The US Department of Justice has announced charges against the CEO of Mining Capital Coin (MCC), a self-advertised cryptocurrency mining and investment platform, for allegedly orchestrating a $62 million global investment fraud scheme.
44-year-old Luiz Capuci Jr. from Florida allegedly misled investors about MCC’s cryptocurrency mining and investment program by selling what the company called ‘Mining Packages’ – essentially a rentable chunk of computing power as part of a larger international network of crypto mining machines. Investors were promised substantial profits and guaranteed returns.
Capuci also touted his firm’s own cryptocurrency, Capital Coin, as a decentralized autonomous organization that was “stabilized by revenue from the biggest cryptocurrency mining operation in the world.”
However, Capuci allegedly operated a fraudulent investment scheme and, instead of putting investors’ money to good use as advertised, he diverted the funds to cryptocurrency wallets under his control.
The indicted CEO is also accused of luring investors with promises that his company’s ‘Trading Bots’ could conduct thousands of trades per second, thanks to “new technology never seen before.”
“As he did with the Mining Packages, however, Capuci allegedly operated an investment fraud scheme with the Trading Bots and was not, as he promised, using MCC Trading Bots to generate income for investors, but instead was diverting the funds to himself and co-conspirators,” according to the DoJ.
Capuci allegedly concealed the location and control of the proceeds of fraud by laundering the funds internationally through various crypto exchanges.
According to the indictment, the crypto boss showered new investors with gifts ranging from Apple watches and iPads to luxury vehicles such as a Lamborghini, Porsche, and even Capuci’s personal Ferrari.
The man is charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to commit securities fraud, and conspiracy to commit international money laundering, which brings the maximum total penalty to 45 years behind bars, if convicted of all counts.
In related news, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) on Friday sanctioned virtual currency mixer Blender.io (Blender), for allegedly being used by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) to support malicious cyber activities and laundering of stolen virtual currency.