Wednesday, November 13, 2024

A MYSTERIOUS US$ 80 MILLION BITCOIN SCAM INVESTIGATED IN SOUTH AFRICA

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BitCaw

BitCaw – a South African crypto-scamAs reported by Reuters, South African authorities are investigating a company called BTC Global, which told potential investors via its website www.bitcaw.com they would earn 2 percent per day, 14 percent a week and 50 percent in a month. At least, that’s what the police said. Actually, it seems to be possible that the website and the company are not connected bit two seperate ventures.

According to a CCN report, BTC Global was launched on Sept. 25, 2017. The website www.bitcaw.com lists a Steven Twain as the “primary trader”. A request for comment by Reuters sent to an email address listed on the website as belonging to Twain received no response.

Currently, it’s questioned whether and how BitCaw and BTC Global are connected. Lawyers representing BitCaw Trading stated on Monday that the company was not aligned to BTC Global, as the Hawks claimed in their media release on Friday. The laywers said that BTC Global was a “completely separate entity”.

This comes after the police announced that BitCaw Trading and BTC Global were the same company, and were being jointly investigated for a scam that may have fleeced up to 28 000 investors out of R1bn. BitCaw threatens to sue the police for their false statements. Confusing, isn’t it?

According to a CCN report, the company (or the website) lost more than 1 billion rand (approx $80 million) from some 28,000 investors, according to a news release from the South African Police Service. As usual with such scams some investors received payments in the beginning, the police news release noted, but at some point, the payments stopped. The police said in their statements, the losses identified to date could be only the “tip of the iceberg” and that thousands more individuals could have lost funds.

The police website lists police individuals people can contact by phone or email. All information provided to the police will be kept in confidence, the new release stated. A source close to the police said that they have sufficient evidence to support their claim that the website BitClaw and the company BTC Global are connected entities.

We continue to report on the one/or two) cases.