US Department of Justice investigates price manipulation in Bitcoin

The US Department of Justice has launched an investigation into whether some crypto-traders manipulate the price of Bitcoin and other digital money.

According to a Bloomberg report, the US Justice Department has launched an investigation into whether some crypto-traders manipulate the price of Bitcoin and other digital money. It is reported that the move is the result of a US audit of the crypto money market.

Citation from anonymous sources suggests that the investigation is still in its infancy and focuses on illegal practices that could affect prices. As indicated, these illegal applications include the use of counterfeit orders to trick other crypto-traders and the use of wash trading * to create counterfeit trade volume.

Federal prosecutors are reportedly working with the US Commodity Futures Commission (CFTC).

John Griffin, a professor at the University of Texas, said that limited oversight has made the crypto-money ecosystem a fraudulent goal:

“There is very little oversight on manipulative trading, fraud and ‘wash trading’. It would be easy to defraud a market like this. ”

Various cryptographers believed that bitcoin prices were actively manipulated for a long time. A blogger, known as Bitfinex’ed last year, has documented the actions of ‘Spoofy’ IN as the only entity that claims to dominate Bitcoin price. According to his work, Spoofy was a crypto merchant or crypto merchant group, who actually took orders of $ 1 million or more without realizing them. The intent was to trick other users into pushing the direction in which they wanted to send crypt money.

  • wash trading: Imaginary transaction on stock exchanges. The act of closing that order with your other account while opening an order with an account located on the Bourse. Thus, the volume is inflated artificially.
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Aamir Kapoor is a fintech writer specializing in cryptocurrency and blockchain. He has a background in finance and banking and was a researcher.