against legit tokens and coins like Bitcoin and BUSD, the SEC should step up their efforts to get "influencers" accountable if they do this.

The amount is not huge and those big celebrities can pay that so there should be more to make them accountable so that this could serve a good reminder not to go on illegal promotions.

Correct, I was in charge of the SEC I would propose those influencers to pay up 200% of the alleged money they received to promote those shitty coins and tokens. It does not make sense to fine someone if in the end they still will have profits from the crime they are being indicted of.

This is not supposed to be a slap on the wrist, otherwise these promoted scams won't get controlled at all.

[rdbase]

I agree that this is a good thing to do. This isn't some "be aware" story or scary thing, this isn't some witch hunt, these people promoted some sh*t stuff for money, making others lose, just so they could profit, and that is illegal.

You can't do that with gold, you can't do that with stocks, so you shouldn't be able to do it because it would cause others to lose so much money and not only unethical but it is against the law at the same time. On the other hand, if you come out and say "this project paid me to promote it" and then do it, that's fine, just like having an "advertisement" logo somewhere or something, allows people to see you got paid for it, otherwise what's the point.

And the clear evidence of this is on twitter, instagram and meta for the courts to show they did do the crime.
Which is why the SEC has avocation for going after them in the first place. Because they did not put a disclosure in those promotions nor their videos.
Even the youtube crypto influencers are starting to put those disclaimers on daily videos once they publicize them on their channels.
Solely because the SEC have enforced their mandate with actually prosecuting these celebrities promoting these crypto projects.

Glad there government is serious about sueing up those famous and rich people promoting scam since this could serve a warning to many influencers to not try to promote any crypto scams to their followers also with other celebrity to use their fame and take advantage just for their own personal gain.

I believe the settlement is not big enough to deter other shady people on internet to continue pushing these scams to their naive followers, in my opinion, instead going against legit tokens and coins like Bitcoin and BUSD, the SEC should step up their efforts to get "influencers" accountable if they do this.

The amount is not huge and those big celebrities can pay that so there should be more to make them accountable so that this could serve a good reminder not to go on illegal promotions.

The amounts were the same for both these promoters of the Ethereum Max token project.
Which I don't know if it was just for the amount they were paid to promote them or some other things they found to put towards the fine by the SEC.

I believe the settlement is not big enough to deter other shady people on internet to continue pushing these scams to their naive followers, in my opinion, instead going against legit tokens and coins like Bitcoin and BUSD, the SEC should step up their efforts to get "influencers" accountable if they do this.

The amount is not huge and those big celebrities can pay that so there should be more to make them accountable so that this could serve a good reminder not to go on illegal promotions.

Correct, I was in charge of the SEC I would propose those influencers to pay up 200% of the alleged money they received to promote those shitty coins and tokens. It does not make sense to fine someone if in the end they still will have profits from the crime they are being indicted of.

This is not supposed to be a slap on the wrist, otherwise these promoted scams won't get controlled at all.

I would assume saying they are not allowed to promote anything to do with cryptocurrency projects for the next three years is good enough and not warrant any jail time tells you something.
Just asking for the amount of money back for what they were paid was kind of a just a slap on the wrist and ask them not to do it again anytime soon does not solve anything.

[FanEagle]

And the clear evidence of this is on twitter, instagram and meta for the courts to show they did do the crime.
Which is why the SEC has avocation for going after them in the first place. Because they did not put a disclosure in those promotions nor their videos.
Even the youtube crypto influencers are starting to put those disclaimers on daily videos once they publicize them on their channels.
Solely because the SEC have enforced their mandate with actually prosecuting these celebrities promoting these crypto projects.

Basically this is just regarding law and nothing more, that's what I have been trying to convey to everyone. There is a law that says a make up youtuber has to say that they got paid (not directly say it but say like "business partnership" in description of the video) when they promote a new brush, and this is just a brush, how expensive it could be? Whereas we are talking about people promoting investment and causing millions of dollars to change hands with their promotions if they are famous enough.

This is why I believe that it shouldn't really be an issue or be weird for SEC to go after these people, you have to say it was a business partnership in order to get away from jail.

