WallStreetBets Members May Have Lost Over $2M to Telegram Crypto Scam: Report
WSB members were encouraged to buy a new token called WSB Finance on a Telegram account not affiliated with the subreddit.
May 5, 2021 at 2:36 p.m. UTCUpdated Sep 14, 2021 at 12:51 p.m. UTC
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Members of the WallStreetBets (WSB) Reddit forum were targeted by a probable cryptocurrency scam that could have led to losses of over $2 million, according to Bloomberg.
- Users were encouraged to buy a new token called WSB Finance on an account called “WallStreetBets – Crypto Pumps” on messaging service Telegram.
- The account told users to send either Binance coins (BNB) or ether to a crypto wallet and then contact its “token bot” to receive WSB Finance tokens, which were never delivered.
- Around 3,451 BNB were then removed from this wallet, which at the crypto’s current valuation of $650 equates to more than $2.2 million. This does not account for how much ETH was also sent.
- The Telegram group was not affiliated with WSB and has since disappeared, according to the report
- WallStreetBets gained notoriety in January for causing an explosion in the price of GameStop (GME) stock in a community bid to counter short sellers.
- The subreddit has been resistant to allowing crypto discussion on its forums, tentatively lifting its ban in April before reinstating it less than 24 hours later.
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