Defunct Adult ‘Fantasy Market’ Hit With Fine in Crypto Fraud Case

Fantasy Market, a now defunct supposed porn platform designed to be funded by its own cryptocurrency, was really just a fraud scheme, according to charges filed by the Securities and Exchange Commission, which last week filed a complaint against company’s CEO for allegedly orchestrating a phony ICO—initial coin offering—that he claimed would raise $25 million, according to a report by the tech news site The Next Web. The CEO, Jonathan C. Lucas, authored a “white paper” for investors in which he described Fantasy Market as a platform where customers would pay with the company’s own crypto coins to request porn performers to perform specific acts of the customer’s choosing, according to the SEC complaint. But even though Lucas told investors that the site was up and running in “beta” form, according to the SEC, there was in reality no such site in operation. He also told investors that the value of the company’s cryptocurrency, Fantasy Market Tokens, would zoom upward as the site’s popularity took off. In his “white paper” Lucas also misrepresented his own experience, and created a “fictitious management team,” among other “numerous materially false statements,” according to the SEC complaint. In the end, however, Lucas took in about $63,000 in cryptocurrency from 100 investors, but was forced to return the funds once investors took their complaints to the media, the SEC said. Lucas has already agreed to pay a $15,000 fine, in a settlement to the case—but without admitting any wrongdoing. Though in the settlement, Lucas also did not deny the charges leveled by the SEC, according to the cryptocurrency news site Coin Telegraph. Lucas is also banned for five years from holding an officer or director position at any company. The settlement must now be approved by a court.  Photo By Aleksandr Berdnikov / Wikimedia Commons