Prosecutors said that the putative cryptocurrency initiative was fake from the start in 2014. OneCoin, which Karl Greenwood co-founded, established a pyramid scheme to advertise it to millions of individuals and make as much as $4 billion in profit, according to the prosecution. In an internal communication, Greenwood, 45, is accused of calling the investors "idiots." Greenwood admitted to wire fraud and a conspiracy to launder money.
The U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Damian Williams, stated that Karl Sebastian Greenwood managed one of the greatest international fraudulent transactions ever undertaken. Greenwood and his accomplices, who included wanted criminal Ruja Ignatova, defrauded unwary victims of billions of dollars by asserting that OneCoin would be the Bitcoin killer.
Ignatova, also a creator of OneCoin and a resident of Bulgaria, is still wanted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) as the "CryptoQueen." For information that results in her arrest, the FBI is offering a $100,000 reward.
The court case in question, along with other recent proceedings, according to Williams, is intended to send a powerful signal that is coming after everyone who wants to abuse the cryptocurrency community via fraud, no matter how big or clever an individual is. Greenwood, a Swedish and British national, was detained in 2018 and extradited to the United States from his home in Thailand.