SEC Freezes Accounts Of Veritaseum And Its Founder Reggie Middleton

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has received a temporary restraining order to freeze the assets of Reggie MIDDLETON and ICO Veritaseum (VERI) which was organized by him. The procedure applies to accounts at financial institutions of Bank of America, Citi and JPMorgan Chase, as well as to cryptocurrency exchanges Gemini and Kraken and 15 addresses on the Ethereum blockchain.

According to a lawsuit filed on Monday, Middleton conducted a fraudulent and illegal ICO in 2017 and subsequently manipulated the value of tokens. The organizer is accused of disseminating false information about the business, as well as of trading on the open market in order to raise the price of VERI. In addition, the SEC claims that he illegally appropriated at least $520,000 of investor money for personal purposes, as well as $600,000 for the purchase of precious metals to implement another fraud

In addition to freezing assets, the SEC asked the court to prohibit Middleton from destroying or modifying documents and establish a lifelong ban on managing a public company and participating in the placement of digital assets.

Reggie MIDDLETON was unable to register the Veritaseum ICO with the SEC and stated that the coins were not securities, but investments in a technology platform or personal brand. He also described VERI tokens as prepaid fees, software, or compared them to WalMart gift cards. The SEC claims this entanglement was an attempt to circumvent the law.

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