The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has accused Stefan Qin of cryptocurrency arbitrage fraud and of not returning investors’ funds. Qin is the founder of Virgil Sigma funds in New York and VQR Multistrategy in the Cayman Islands.
In the summer of 2020, Qin told investors who tried to withdraw investments totaling $3.5 million that their funds would be moved to VQR Multistrategy. According to the SEC’s complaint, the funds were never transferred.
In December, Qin asked fund trader Antonio Hallaka to help him withdraw $1.7 million from VQR, saying that he borrowed money from Chinese loan sharks to invest in Virgil Sigma.
Also the fund managers are charged with making changes to trackers used to monitor investments on 39 cryptocurrency trading platforms in 2019.
The defendant is currently in South Korea and is prepared to cooperate with the SEC.
“Stefan Qin has a full set of facts and seeks to ensure that no investor is harmed,” said Reuters lawyers.
The regulator seeks to recover investors’ principal and disclosed profits. The SEC also seeks to bar Qin from participating in the offer, sale, or issuance of any securities, except on his personal account.
gov.uscourts.nysd.551108.1.0 by ForkLog on Scribd
Earlier, on December 23 the SEC filed suit against Ripple, Brad Garlinghouse and Chris Larsen. The agency contends that the company sold unregistered securities in the form of the XRP token.
Also on the same day, Bitwise Asset Management announced the exclusion of the XRP token from its flagship Bitwise 10 Crypto Index Fund. Crypto bank Galaxy Digital, Michael Novogratz’s halted trading of the XRP token on December 24.
Brad Garlinghouse said that the SEC’s suit against Ripple is a terrible precedent for the crypto industry, which could spell trouble for other crypto companies.
Subscribe to ForkLog news on Twitter!