Just a few days in the past BehindMLM revealed a assessment on BigWhale.
We discovered the a typical MLM crypto Ponzi scheme, with a possible hyperlink to a publicly traded Canadian agency being an attention-grabbing twist.
Being outed for committing securities fraud and working a Ponzi scheme has evidently terrified whoever is working BigWhale, such they despatched in a “authorized discover” earlier at this time.
It’s been some time since I’ve publicly dressed down crypto scammers pretending they’re above the legislation. Let’s get into it.
BigWhale’s “authorized discover” was despatched in by “Jeroen M.”, who claims to be a “authorized consultant” for BigWhale.
LEGAL NOTICE
This letter is in response to content material revealed in your web site, BehindMLM.com, about our firm, “BigWhale.io”, in addition to a Canadian citizen, “Marianna Vilchez”, and a Canadian firm, “Quizam Media Corp” (CNSX Ticker: QQ), on the following URL (“Your Web site”):
Bigwhale Evaluation: BNB staking Ponzi scheme
We want to clarify the next info and statements concerning the content material revealed in regards to the aforementioned particular person & corporations:
1. Marianna Vilchez is a Canadian citizen, who works for a Canadian firm, Quizam Media Corp.
2. Marianna Vilchez works part-time as a media relations / public relations / social media supervisor for quite a few purchasers on a web based platform.
She isn’t a full time worker of BigWhale.io – she has no authorized contract with BigWhale.io, moreover, the one relation between her and BigWhale.io is thru the net platform the place she affords mentioned providers to quite a few different prospects.
3. Quizam Media Corp., a publicly traded firm with the inventory ticker QQ on the Canadian Securities Trade (a inventory change operated by CNSX, Inc, domiciled in Canada), the place Marianna Vilchez is employed, additionally has completely no relation with BigWhale.io, no authorized contract, no type of contact, or any enterprise or any type of relation with BigWhale.io and its house owners in any respect.
4. As such, within the view of the info above, we want to notify BehindMLM.com, its website hosting supplier, Google LLC, in addition to its promoting associate, additionally Google LLC (Google Adverts) and GoDaddy, Inc (Area Registrar for BehindMLM.com) – that the content material revealed about Marianna Vilchez and Quizam Media Corp is in violation of Canadian defamation / libel legislation, as it’s not solely factually incorrect and deceptive, but additionally meets the next standards to be deemed as defamation / libel underneath each widespread and civil defamation legal guidelines of Canada.
Now, the issue right here is that BehindMLM by no means definitively tied Quizam Media Corp to BigWhale. In actual fact we categorically acknowledged in our assessment;
Whether or not anybody else from Quizam Media Corp is concerned in BigWhale is unclear.
I don’t have any proof anybody from Quizam Media Corp past Vilchez is concerned in BigWhale.
What we did was uncover certainly one of Quizam Media Corp’s staff was introducing herself as a BigWhale govt, particularly from BigWhale’s “Media Relations Division”, in official BigWhale advertising movies.
These are statements of reality. And given these info it’s completely cheap to ask and discover whether or not there’s a possible hyperlink between Mairianna Vilchez’s two employers – particularly given the widespread CBD hyperlink.
Oh and naturally combining statements of reality with cheap observe up questions is hardly defamatory.
Moreover, so far as the content material pertains to “BigWhale.io”, which is owned and operated by a Switzerland primarily based firm and thus falls underneath Swiss legal guidelines & jurisdiction, the next statements are a cordial, pleasant rebuttal in addition to a authorized discover to display that the content material revealed in your web site, about BigWhale.io, can be deceptive and factually incorrect on a number of fronts:
7.1 – BigWhale.io nor its mother or father firm, has by no means claimed to offer “banking providers” to its purchasers.
BigWhale.io is a Decentralized Finance (DeFi) platform, which affords staking and lending providers on the Binance Good Chain and Binance’s native token, BNB Coin – and it markets itself as a “DeFi Financial institution”, whereby, “DeFi” stands for “Decentralized Finance”.
BigWhale doesn’t present banking providers you say?
