Floyd Mayweather Jr Backed ICO Co-Founders Arrested for Fraud

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced an ICO endorsed by champion boxer Floyd Mayweather has officially been deemed a fraud.  Scroll Down for More

SEC Complaint

Centra Tech Inc. co-founders Robert Farkas and Sohrah ‘Sam’ Sharma are alleged to have “masterminded a fraudulent ICO in which Centra offered and sold unregistered investments through a CTR Token. Sharma and Farkas allegedly claimed that funds raised in the ICO would help build a suite of financial products, according to a complaint filed by the SEC and released to the public late Monday.

The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged two co-founders of a purported financial services start-up with orchestrating a fraudulent initial coin offering (ICO) that raised more than $32 million from thousands of investors last year. Criminal authorities separately charged and arrested both defendants,” the notice begins.

Mayweather's Involvement

Our friends at Bitcoin.com News referred to a New York Times report as to how the famed fighter ultimately got involved with Farkas and Sharma:

According to an expansive New York Times profile of the pair and Mr. Mayweather last year by Nathaniel Popper, “How Floyd Mayweather Helped Two Young Guys From Miami Get Rich,” 27 October 2017, “The debit card was described as a new product that would make it possible to spend virtual currencies anywhere Visa cards were taken. The company’s site showed Centra cards emblazoned with the Visa logo,” Mr. Popper exposed. “There was one problem with this plan. The company had not been approved, or had even applied, to run a Centra card on the Visa network, a spokeswoman for Visa said. After The New York Times reached out to Visa this month, Centra took all the mentions of Visa off its website.”

Mr. Popper noticed, “The primary business experience of Mr. Sharma and Mr. Farkas was at Miami Exotics, a luxury car rental business that the two built.” In September of last year, Mr. Mayweather “told his 13.5 million followers on Facebook not once but twice that they should buy a new virtual currency known as the Centra token. ‘Get yours before they sell out,’ he wrote above a picture of himself admiring the many boxing title belts he had been awarded over the years. ‘I got mine and as usual I’m going to win big with this one!’”

- Aaron Goldstein, Gambling911.com