Police in Thailand have raided 13 rooms in a Bangkok apartment complex in connection with an alleged Ponzi scheme called UFUN that may have promoted a fraudulent type of digital currency.
The raid, reported by local source The Star, follows a number of searches and arrests across the Asia-Pacific region as part of a crackdown on UFUN led by Thailand’s assistant police chief Suwira Songmetta.
The group’s controversial business model focuses on UToken, a so-called bitcoin rival that UFUN claimed was backed by a “gold reserve system” alongside several multibillion-dollar companies. However, it remains unclear whether the UToken actually existed given the circumstances.
A similar organisation, MyCoin, made headlines in February following reports its founders had disappeared with up to $387m in bitcoin. It was later revealed that the organisation, which marketed itself as a bitcoin exchange, was unlikely to have handled the digital currency at all.
Last month Songmetta estimated that about 120,000 people were affected by the scheme. Losses could reach as high as 38bn Thai bhat ($1.13bn), he said.
So far over 110 victims have filed complaints with the police.