Investors who buy into the tales of gold can lose about $ 50 million.
In July, the South Korean company Shinil Group announced that it had discovered the Russian armored cruiser Dmitry Donskoy near Ulleungdo Island, which sank in 1905 during the Battle of Tsushima. At the same time, company executives claimed that 200 tons of gold worth $ 132 billion were on board the sunken ship. In an interview, experts on the history of the navy immediately stated that there could be no treasure on board a battle cruiser. Why did the Koreans want to mystify the public? It has now emerged that the discovery of the non-existent treasure was part of a clever fraudulent scheme.
The investigators who began to unravel this tangle made a number of surprising discoveries. First, it turned out that the wreck of an armored cruiser, which sank at a depth of 400 meters, was discovered back in 2003 by divers of the state Korean Institute of Ocean Science and Technology (Korea Institute of Ocean Science and Technology). And Shinil Group has absolutely nothing to do with it. Moreover, it turned out that this company was created just a couple of months ago and existed mainly on paper.
At the same time, in Singapore, a company with the same name began selling the Shinil Gold Coin cryptocurrency on the exchange, which, according to the "treasure hunters", was provided with the treasures of "Dmitry Donskoy". At the same time, investors were promised that by September the value of Shinil Gold Coin would grow 50 times - from 200 won (this is the name of the Korean currency) to 10,000. The naive financiers were told that after raising and selling the treasure, the owners of the cryptocurrency will receive 10 percent of the value of the treasure. At the same time, 50% of the cunning schemers promised the Russian government, and another 10% with a generous hand allocated to infrastructure projects in Korea.
Since the "find" of gold on a sunken ship became a worldwide sensation and was replicated by the mainstream media, many people bought into the prospect of easy money. According to some estimates, about 100 thousand people invested in the Shinil Gold Coin cryptocurrency, and as a result, a round amount of about $ 50 million was obtained.
Meanwhile, Shinil Group President Choi Yong-seok said they had no confirmation that there were gold bars or gold coins on board the ship. Everything goes to the fact that cryptocurrency holders will not be able to get their money back and will fall into the category of "defrauded depositors". The South Korean newspaper Chunan Ilbo reported that a certain Yu Ji Bom was the organizer of the taking of money from the population. Some time ago, he already had a conviction for fraud, and today he is wanted by Interpol. According to documents seized by police during a search of the Shinil Group office, some of the money has already settled in the accounts of Yu Ji Bom and his confidants. A swindler who tried to make money on a Russian cruiser has been hiding from justice for 7 years and, according to some reports, settled with his family in Vietnam. It remains to be hoped that the swindler who lay low,pulling out into the light of day will be easier than raising a sunken armored cruiser.
YAROSLAV KOROBATOV