After warning this week of enhanced regulatory scrutiny to come, the Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday levied its first charges in the booming decentralized finance space, charging two Florida men and their Cayman Islands company for allegedly selling more than $30 million of securities to investors in unregistered offerings over the course of a year....
Instead the SEC claims it was impossible for the business to operate as promised because the real-world assets couldn't generate enough income to pay back the surging value of investments made in tokens like ether. Executives failed to notify investors of the roadblock, the SEC alleges, and instead used personal funds and funds from another company they controlled to make principal and interest payments to investors.
Blockchain Credit Partners and executives Gregory Keough and Derek Acree didn't admit or deny the SEC's findings, but agreed to pay back more than $12.8 million in disgorgements and penalties of $125,000 each.“The federal securities laws apply with equal force to age-old frauds wrapped in today’s latest technology,” Daniel Michael, a unit chief of the SEC's enforcement division, said in a Friday statement.