Edit: Cat Brother, Wu talks about blockchain
On April 30th, the US Department of Justice issued a statement accusing Roger Ver (Bitcoin Jesus) of evading nearly 50 million US dollars in taxes, and charged him with mail fraud, tax evasion, and filing false tax returns. He was arrested last weekend in Spain, and the US is seeking to extradite him to face trial in the US.
Roger Ver is an early advocate of Bitcoin and a key supporter of BCH. He is also an early investor in Bitcoin.com, Blockchain.com, CoinFLEX, and other Bitcoin startups. However, in recent years, Roger Ver has been involved in financial disputes with companies such as Matrixport, CoinFLEX, and Genesis.
Below is the full text of the press release issued by the US Department of Justice:
Original link:
https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/early-bitcoin-investor-charged-tax-fraud
Yesterday, an indictment was unsealed, charging early Bitcoin investor Roger Ver with mail fraud, tax evasion, and filing false tax returns. Ver was arrested last weekend in Spain, and this arrest is based on criminal charges in the US. The US will seek to extradite Ver back to the US to face trial.
According to the indictment, Ver, who previously resided in Santa Clara, California, owned two companies, MemoryDealers.com Inc. and Agilestar.com Inc., which sold computer and networking equipment. Starting in 2011, Ver allegedly purchased Bitcoin for himself and his companies. He also enthusiastically promoted Bitcoin, even earning the nickname "Bitcoin Jesus."
On February 4, 2014, Ver allegedly obtained citizenship in Saint Kitts and Nevis, and shortly thereafter renounced his US citizenship through a process called expatriation. It is alleged that after expatriating, US law required Ver to file tax returns, reporting the constructive sale of his assets (including Bitcoin) worldwide and reporting the fair market value of his assets. He was also allegedly required to pay an "exit tax" on these capital gains. As of February 4, 2014, Ver and his companies allegedly owned approximately 131,000 bitcoins, which were trading at around $871 each on several major exchanges. MemoryDealers and Agilestar allegedly owned approximately 73,000 of these bitcoins.
Ver allegedly hired a law firm to help him with expatriation and prepare related tax returns. He also hired an appraiser to value his two companies. Ver provided the law firm and appraiser with false or misleading information, concealing the true amount of Bitcoin owned by him and his companies. As a result, the law firm allegedly prepared and submitted false tax returns that significantly undervalued the value of the two companies and their 73,000 bitcoins, and did not report any Bitcoin owned by Ver personally.
The indictment further alleges that as of June 2017, Ver's two companies still held approximately 70,000 bitcoins. It is alleged that around that time, Ver claimed ownership of these bitcoins and sold tens of thousands of bitcoins on a cryptocurrency exchange in November 2017, obtaining approximately $240 million in cash. Despite no longer being a US citizen at the time, he still had a legal obligation to report and pay certain allocated taxes to the IRS, such as dividends from MemoryDealers and Agilestar, both of which are US companies. Ver allegedly concealed from his accountant the fact that he had received and sold bitcoins from MemoryDealers and Agilestar that year. As a result, Ver's 2017 personal tax return did not report any income or taxes related to the Bitcoin distributions from MemoryDealers and Agilestar.
It is alleged that Ver caused the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to lose at least $48 million.
Stuart M. Goldberg, Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General of the Tax Division of the US Department of Justice, and Martin Estrada, US Attorney for the Central District of California, announced the news.
The IRS Criminal Investigation Division's Cyber Crimes Unit is investigating the case.
Matthew J. Kluge, Assistant Chief of the Tax Division of the US Department of Justice, and Trial Attorney Peter J. Anthony, as well as Assistant US Attorney James C. Hughes of the Central District of California, are prosecuting the case.
The indictment is merely an accusation. All defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty in court.
Financial Disputes
During the extreme market volatility that occurred earlier in the first half of 2022 after the collapse of Terra, Roger Ver suffered significant losses in his margin trading account, and CoinFLEX failed to liquidate his massive positions in a timely manner, ultimately forcing the platform to seek restructuring. This led to ongoing disputes between Roger Ver and CoinFLEX CEO Mark Lamb regarding responsibility for the platform's collapse.
On June 29, 2022, Mark Lamb tweeted, "Roger Ver owes CoinFLEX 47 million USDC in value. We signed a written agreement requiring Roger Ver to personally guarantee any negative assets in his CoinFLEX account and regularly replenish the margin. However, he violated this agreement, and CoinFLEX has issued a default notice to Roger Ver." Roger Ver responded with a tweet denying the debt and refuting, "Not only do I not owe this counterparty any debt, but in fact, this counterparty owes me a large sum of money." In January 2023, Mark Lamb publicly addressed a letter to Roger Ver and Blockchaincom CEO Peter Smith, stating that CoinFLEX had suspended withdrawals for 250 days, and despite 98% of people voting in favor of the restructuring proposal, the process was continuously disrupted by the other party, preventing the restructuring from taking place.
On January 25, 2023, a department of the bankrupt Genesis Global Capital accused Roger Ver of failing to settle cryptocurrency options trades. According to the filing, GGC demanded monetary compensation for "the defendant's failure to settle cryptocurrency options trades that expired on December 30, 2022, with the amount to be determined at trial but not less than 20.9 million US dollars."
The next day, Roger Ver responded to the matter on Reddit, stating that he had sufficient funds to pay Genesis what he owed and was willing to do so. "However, our agreement requires Genesis to maintain solvency, as they cannot ask their clients to play a 'heads I win, tails you lose' game." He believed that Genesis had begun to lose solvency since June of last year and looked forward to Genesis explaining how they accurately assessed certain problematic items, including the difference between the valuation of client collateral and their own cryptocurrency assets.
On November 6, 2023, Roger Ver revealed that he had sued Smart Vega Holding Limited, a subsidiary of Matrixport under Wu Jihan, in August 2022, and was seeking 8 million US dollars in damages. He claimed that the other party had frozen his funds due to holding him responsible for losses on CoinFLEX.
Matrixport stated that this action was the result of an investigation into trading violations. Matrixport referred to Roger Ver as a client of bitcom. The issue stemmed from the exchange's investigation into Mr. Ver's margin trading violations, finding that he had breached contractual obligations and needed to pay fines for defaulting on additional margin.
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