[tiCeR]

I agree that this is a good thing to do. This isn't some "be aware" story or scary thing, this isn't some witch hunt, these people promoted some shit stuff for money, making others lose, just so they could profit, and that is illegal.

You can't do that with gold, you can't do that with stocks, so you shouldn't be able to do it because it would cause others to lose so much money and not only unethical but it is against the law at the same time. On the other hand, if you come out and say "this project paid me to promote it" and then do it, that's fine, just like having an "advertisement" logo somewhere or something, allows people to see you got paid for it, otherwise what's the point.

I haven't been following any action taken by the SEC ever and I don't know whether they disclosed more cases than just the one about Kardashian because that puts them in a better light?

There are so many influencers or celebrities promoting scam tokens that the SEC could actually be posting several reports every day about that. I really think that this Kardashian thing was something they couldn't ignore because of the public awareness.

Yet everyday rappers or boxers or people like Logan Paul pull of their scams or promote scam stuff and we don't get to read anything about it. Any other cases where celebrities have been sued or got a penalty by the SEC?

[rdbase]

I agree that this is a good thing to do. This isn't some "be aware" story or scary thing, this isn't some witch hunt, these people promoted some shit stuff for money, making others lose, just so they could profit, and that is illegal.

You can't do that with gold, you can't do that with stocks, so you shouldn't be able to do it because it would cause others to lose so much money and not only unethical but it is against the law at the same time. On the other hand, if you come out and say "this project paid me to promote it" and then do it, that's fine, just like having an "advertisement" logo somewhere or something, allows people to see you got paid for it, otherwise what's the point.

I haven't been following any action taken by the SEC ever and I don't know whether they disclosed more cases than just the one about Kardashian because that puts them in a better light?

There are so many influencers or celebrities promoting scam tokens that the SEC could actually be posting several reports every day about that. I really think that this Kardashian thing was something they couldn't ignore because of the public awareness.

Yet everyday rappers or boxers or people like Logan Paul pull of their scams or promote scam stuff and we don't get to read anything about it. Any other cases where celebrities have been sued or got a penalty by the SEC?

Logan Paul has been caught to be prompting a definite scam of the failed Crypto Zoo project and those NFT eggs a little while ago.
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-64210289
But it never fell in any jurisdiction with the SEC for some reason.
Is it because it was too new for this law they have put in place trying to defend the public from being defrauded?
Or they didn't take enough money from their customers to make them take action? Only they would know.

[savetheFORUM]

Logan Paul has been caught to be prompting a definite scam of the failed Crypto Zoo project and those NFT eggs a little while ago.
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-64210289
But it never fell in any jurisdiction with the SEC for some reason.
Is it because it was too new for this law they have put in place trying to defend the public from being defrauded?
Or they didn't take enough money from their customers to make them take action? Only they would know.

I would guess that the law is not there yet in time for him to get any punishments, he probably got a slap on the wrist type of thing, a stern warning of "never do it again if you do not want to pay millions in fine" and you are not going to see him do it ever again, not without disclosing at least.

I believe that sponsorship and business partnerships are different. How? Well let me put it this way, if you go on twitter and write "this new NFT is awesome!" that's basically getting paid to promote, but if Logan has a fight, and he gets a sponsorship for the fight, lets say on his trunks, and he tweets "thank you to X nft project for sponsoring me in this fight" that would be fine. He could try to do that.

[rdbase]

Logan Paul has been caught to be prompting a definite scam of the failed Crypto Zoo project and those NFT eggs a little while ago.
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-64210289
But it never fell in any jurisdiction with the SEC for some reason.
Is it because it was too new for this law they have put in place trying to defend the public from being defrauded?
Or they didn't take enough money from their customers to make them take action? Only they would know.

I would guess that the law is not there yet in time for him to get any punishments, he probably got a slap on the wrist type of thing, a stern warning of "never do it again if you do not want to pay millions in fine" and you are not going to see him do it ever again, not without disclosing at least.

