Eccentric software mogul John McAfee staged an illegal “pumping and unloading” cryptocurrency system that earned millions of dollars for him and his staff, federal prosecutors in Manhattan said Friday.
In a federal court-sealed indictment, prosecutors charged McAfee and Jimmy Watson, his “executive adviser” on cryptocurrencies, with executing two schemes to block cryptocurrency investors of about $ 13 million.
In the first illicit plot, McAfee and his team bought large amounts of “altcoin” – knowing at the same time that they intend to advertise the cryptocurrency using its Twitter account, which has a large and loyal number of followers, prosecutors accused.
McAfee, the founder of McAfee antivirus software, then sold the altcoins after his tweets artificially increased the value of cryptocurrencies, earning about $ 2 million from the “pump and dump” scheme, according to the indictment.
In a second ploy, McAfee and his team took money from cryptocurrency issuers to promote events called “initial coin offerings,” prosecutors said.
The illicit group failed to reveal that they were paid to make the events public, which is illegal, according to the indictment. That scheme would have earned them another $ 11 million.
McAfee and Watson were charged with seven counts of conspiracy and money laundering.
McAfee is currently being held in Spain, where he was arrested by US authorities last year for tax evasion.
In August, he became infamous for lying about his viral claim that he had been arrested in Norway for wearing a belt as a face mask, saying it was just a prank.