Fake BlackRock XRP Filing Reported to Delaware Department of Justice

Delaware's Department of Justice could be looking into a fake filing, a fake filing that suggested Blackrock was prepping the launch of a spot XRP ETF. Well, joining us now to discuss this coin desk, global policy regulation, managing editor Nick Day who is also the editor of the almost Sam Beckman Fried List uh coin desk crypto state of crypto newsletter. Uh Nick. Ok. So Blackrock confirmed coin desk uh that it was not attempting to launch an XRP uh ETF but the filing still there on the on the website for Delaware Department of State uh division of corporations. Uh What did your sleuthing sleuth? Yeah. So uh we heard yesterday from the Delaware Department of State, which is kind of the umbrella entity that the division corporation was part of uh that the matter has been referred to the Delaware Department of Justice for investigation. We reached out to the Delaware Department of Justice to ask if they are taking on this investigation or you know what that process might look like on their end. We have not yet heard back but you know the fact that first off we're talking about how ridiculous this entire thing is for day three of this. Um The fact that, you know, this is now being referred to, uh the criminal investigator suggests that they are taking this seriously. Um And again, you know, as we talked about yesterday, this is not the first time we've seen these kinds of fake filings happen. Uh I think the tendo probably a bit more higher profile given that Blackrock is, uh I would argue a little bit bigger than Grayscale, our, you know, sister company that previously was the uh that had fake filings named after it. So Nick, I'm gonna say in this industry, I've seen more ridiculous. So, uh this isn't the most ridiculous thing that we've seen. Nick tells how difficult is it to file for a trust under a false name and entity? You would think that there would be so it would, it would be kind of hard to pull this off. So what's interesting is if you go to the division corporation website, there is a how to page that has a step by step process for one to follow if they wanted to file for an entity, right? Um It's very clear, it's very straightforward. You need to, you know, have the information relevant that you know, whatever, so you have to have that handy. Um So that's like name and address and all that stuff. The bigger question for me is, you know, uh what is the process by which uh filing goes from being on, you know, this word document that you submit to the website. And we asked, we send a couple of questions about that. We have not yet heard back on those questions. But, uh, as far as the filing process itself goes, it seems really kind of, you know, very straightforward. You just have to fill out the information, send it in and, uh, you know, that's it. You're done well. So they, you don't even need to show ID or anything, right? And you just basically just do it online and that's it as far as we can tell. Basically, I mean, obviously we didn't actually try to uh you know, file a fake entity. Uh We didn't go quite that far. But uh yeah, it does look like, you know, once you have the documents in place, you have to figure out how to get it through the division corporation. So you can send it by mail, you can send it by uh you know, certain other methods. But, you know, once you're done, I don't think it does not appear that they asked for ID or anything like that. But again, you know, what we still don't know is what exactly the process uh process looks like on their end, how they verify or post documents if it's automated process, if it's, you know, if there's a human review in there. Um So those are questions that we did ask, we're waiting for responses. It's Delaware I have so many Biden jokes to make, but I'm just not going to despite your time. But yeah, that's a good one, Nick. All right, really, really quickly before we wrap it up here, just remind us uh at the Department of Justice's comments, how are they responding? What are we expecting? So, the Delaware Department of Justice has not responded, uh at least not to my email about whether or not they're going to take on this investigation. Um So you're just waiting to see what they say and you know what that uh might imply for whoever filed this uh you know, entity. All right, Nick, we're gonna leave it there. Thanks so much for joining us this morning. Always a pleasure and love when you can get in on Lawrence's dad jokes with them to both of you. That was, that was Coindesk global policy and regulation and managing editor Nick Day and don't forget to sign up for the state of crypto newsletter that's on coin desk dot com.