I believe that sponsorship and business partnerships are different. How? Well let me put it this way, if you go on twitter and write "this new NFT is awesome!" that's basically getting paid to promote, but if Logan has a fight, and he gets a sponsorship for the fight, lets say on his trunks, and he tweets "thank you to X nft project for sponsoring me in this fight" that would be fine. He could try to do that.

You mean what Khabib Nurmagomedov, a well known former fighter in the UFC, just did on his twitter promoting a cryptocurrency project?

"Do you want to enter a closed community and get the chance to meet with me? The new crypto product that I am creating in collaboration with the GMT project will be your pass. I'll tell you all the details soon"
https://twitter.com/TeamKhabib/status/1629067947376361472

Many are questioning if it was really him who put this tweet out or maybe his agent has control over what is published without his approval.
Who really knows with these celebrity types.

But from what I gathered by going to the site in question, here is what you see directly on the splash screen for their project. So you can decide if it sounds legitimate.
"Easy Way to Earn Bitcoin: Earn BTC via staking GMT Token, holding NFTs, and playing a game, all of which are backed by the real mining infrastructure of our data centers."

[DaveF]

This is nothing new. Years ago there were celebrities promoting pump and dump stock scams who got slapped down bey the SEC hard. Then you have the people promoting gold & precious metals who got slapped down hard. The standards and laws and wording of what you have to tell people about in terms of risks and holdings have been settled law for decades. Just because it's new people with a new medium of communication about a new thing does not make it any different.

If you take advice from somebody who just posts videos on youtube or posts on other social media places you are an idiot.
If you are promoting these things without putting in a basic disclaimer about certain things you are an idiot.

-Dave

 

[rdbase]

Yet people are puppets and pawns in the eyes of these influencers, so what more do you want to come out of this @DaveF ?

Meanwhile the SEC are looking to lobby all cryptocurrency as a security except for bitcoin.
https://news.bitcoin.com/ripple-lawyer-argues-sec-chair-gensler-has-prejudged-crypto-asset-cases

Nothing they haven't done before but this time it is post-FTX and the destruction they have caused littered with casualties in it's wake.

[DaveF]

Yet people are puppets and pawns in the eyes of these influencers, so what more do you want to come out of this @DaveF ?

Nothing really, I was just pointing out this has happened many times before. From direct mail to radio to TV and now to the internet.
The medium has changed not the scam. Every time the medium changed the authorities started going after these people again until it slowed down. And then the next bunch starts with the next was go getting to people.

As the saying goes, you can't fix stupid. If you want to invest in something because somebody tells you to without doing ANY kind of research then you are going to get burned.
Part of the job of these government agencies is to act as your mom and stop you from doing soothing stupid. If they should or not have that as part of their job is a discussion for a different place.

-Dave

[rdbase]

There is a petition out from the digital currency traders alliance to rule against the SEC. US citizens only because you need to assign your district's politician to speak for you on this matter

https://joindcta.org/advocacy/stop-the-sec

[rdbase]

SEC has been making headlines the last couple of days with an all out war against anything to do with cryptocurrency.
In it's latest they have their sights set on binance's stablecoin busd and this has caused many to withdraw theirs from the platform and liquidate these assets in fear of a court ruling which will deem them as a security.

source: https://beincrypto.com/sec-staff-say-binance-us-offers-unregistered-securities

Some have speculated with this ruling it can cause a sideeffect among all other stable coins and even take down USDT along with it. Implicating all of the other stable coin markets as we know it:
https://cryptopotato.com/what-will-happen-to-binance-if-sec-manages-to-kill-busd

[rdbase]

SEC sues another celebrity the exact same one that they did to Kardashian on the promotion of a cryptocurrency scam.

SEC fines former NBA star Paul Pierce $1.4M over Etheruem Max
https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2023/02/17/sec-sues-former-nba-star-paul-pierce-over-ethereummax-promos
https://decrypt.co/121615/nba-star-paul-pierce-sec-fine-ethereum-max

Don't know why it took this long after fining her to go after this ex-NBA star for the exact same suit regarding promotion of a cryptocurrency.
But they only did just settle this late last week so they are really going with a fine tooth comb to squeeze even more out of this situation on the aftermath of the downfall of cryptocurrency exchange FTX months later.

