Chinese victims of a billion dollar Ponzi scheme that defrauded hundreds of thousands are baying for the blood of Tron CEO Justin Sun, Chinese crypto news site Nuclear Finance reported today.
Tron is known by the name “Wave Field” in China. But a Ponzi-like “Wave Field Super Community” scheme also traded on that name and claimed associations with the popular platform to draw in thousands of investors.
Last week, it abruptly shut up shop.
The scam is thought to have cost its victims at least 200 million CNY ($30m) and has led to at least one suicide, according to Nuclear Finance.
Investors are now enraged that Sun failed to disassociate Tron and BitTorrent, the other company he owns, from the fraudulent scheme. They claim that Tron’s crypto TRX benefited from increased activity and liquidity, as unwitting investors plowed their TRX into the scheme on the promise of major returns.
Launched in January this year, “Wave Field Super Community” claimed to be a so-called Tron “Super Representative,” one of 27 nodes given special status on the platform. Victims said that, ever since the scheme’s launch, they asked Sun to clarify the relationship, but he did not respond.
The Tron CEO did reply on July 1, the day following the closure of the “Wave Field Super Community” website. He posted a warning on social media platform weibo, which said that investors should be alert to Ponzi-like schemes using the TRON name. However, he did not mention the Wave Field Super Community scam by name.
July 1 was also the day that a suicide note and photographs posted by a woman named Xia Bing went viral on the WeChat messaging site, according to Nuclear Finance. The woman is thought to be a middle-aged, single parent who had borrowed money from a neighbour to invest in the Ponzi scheme.
Sun was unavailable for comment.
