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Lee Yan LaSur (St.Vincent Times)

January 17, 2023

(St.Vincent Times) Unsuspecting investors in cryptocurrencies who bought Bitcoin through “Austrian-based” Prime Holdings had their money routed through a St. Kitts and Nevis company and then stolen, fraud investigators have discovered.

Intel Suisse, financial fraud investigators, traced transactions made by European investors, directed through an online German bank and also through a newly-created FinTech company registered in St. Kitts and Nevis but owned by a UK citizen.

By tracking the blockchain addresses as the bitcoins were moved around to avoid detection, a cache worth some $3.5 billion was discovered. Financial police in Germany and St. Kitts have been alerted.

The financial regulators in Austria and the UK issued warnings about Prime Holdings, which had an Austrian address that didn’t exist. A Swiss address they also provided turned out to be the International Red Cross headquarters in Geneva.

The scam was so sophisticated that even after investors lost their money, they then received near-perfect forged letters from regulators offering to recover investment monies for a commission.

Due to the relatively untraceable nature of cryptocurrencies, they are the favorite store of stolen wealth for criminals. Investors should only deal with well-respected financial institutions, and Proceed with caution.