US SEC Warns Of ICO Scams Again As Altcoins Shoot Higher

The US SEC warns of ICO scams yet again as the crypto market entered an explosive state over the past few weeks. Most of the traders focused on Bitcoin and Ethereum but other altcoins performed quite well with some rallying by hundreds of percent or thousands of percent in days as we reported in our altcoin news.

Be aware of potential scams involving Initial Coin Offerings: https://t.co/weG4zl8n7F

— SEC New York (@NewYork_SEC) July 30, 2020

Most of the growth was through legitimate projects but the US SEC warns again of fraudulent ICOs. In a tweet published a day ago, the New York office of the SEC wrote:

 “Be aware of potential scams involving Initial Coin Offerings.”

Attached to the warning was the investor alert from 2017 during the peak of the latest ICO boom which was written by the SEC’s Office of Investor Education and advocacy. The alert, however, is outdated as it mentions potential scams involving stock of companies that are claiming to relate or engaged in initial coin offerings (ICOs). From the information that we have here at DCForecasts, these scams are not prevalent as they were back in 2017 but it’s still worth keeping an eye on the scams just as when you are dealing with characters purporting to offer ICOs or other investment tools.

BREAKING 🚨🚨🚨

PBOC Shanghai Head office just made a new regulatory update as

“Strengthen regulation and control, clamp down cryptocurrency trading” pic.twitter.com/zL0BgOJBUF

— Dovey 以德服人 Wan 🪐🦖 (@DoveyWan) November 22, 2019

But, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission is not the only authority that targeted ICOs over the past years. The Shanghai branch of the People’s Bank of China warned against crypto as well as ICOs, IEOs, STOs, and other types of capital-raising methods. According to the translation of the note, the PBOC warned that the sale of tokens for BTC, Ethereum and other virtual currencies remains:

 “essentially unauthorized illegal public financing, suspected of illegal sale of tokens, illegal issuance of securities and illegal fund-raising.”

This came one year after the PBOC sent out another warning about ICOs:

 “As of the date of this announcement, all types of token issuance financing activities shall cease immediately. The organizations and individuals who have completed the financing of tokens should make arrangements for repatriation and so on, reasonably protect the interests and properly handle the risks.”