source
Who says crime doesn't pay except this according to the Financial regulators in South Africa wasn't a crime as no services were provided.
I find it quite amazing that people are still falling foul of fraudsters from not using just some common sense. Africrypt is the exchange in question and I have never heard of them and they traded out of South Africa.
$3.6 Billion is a huge score/fraud for the two brothers who are only 20 and 17 years of age. Something so simple if you think about what they have done and will no doubt walk away scot free. What makes it worse is when they started the exchange in 2016 they were 15 and 12 years of age so how was this even possible. If you open bank accounts at that age you still need a parent to counter sign on their behalf. The same applies for registering a company and must have had some outside help.
However, the government’s ability to investigate the matter is constrained by the lack of regulatory framework on digital assets in South Africa, which does not consider cryptocurrencies a financial product.
source
This is the biggest problem as not recognizing crypto as a financial product is ludicrous. We have countries who have made Bitcoin a legal tender and other countries lagging behind clueless on their next move. Crazy as this crime sounds you wonder why there aren't anymore if this isn't seen as a crime by the Financial regulators in South Africa.
The regulatory body, the Financial Sector Conduct Authority, has denied having jurisdiction. It was further stated that it was the FSCA’s view that no financial product or financial services were provided.
What I don't understand is why do people use exchanges that are not well known as surely going with an established exchange the risk is cut down. I find it interesting to think that a 20 year old and a minor managed to pull off the biggest scam in crypto and it is looking more than likely they will get away with it. If they will live to spend the money is another story as they will have to look over their shoulder for the rest of their lives.
We have seen rug pills on DeFi and just investing is only half the story as one has to research what you are investing into. Places like Kingdoms definitely will appeal to many more investors as peace of mind is definitely a plus. So many shit coins are being printed with high yields which unfortunately draw people in through sheer greed.
I am still puzzled why people would still use an exchange they know nothing about and why use an exchange that is in country that has basically no law regarding this type of thing. Mirror Trading International was a scam that has never been resolved and was up until then the biggest crypto scam ever and this has dwarfed that being nearly 6 x larger.