Word on the street is that the FBI launched a crypto project to track down market manipulators and are also supposedly investigating meme influencers accounts like Ansem(sorry, the only one I know).
I gotta say, I'm a little disappointed it took them this long, I mean, it's like the most obvious move, if you're trying to catch the best of criminals, you have to become one, a 7 year old could figure that out.
The undercover operation, codenamed “Operation Token Mirrors,” has culminated in U.S. prosecutors charging 18 individuals and entities, including four major crypto firms—Gotbit, ZM Quant, CLS Global, and MyTrade—for alleged market manipulation and fraudulent trading practices. These firms are accused of engaging in widespread fraud, including “wash trading” schemes that misled investors and artificially inflated the value of over 60 cryptocurrencies.
Yeah, big deal, you think most crypto traders are not aware of market manipulation?
Maybe newbies aren't but that's just due to their inability to do some research to properly understand the ecosystem.
Fun fact, most victims are often those that have no prior history in investing in financial assets, otherwise, yeah, we all are aware of market manipulation, frankly because the very “regulated system” runs that shit.
It ain't crypto specific, and what's funnier is that everybody would manipulate the market if they had the means.
$100 million in liquidity sitting somewhere? Hell I'm pumping shit and dumping after. If you're crazy to jump in on a ride up, you're frankly ready to hold on to something as it crashes back down.
Does this mean this isn't fraud? Well, what isn't fraud these days?
Usually when it fails, that's when everyone starts screaming fraud all day, if it were a hot success, the sentiment would be a lot different.
So to answer the question, it's as much of a fraud as anything else in this space.
It's all risk and reward, and they risk a huge deal providing liquidity, did anyone really think they would not be tempted to maximize returns to cover for any potential casualties?
Memes and Airdrops To Slow Down?
Wash trading, a practice where traders simultaneously buy and sell an asset to create artificial trading activity, is at the heart of the charges. The conspirators allegedly inflated the value of tokens like the Saitama Token, which once boasted a market capitalization of $7.5 billion. They then executed “pump and dump” schemes, manipulating prices upward to attract unwary investors before selling off their holdings at the inflated values, leaving investors with losses.
The firms behind these fraudulent activities, including ZM Quant and Gotbit, are accused of facilitating this manipulation by hiring market makers to execute sham trades. These companies allegedly used multiple wallets and trading bots to conceal the true nature of their trades, inflating trading volumes and token prices without genuine market demand.
Well shit, memes are about to hit new lows and projects gearing for airdrops will likely postpone listing.
It's quite surprising how little crypto traders are unaware of why memes and airdrop tokens were getting listed across top markets in the industry.
It was all market manipulation at the finest.
Create hype, launch, lure in some big investors and numerous retails, manipulate price momentum, dump, ranse and repeat, so fuckin easy when you're sitting on millions to play with.
Ultimately, retails lose at the end of the day, it's the reality of all financial markets.