That is from BigWhale’s whitepaper, accessed on July twenty fourth, 2023:
And that is from BigWhale’s web site FAQ, once more accessed on July twenty fourth, 2023:
You possibly can fake in any other case, however BigWhale clearly represents itself to be a financial institution that helps third-parties circumvent monetary legal guidelines and laws.
That is from BigWhale’s whitepaper, once more accessed on July twenty fourth, 2023;
In all probability not good to publicly admit to circumventing monetary legal guidelines and cash laundering, however I digress.
7.2 – BigWhale.io has been audited by Certik.com, the trade main auditor of good contracts, tokens, DeFi platforms and all types of cryptocurrency companies / initiatives.
Cool. With respect to securities legislation within the US and Canada, a Certik audit is meaningless.
7.3 – BigWhale.io can not legally disclose (and is underneath no obligation to) the small print, names, addresses and any private or personal data of the purchasers it really works with – that is relevant to each its traders, in addition to debtors.
Below US and Canadian legislation affords of securities are required to register with monetary regulators. In British Columbia that is the BCSC. Within the US that is the SEC.
As a part of authorized operations, BigWhale is required to file interval audited monetary stories. In these stories particulars of enterprise operations are legally required to be disclosed, which could embody consumer data.
7.4 – BigWhale.io is underneath no obligation to reveal the private data / personal particulars of its employees members, founders / house owners.
By the use of it providing securities and having to register with monetary regulators, BigWhale is legally required to reveal details about its “founders/house owners” with the BCSC, SEC and customers.
7.5 – Neither BigWhale.io – nor Quizam Media Corp – each of that are fully unrelated corporations in two totally different jurisdictions – have something to do with securities, and as such, they don’t have anything to do with the British Columbia Securities Fee as acknowledged in your web site.
BigWhale.io as acknowledged above, is a cryptocurrency monetary providers firm, and Quizam Media Corp is an organization which is concerned in coaching and consulting providers, advertising providers, movie manufacturing and hashish retail gross sales – neither of those two corporations have something to do with securities.
We didn’t definitively hyperlink Quizam Media Corp to BigWhale so we’ll give them the good thing about the doubt on providing unregistered securities.
With respect to BigWhale, it ought to be famous that securities legislation between the US and Canada is materially the identical – if you happen to’re providing securities you want to be registered with the SEC and/or Canadian monetary regulators (every province has its personal securities regulator).
Acknowledging that, I’ll method the problem of BigWhale providing securities with respect to US legislation because it’s easier.
Below US legislation, a safety is decided to exist if an providing constitutes an “funding contract”.
An “funding contract” is decided by way of the Howey Check.
The U.S. Supreme Court docket’s Howey case and subsequent case legislation have discovered that an “funding contract” exists when there may be the funding of cash in a typical enterprise with an affordable expectation of income to be derived from the efforts of others.
With respect to BigWhale, customers make investments cryptocurrency on the promise of marketed passive returns, purportedly derived by way of offering banking providers to undisclosed third-parties.
Thus having happy the Howey Check, we are able to conclude BigWhale is providing securities.
8 – The content material revealed in your web site goes on to state the next factually incorrect, deceptive and defamatory statements:
8.1 – “BigWhale has no retailable services or products. Associates are solely capable of market BigWhale affiliate membership itself.”
Rebuttal: BigWhale.io is a web based cryptocurrency platform, particularly a DeFi app which runs on the Binance Good Chain, with a completely public, verified good contract, audited by trade main auditor Certik.com, and up to now, has paid out extra in curiosity than it has taken in as deposits from its customers / traders – a verifiable reality which could be confirmed by any particular person as all of this knowledge exists publicly on the Binance Good Chain and could be confirmed with a software equivalent to BSCscan.com which is a Binance Good Chain block explorer.
BigWhale.io solely affords its associates program as a promotional incentive, and states that it, together with the rate of interest it affords to its crypto traders, usually are not fastened however somewhat might change relying on market circumstances. That is acknowledged on the web site, within the documentation, and in quite a few different channels.
Nothing in your rebuttal addresses the actual fact BigWhale has no retailable services or products. Or that BigWhale associates are solely capable of market BigWhale affiliate membership itself.
As for “paying out greater than has been invested”, that’s not a verifiable declare BigWhale could make with out legally required audited monetary stories.
