Skip to main content

DJ Khaled and Floyd Mayweather charged by US SEC for Illegally promoting Bitcoin

                             DJ Khaled and?Floyd Mayweather charged by US SEC for Illegally promoting Bitcoin
Boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr and music producer DJ Khaled will pay thousands of dollars to settle charges that they violated US financial laws.

The US Securities and Exchange Commission announced the settlement on Thursday as the US financial regulator said the men failed to disclose payments they received to promote certain cryptocurrency investments.

The men neither admitted nor denied the claims, but agreed to pay combined penalties totalling more than $750,000. The two cases are the first the SEC has brought over touting violations involving initial coin offerings or ICOs, a relatively new investment vehicle associated with crypto-currencies. An ICO allows people to invest in a company by buying "tokens" or "coins" that it issues.

Despite the new language, the SEC has warned investors that it views many of the offerings as investments governed by existing securities laws. Those rules require disclosure of payments in exchange for publicity.  In this case, the SEC said Mayweather received $300,000 to promote three separate offerings, including one by Centra Tech, a Miami company that the SEC accused of fraud in April.

Mayweather's promotions included a message to his Twitter followers that Centra's ICO "starts in a few hours. Get yours before they sell out, I got mine…" Khaled was paid $50,000 by the same company, the SEC said.

The SEC said DJ Khaled agreed to repay the $50,000 he received for the endorsement, as well as a $100,000 fine and interest while Mayweather will repay the $300,000 he received, as well as a $300,000 fine and interest.

SEC Enforcement Division Co-Director Steven Peikin said the cases were a reminder that investors should "be sceptical of investment advice posted to social media platforms, and should not make decisions based on celebrity endorsements".

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Man cuts off his kinsman's penis over Ludo game argument

A father-of-six bled to death after one of his kinsmen cut off his penis following an argument. Mr. Sunday Ikwunyelu, aka A-Big, from Akpulu village, Ugbenu, in Awka North local government area of Anambra state, was killed by his relative Mr. Ifeanyi Eziechine over a ludo game. Ifeanyi reportedly hit Sunday with a heavy weapon, weakening him, then he cut off his genitals with a knife and Sunday bled to death. The wife of the deceased, Mrs. Maryrose Ikwunyelu narrated the incident that led to her husband’s sudden demise. She said: I was in front of my shop playing ludo game with one nurse Rebecca when Ifeanyi, who hap­pens to be my husband’s brother, joined us. He requested to be allowed to participate in the game but I declined on the ground that he often caused trouble each time he participated and lost out in the game. Sometimes, it would lead to wanton destruction of some items in my shop and the compound. It was on that note that he took offen...
Post a Comment
Read more

Police rescue young lady from the hands of ritualists in Delta State

Officers of the Delta State police command, on Thursday, rescued a lady from suspected kidnappers/ritualists in Asaba. The lady was said to be returning from Ogbegonogo market when she boarded their tricycle. Two other gang members later joined her from both sides, leaving her in the middle. Trouble, however, started when the rider refused to stop at the victim’s destination, forcing her to raise an alarm that attracted some policemen who gave them a hot chase and eventually rescued the girl and arrested the suspects. An eyewitness said one of them in a bid to disappear threw a ring suspected to be magic ring in his mouth and attempted to vanish but the Police diffused the charm.  Irate youths who gathered at the scene made efforts to go on jungle justice but the police prevented them.
Post a Comment
Read more

Law Enforcement Agency arrests 60 drug traffickers

The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) in Kogi on Friday said it had arrested 60 suspected drug traffickers and seized 976.2 kg illicit drugs between April and June. Alhaji Idris Bello, Commander, Kogi State Command of the agency, disclosed this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lokoja. Bello said the arrested traffickers included 56 males and 4 females. “The command also seized 976.2 kilogrammes of various illicit drugs, with Indian hemp accounting for about 974.5 kg, within the period” he said. According to him, out of those arrested, four were upon prosecution convicted and sentenced to various jail terms. He added that 28 of the suspects were undergoing counseling while 28 others had been counseled and released. Bello said the 2018 UN International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking on June 26 was celebrated to enlighten the public on the dangers of hard drugs. Bello, however, said over 60 per cent of crime and cr...
Post a Comment
Read more