Five U.S. states have ordered TruthGPT Coin promoters to stop using images of Elon Musk, Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao, and Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin in what is being called an investment scam. Texas, New Jersey, Alabama, Montana, and Kentucky financial regulators are taking action against the supposed AI-based crypto scheme.
The Texas State Securities Board and other regulators claim that the TruthGPT Coin (TRUTH), promoted by Horatiu Caragaceanu, The Shark of Wall Street, and Hedge4.ai, uses artificial intelligence to predict future crypto prices. The project has been ordered to cease all activities.
“Artificial intelligence is buzzing,” said Texas Securities Commissioner Travis J. Iles, adding that “bad actors continue their attempts to capitalize on this widespread public interest.” The regulators accuse Caragaceanu of offering unregistered securities to Texas residents, a practice he has been involved with in the past.
Caragaceanu, who operates out of California and Bucharest, has a history of promising high returns on coin offerings that now have no value. Regulators have also named other ventures connected to him, including the GPTX token and Hedge 4 non-fungible tokens (NFT).