SEC Branch Trolls Blockchain Stock Pumpers

The social media team at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's Fort Worth office has taken aim at the recent trend of publicly traded companies looking for a blockchain price boost.

As previously reported, the past months have seen a range of companies, including a virtual reality platform and a Long Island iced tea distributor, "pivot" to blockchain – and subsequently benefit from the market windfall thanks to investors.

Those dizzying price gains have elicited criticism, a public stock freeze or two and, now, a crack from the Forth Worth SEC, which posted earlier today:

We’re contemplating adding “Blockchain” to our name so we’ll increase our followers by 70,000 percent.

— SEC Fort Worth (@FortWorth_SEC) January 8, 2018

Other companies

which pivoted to crypto or blockchain focuses include Riot Blockchain, formerly BiOptix Diagnostics, and LongFin, which saw a 2,600 percent stock jump after purchasing a blockchain micro-lending company.

While these companies have announced efforts to work with blockchain or, at the very least, mine cryptocurrencies (as seen in a number of past filings, organizations like the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) have sounded the alarm on such announcements.

Specifically, the group warned investors to be wary about any publicly traded stocks that boast having a connection to the tech. It stated in a release last month that "it's easy for companies or their promoters to make glorified claims about new products, services and other cryptocurrency-related connections," noting that the tactic could be deployed by would-be fraudsters.

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