The ICO and token hype has been over for months now. The crypto market has slipped into depression. The honest actors of the crypto scene are currently digesting the experience with ICOs and working on long-term prospects for security tokens and regulated marketplaces. The regulatory authorities in many jurisdictions are also still in the process of being worked through. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), for example, has issued guiding decisions on individual cases in the crypto sector almost within a day’s time.
We can expect the collapse of most “shit coins” over the next couple of months. Until then, pump and dump schemes with penny tokens will continue and naive investors will be ripped off.
Deep Red Crypto Mining
Not only the token hype is over. Crypto mining too is in a state of crisis. According to the calculations of the various experts, mining across all coins and blockchains is heavily negative at the current price level. A few weeks ago the blockchain analyst James BARCLAY calculated that the mining of BTC on the Bitcoin blockchain at 35 TH/s is only profitable at a BTC price north of USD 6,900. We are currently holding at just above 40 TH/s and BTC prices below USD 5,200 (19 Nov 2018). Crypto-mining is currently consistently negative and makes sense at best due to speculation on rising prices. In the short term, however, this seems to be wishful thinking at best.
Crypto-MLM in Distress
The depressive mood across all crypto segments is putting the many crypto-MLM systems that have raised hundreds of millions of dollars from their FOMO-affected investors over the past 2 years into serious distress. Many of these PONZI systems have already collapsed, successfully destroying their members’ money. OMNIA TECH, NEXUS GLOBAL have long since abandoned their focus on mining. Although Robert VELGHE‘s OMNIA TECH has only recently established an (allegedly) gigantic mining center in Armenia with the alleged support of local companies and authorities, this does not change the lack of profitability and prospects for investors.
In this respect, the MLM schemes now also and above all bet on FOREX trading, i.e. trading in cryptocurrencies. The worthless penny tokens (shit tokens or dead tokens) are an important building block for their pump and dump schemes of the MLM systems. The individual MLM schemes push individual penny tokens and play with volumes and prices. This is securities fraud.
Securities Fraud: “Bump and Dump” with Penny Token
The final rip-off! A good case in point is the NASDACOIN. Until recently, nobody knew this coin for a good reason – it’s an evident scam. And now the appropriate vehicle for a pump and dump scheme.
The NASDACOIN has been included in CoinMarketCap since August 22, 2018, and is listed on some minor “offshore” crypto exchanges such as Crex24 or Mercatox. Until October 10, 2018, the coin did not exist on the trading floors. In the last few days, however, the coin exploded at short notice with quite impressive trading volumes (see CoinMarketCap). The coin shot up from USD 0.08 on 10 October to USD 4.88 on 15 November 2018.
After being developed by the Pump and Dump organizers to just under USD 0.1 on November 14th, the price then exploded to USD 4.88 on November 15th, before falling back to its current level of USD 2.7 on November 19th. Market capitalization more than quintupled within just hours from USD 17.9 million to just over USD 90 million and much again to currently (19 November) USD 50 million. While the daily trading volume over the months before 10 October oscillated between 3-4 thousand dollars a day, it exploded from 14 to 15 November to over 1 million. The explosion was orchestrated by the usual crypto-MLM suspects on Facebook.
NASDACOIN is allegedly run by Brazilian John BAPTIST. He has a vast MLM history and is associated with the BitConnect crypto-scam according to Bitcoin Exchange Guide. Behind the NASCOIN is apparently nothing – neither vision nor infrastructure. According to the analysis of the Bitcoin Exchange Guide, demand is generated primarily in the social media. The operators of the MLM systems, who rip off naive investors primarily via various Facebook groups, are known to be located there. The NASDACOIN stands for some other penny tokens with which Pump and Dump schemes are operated. Since these tokens qualify as securities, their manipulation is criminally relevant.
The NASDACOIN, for example, is pushed by a Dmitri SAVELYEV (see his Facebook profile here). SAVELYEV is a fake person who has advertised various crypto-MLM scams in the past. Among other things, he runs a Facebook group with more than 33,000 members, through which he has alternately advertised AVALON LIFE, CRYPTOGOLD or NEXUS GLOBAL. He recently “pumped” the NASDACOIN with it. On November 4, 2018, he posted the first promotion and from November 12 to 14, he then “pumped” the coin to the 33,000 members of his group. Everything is outright illegal of course but nevertheless, it is done in a lawless virtual crypto-space. Prices are manipulated and only the organizers win.
In this respect, we can only recommend all investors not to get involved in these speculations with penny tokens. This offers a worse chance of winning than roulette at the casino.
Market Shakeout Needs to Continue
The recovery on the crypto markets will not take place until the last excesses of the irrational crypto-hypes of 2017 are over and the last crypto-MLM scheme is collapsed. Crypto-MLM scams will disappear and the associated losses for the investors of these systems must be digested psychologically and financially in the market. This will continue for many months to come. Months that will also be needed from the serious side of the crypto industry to create the structures and framework for the new upswing.
