In a small town in rural Kansas, the heartland bank became the latest target of a cryptocurrency scam. The Atlanta-based company InBlockchain offered the bank employees an opportunity to invest in an initial coin offering (ICO) for a cryptocurrency called Hollandia Coin. The employees invested $33,000, but the price of Hollandia dropped by more than 99%, causing the bank to lose millions in retirement and employees’ savings. The company promised a return as high as 1,500% over 5 years. However, it turned out to be a Ponzi scheme with no assets other than a poorly designed website and a luxurious Atlanta office with an address that did not exist. The FBI and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission are investigating the case, and the banks are still trying to recover the losses. While cryptocurrencies are touted as a technological wonder by their boosters, they continue to attract financial swindlers and con artists that take advantage of regulators that don’t know what to do about it. This is just one of the thousands of cryptocurrency scams that are playing out around the world.
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