From the latest "Shill Team" of who got served by Scary Gary and SEC this past week, NBA All-Star Shaquille O'Neal was mentioned as one of the defendants in this lawsuit. https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/international/world-news/us-sec-files-crypto-fraud-lawsuit-against-lindsay-lohan-and-7-other-celebrities/articleshow/98931900.cms?from=mdr
Soulja Boy a producer of music and rap-artist is the only one in the lawsuit who hasn't settled and paid the fine.
So he is the only one to have enough contempt for what Gary Gensler and the SEC are doing and decided to fight back with a countersuit?
Along with the other cases currently going on with Garlinghouse CEO of Ripple and now Coinbase with Brain Armstrong against their earn program you would think they have enough on their schedule.
So now just might be the right time to pursue this to the Nth degree.

[rdbase]

Another one for Ripple against the SEC which from the looks of it will be closing soon enough in favor of Brad Garlinghouse.
https://bitcoinist.com/ripple-bolsters-case-new-filing-ruling-end-april

The SEC thought taking on the cryptocurrency sector meant they were going to knock each one over like dominoes and that was it.
Game over!
But they have took on the entire crytpoverse and now looks like they have bit off more than they can chew.

[YuginKadoya]

TWITTER VIDEO LINK

Actually, this is a great topic to cover for crypto Dummies, this will surely protect for who want to invest in crypto but don't have proper knowledge about the risk involved in it, they think it is all just gains, which is not a real deal, and I think if we could share this video this will surely spread awareness that not because it is well-known personnel you can be so sure that it is a 100% legit project, but what about it is a 100% legit project but it just failed miserably then it will surely land on scams or a rug-pull project, and it doesn't mean that if a celebrity is endorsing it, it will be a 100% success project I think we need to always keep in mind the DYOR word,

Well, I think that this is a powerful message to now do such a thing and if Kim Kardashian could be charged and can be punished by the law then I think Logan Paul and other influencers on Youtube that show's misinformation and sometimes direct scams could be sentenced with the same punishment,

[jakelyson]

Well, I think that this is a powerful message to now do such a thing and if Kim Kardashian could be charged and can be punished by the law then I think Logan Paul and other influencers on Youtube that show's misinformation and sometimes direct scams could be sentenced with the same punishment,

That is a good take. Influencers should take a lesson on this. They should not take seriously who or what they are endorsing to the public. Since most will just follow what famous influencers do, it is upon them to make sure that they are not guiding their followers to bad decisions. We can only reach so much and educate a few but these influencers have a vast reach in their network. If they can educate themselves, and do their own research before accepting the endorsement, then there will be fewer victims of scams caused by them. I know it is hard to resist good money coming from scammers, but they should also bear in mind that they are influencing a lot of people who, not all but most, follow them blindly.

[YuginKadoya]

That is a good take. Influencers should take a lesson on this. They should not take seriously who or what they are endorsing to the public. Since most will just follow what famous influencers do, it is upon them to make sure that they are not guiding their followers to bad decisions. We can only reach so much and educate a few but these influencers have a vast reach in their network. If they can educate themselves, and do their own research before accepting the endorsement, then there will be fewer victims of scams caused by them. I know it is hard to resist good money coming from scammers, but they should also bear in mind that they are influencing a lot of people who, not all but most, follow them blindly.

This is the sad truth about social media they will surely allure many people to buy such things because they truly believe that it will change their lives when it hits double but as time passes, there will be no money that will come back to those people that invested in that project their money is long gone and sometimes they surely believe what their influencers are saying when an influencer just do things many of their followers are blinded to this, and as the saying goes monkey see monkey do,



Although not Crypto related I think this is surely relatable and has the same concept as the cryptocurrency Stock pump and dump, because in  this issue they charge those popular influencers on the internet here is the link to the ARTICLE they will surely lead their followers in buying with stocks and when that particular stocks get higher they will sell all of their stock without informing their audience that they will sell, and so this is kind of a scam leading to many of their audience in a loss of $100 million in total,