SEC sues five companies on suspicion of committing "pig killing" fraud

According to BlockBeats, on September 21st, the US SEC has filed lawsuits against three individuals and five companies, accusing them of operating a "pig killing" scam. These two lawsuits filed on Tuesday are the first enforcement actions taken by the SEC against this type of cryptocurrency scam, and come just one day before the US House Financial Services Committee is preparing to hold a hearing on the "pig killing" scam. SEC Enforcement Division Director Gurbir S. Grewal stated in a press release, "Relationship based investment scams, including those involving cryptocurrency investments, pose a huge risk to retail investors, and as these scams become increasingly popular among scammers, this threat is rapidly increasing. In these two cases, we accused scammers of creating a false cryptocurrency ecosystem and displaying false information to investors. Our accusations remind the public to remain highly vigilant about investment opportunities promoted by strangers on social media The SEC's lawsuit against the so-called cryptocurrency trading platform NanoBit claims that the participants of the program - including three US residents mentioned in the lawsuit, 28 year old Liu Jiajie from Los Angeles, California, 29 year old Liao Fei from San Gabriel, California, and 26 year old Zhao Hua from Flushing, New York - collectively carried out a fraud scheme that defrauded at least 18 investors of nearly $1 million in cryptocurrency and fiat currency. Another lawsuit is against another fake cryptocurrency trading platform called CoinW6, accusing unnamed participants of the program of defrauding at least 11 investors of $2.2 million between July 2022 and December 2023.