I am particularly interested in Tether, possibly the biggest fraud currently occurring in Cryptocurrencies.
Tether, traded as USDT, is closely tied to the exchange bitfinex, sometimes reported as the largest cryptocurrency exchange.
Tether is a cryptocurrency whose unique gimmick is that it is advertised as having 1:1 exchangeability for USD. According to the Tether company, every USDT is reported to be backed by a real USD held in a bank account.
The purpose of tether is to solve the problem of transaction delays between cryptocurrencies and the real economy, by enabling crypto traders to trade for a more stable asset.
There is abundant evidence that Tethers claims of USD backing are fraudulent, no money backs Tether and bitfinex is printing Tether to push up the Bitcoin price and acquire bitcoin.
For example, in the last 4 days, while the bitcoin price has been crashing, Tether has issued $350 million of USDT.
A sceptical person would wonder who in the world would have used $350 million USD cash to purchase Tether in the last 4 days.
http://www.livebitcoinnews.com/tether-prints-another-100m-usdt-bitcoin-price-continues-decline/
The current market cap of USDT I believe is $1.85 billion, although coinmarketcap is only showing $1.65 billion. This means, unlike other cryptocurrencies, the company Tether Limited claims to actually have at least $1.65 billion USD in bank accounts to be redeemed on request.
No one has ever redeemed a single tether for USD, and there has never been an audit of their account. Tether Limited perpetually claim an audit is coming ~soon~.
Could the printing of $1.65 billion of fake money have something to do with the recent rise in cryptocurrency prices? It's a mystery.