Less than a month after the Cape Town High Court granted a provisional winding-up order against
Mirror Trading International, liquidators are seeking enhanced powers to investigate the company and recover investment funds.
According to Herman Bester, one of the four appointed liquidators, the team needs to
operate across multiple jurisdictions to determine the full scope of the operation of MTI.
Liquidators are currently trying to track all the assets of the company. Following this process, the team will submit a formal report to the court indicating the likelihood of a successful return of investor funds to the victims of the alleged scam.
According to Bloomberg, a final order for liquidation proceedings may be granted by the courts on 1 March if the proceedings remain unobstructed. The first meeting of the creditors of MTI will take place two months after the decision of the court to vote on the final liquidator. Judging from previous crypto scam-related liquidations, MTI creditors may have a long way to go.
As previously reported by Cointelegraph, both the Texas States Securities Board and the South African Financial Services Conduct Authority took action against the company in 2020.
MTI is accused of misleading its clients to invest in its scheme, promising a 10% return on investment per month. The alleged Bitcoin (BTC) MLM scheme also claimed to have more than 260,000 investors from more than 170 countries.
However, no evidence of successful trading by the company was found in the FSCA investigation of the company’s operations. In total, MTI is expected to hold approximately 23,000 BTCs worth more than $880 million at the current Bitcoin price.
According to the South African media outlet The Citizen, leaked internal communications reportedly indicate that the company’s senior executives were unaware of the scam. According to the details of the Zoom meeting in question, only Johann Steynberg, CEO, was in complete control of the company’s operations.
Steynberg is reported to be AWOL and is believed to be in Brazil. Also, nobody in the company has heard from him since December 2020. The last official communication from the Polokwane resident was a repudiation of the allegations against the company.
MTI is one of several suspected crypto-related scams in South Africa. These investment schemes take advantage of the popularity of Bitcoin in the country to fleece unsuspecting victims.
Back in July, Willie Breedt, the crypto scam operator of VaultAge, who reportedly stole more than $16 million from 2,000 investors, was declared bankrupt. Breedt had fled the country to neighboring Mozambique in the heat of the investigation.
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