New York has expanded what had been a $1 billion lawsuit against three cryptocurrency companies.
Now, Attorney General Letitia James is alleging that the fraud scheme carried out by Digital Currency Group (DCG), its Genesis Global Capital offshoot, and Gemini Trust was three times the size once thought, at $3 billion.
In an amended complaint filed Friday (Feb. 9), James says that more investors have come forward since her office sued the three companies last year, alleging that they misled investors about an investment program known as Gemini Earn.
According to a news release, further “investigation revealed that these additional investors were similarly defrauded and provided with false assurances that their funds were safe when in fact they were not, leading to an additional $2 billion in assets that were lost.”
In all, the attorney general’s office found that the companies defrauded more than 230,000 investors out of upwards of $3 billion, the release said.
“After months of false promises, we pulled the curtain back and revealed that DCG was lying to investors and defrauding them out of billions,” James said. “The fraud and deceit were so expansive that many additional people have come forward to report similar harm.”