8.2 – “BigWhale represents it generates exterior income by illegally offering banking providers to high-risk purchasers”
“No proof of BigWhale’s alleged unlawful banking providers is offered. Nor does the corporate identify any of its purchasers.”
“If Quizam Media Corp or its staff are working BigWhale, that might level to cash laundering happening.”
“Neither BigWhale, Quizam Media Corp or Vilchez are registered with the British Columbia Securities Fee.”
“At a minimal, this implies BigWhale and Vilchez are committing securities fraud.”
“As an alternative of working legally, BigWhale supplies meaningless advertising paperwork to its traders:”
“The Vilchez Quizam Media Corp CBD hyperlink apart, BigWhale is in any other case working an apparent Ponzi scheme.”
“New traders enroll and make investments BNB, and people funds are used to pay earlier traders. It’s the traditional crypto “staking” Ponzi mannequin we’ve seen time and time once more.”
8.3 – The entire statements from the content material revealed in your web site as quoted in level 8.2 above, are 100% solely inaccurate, false, deceptive and factually inaccurate on all fronts.
Your content material insinuates that BigWhale.io and Quizam Media Corp are linked collectively, which is solely false.
You additional state that, “At a minimal, BigWhale and Vilchez are committing securities fraud” – as acknowledged earlier, BigWhale doesn’t deal in any securities in anyway, because it offers in cryptocurrency solely – furthermore, we’ve got already acknowledged Miss Vilchez, has completely nothing to do with BigWhale, and is a full time worker of Quizam Media Corp, which in flip has nothing to do with BigWhale, and neither Quizam Media Corp, BigWhale, nor Miss Vilchez provide or deal in any sort of securities.
BehindMLM was very clear in not definitively linking Quizam Media Corp. We flat out admitted we had no proof linking the 2 corporations.
What we had been cautious to cowl was the chance and authorized ramifications, which is cheap given Vilchez’s widespread employment between the 2 corporations and the CBD commonality.
As for “BigWhale doesn’t deal in any securities in anyway, because it offers in cryptocurrency solely”, we’ve already established that, as per the Howey Check, BigWhale is providing (unregistered) securities.
There aren’t any exemptions for cryptocurrency underneath US or Canadian securities legislation.
And as for “Miss Vilchez, has completely nothing to do with BigWhale”, Vilchez seems in official BigWhale advertising movies.
In these movies, Vilchez introduces herself as being “from BigWhale’s Media Relations Division”.
Clearly Vilchez has one thing to do with BigWhale. Any assertion on the contrary is clearly false.
8.4 – Your content material goes on to state that, “If Quizam Media Corp or its staff are working BigWhale, that might level to cash laundering happening.” – Quizam Media Corp is a publicly traded firm (CNSX:QQ) and is topic to Canadian legislation in addition to their worker, Marianna Vilchez, a Canadian citizen.
Marianna Vilchez works as a freelancer part-time and affords her media relations and press launch and different providers on a web based freelancing platform, that’s the extent to which she has labored with BigWhale.
That’s good to know. Vilchez being a Canadian makes her topic to Canadian legislation. Selling unregistered securities is illegitimate in each Canada and the US as per their respective securities legislation.
BehindMLM maintains that showing in BigWhale advertising movies and holding herself out to characterize BigWhale’s Media Relations Division”, ties Vilchez to promotion of unregistered securities.
Jeroen M. went on to make the same old “take the proof down or else!” threats. Which in fact we gained’t be appearing on.
At a naked minimal BigWhale is committing securities fraud in each the US and Canada.
Within the absence of legally required audited monetary stories proving the existence of exterior income technology, the one verifiable income getting into BigWhale is new funding.
Using new funding to pay BigWhale’s “staking” returns would make it a Ponzi scheme.
Along with leaving his authorized discover as a touch upon our BigWhale assessment (it wasn’t revealed because it’s too lengthy for feedback), Jeroen M. contacted BehindMLM by our contact type.
Jeroen M. requested an e-mail tackle he can ship his authorized discover to.
I’ve offered him with my e-mail tackle, requesting he e-mail in his discover so I can ahead it to the BCSC and SEC for additional investigation.