1/Sounds like jail time: "Ripple created an information vacuum such that Ripple and the two insiders with the most control over it—@chrislarsensf & @bgarlinghouse sell XRP into a market that possessed only the information Defendants chose to share about Ripple and XRP"
2/Smoking guns: "Ripple received legal advice as early as 2012 that under certain circumstances XRP could be
considered an “investment contract” and therefore a security under the federal securities laws."

[ note: we all were saying this on twitter! ]
3/What we all through is confirmed: ". Ripple used this money to fund its operations without disclosing how it was doing so, or the full extent of its payments to others to
assist in its efforts to develop a “use” for XRP and maintain XRP secondary trading markets."
4/TRANSLATION: @ripple was a giant ponzi scheme. They sold imaginary money to retail investors--AGAINST LEGAL ADVICE--and then used that money to pay off (bribe?) partners to build a business to cover up the illegal stock sales.
5/INSIDER TRADING: "Defendants continue to hold substantial amounts of XRP &—with no registration statement in effect—can continue to monetize their XRP while using the information asymmetry they created in the market for their own gain, creating substantial risk to investors."
6/@chrislarsensf knew better but secured the bag: "Despite this knowledge & Larsen’s familiarity with Section 5 from SEC enforcement action that his previous company had settled in 2008 ... @Ripple & Larsen failed to heed some of the legal advice and warnings in the Legal Memos"
7/more smoking guns from the business plan: "Ripple’s stated business plan made Ripple’s conduct alleged here a
foregone conclusion—Ripple made it part of its “strategy” to sell XRP to as many speculative
investors as possible"
8/shell game: "in 2016, Ripple began selling... xCurrent & xVia, from which it has earned approximately $23m through 2019, though neither uses XRP or blockchain technology."

[ read: they suckered retail investors to build a technology that didn't use XRP--like folks here said! ]
9/@chrislarsensf & @bgarlinghouse were dumping while sucker were buying: "Larsen and his wife netted at least $450 million USD from those sales."

"Garlinghouse sold over 321 million XRP... generating approximately $150 million"
10/@Ripple gave illegal market makers discounted $xrp (anyone have names/guesses?) to apparently pump up the ponzi scheme:

"Ripple made many of the XRP Institutional Sales at a discount from XRP market prices."
11/Did Ripple paid off marketplaces? Read this: "Another such distribution included a November 8, 2018 agreement wherein Ripple agreed to pay a company up to $17.5m in XRP if the company met certain “milestones”
relating to the “integration” of XRP into the company’s systems"
12/Yep! Seem so (is this @coinbase?): "Ripple tried repeatedly & unsuccessfully to persuade that digital asset trading firm to “list XRP on [its] exchange” by offering to “cover implementation costs, paying rebates, [and]
brokering intros to large XRP holders for custody.”
13/Didn't work so they offered $1m in cash--is this a bribe?!:

"Undaunted by these initial failures, Ripple Agent-3 emailed the two owners of the firm directly in July 2017, copying Garlinghouse, and asked: “Does a $1M cash payment move the needle for a Q3 listing?”
14/OH MY LORD THE PAINTED THE TAPE and/or stategized manipulating volume: "“The thesis is to show a period of consistent buying from an account that is known to be a consistent seller.

MORE:
15/SMOKING GUN #1,495: " The intended impact of
the buying is not to move the price but rather to provide confidence in the market, which in turn
will move the price.”"
16/@bgarlinghouse greenlights manipulation?

"On Sep 23, the VP of Finance, after consulting w/Garlinghouse & Larsen & obtaining Garlinghouse’s “go ahead,” directed Market Maker to “keep the buying light [the day after the announcement] & then do the bigger slug starting Sunday”
17/When $xrp didn't keep up w/$bitcoin @bgarlinghouse approved a buyback!!

"@Ripple employees prepared & delivered an internal presentation for Garlinghouse & Larsen... “XRP
began underperforming [Bitcoin]” since early May 2020, partly because of Ripple’s sales of XRP"
18/This buyback was obviously intended to keep the ponzi scheme up:

"The employees proposed “supply limiting tactics,” such as Ripple’s buying back XRP."

"Garlinghouse approved the “buy back” option"

OH MY LORD: THEY PUMPED AND DUMPED... AND PUMPED AGAIN!!!!
19/THAT CONCLUDES ONLY THE FIRST HALF OF THIS COMPLAINT

Based on the first half I predict that people are going to jail.
I Will read the second half of the complaint after I clean up the puke from around my desk--this is sickening.

poor investors who got suckered into this ponzi scheme deserve justice

This was a promising project and I'm not anti-crypto, but I am anti-fraud
20/any insight from this:
sec.gov/litigation/com…

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More from @Jason

22 Dec
1/I’ve embraced remote work completely like all tech folks have been forced too, & I’m afraid & inspired that the gains are so significant for employees that many/most will not go back to offices

This is going to lead to a crazy, competitive chess board for funds & startups.
2/Some companies will be able to draw top talent and demand they come to the office (think: Apple, FB, Google)

Companies that do real-world things like build cars or rocketships, will obviously be able to draw people to an office

For knowledge workers??
3/Nope. The top developers, writers, sales executives, product people, marketers, investing, finance executives, etc. will be able to say the following to big companies:

"I am only looking for job opportunities that allow me to work from home."

That's it. Done. Employees win.
Read 8 tweets
21 Dec
1/ON WORKING FOR ME: I have a ton of folks asking to do free internships

We don't do them cause I hate short-term relationships

My joy has been developing talent, so we always have a half-dozen, entry-level positions available @launch

*BUT* raises are 10-20% for survivors...
2/folks who start on this path go from $50k to $60k to $75k to $90k to $120k over 5 years--with zero experience in venture capital, no business degree, & no Ivy league pedigree

We look for:

--hustle
--optimism
--ownership
--ability to learn new skills quickly
--focus
3/We look for folks who are doing stuff in the world

a blog, youtube channel, side hustle--folks who build stuff, tinker, & learn skills constantly

We don't care about degrees we care about how you've demonstrated your skills in the world already
launch.co/careers
Read 5 tweets
24 Aug
1/I have two professional goals left in this life.. the first is to be the greatest startup investor of all time.

The plan is super confidential... so please don't share it.

Step one is to have the greatest startup podcast in the world: @TWiStartups (it already is IMO)
2/Step two is to have the greatest accelerator in the world, @launch accelerator, & have seven companies per class and do 12-18 classes a year.

We are right up there with @techstars & @ycombinator -- but not clearly #1 yet (lots of work left to do).
3/Step three is to have @launch Funds to power the accelerator and do direct investments quickly.

I hate raising funds, but I'm getting better at it. Candidly, I don't like the dog and pony show... it's my weakest link in this chain.
Read 9 tweets
15 May
My recession thesis:

A/close to 100% of companies will embrace remote work after this because...

B/100% of founders & management teams just learned how to manage remote work & quickly found that...

C/Some workers are crushing it & others are, well, “not crushing it” so...
D/most companies don’t know who the underperformers are, because, well, they never looked at exactly what people accomplished (great managers do this, most folks are not great managers)... so...

E/The folks not crushing it are going to get cut... And...
F/Office space will be reduced by at least 50% by companies.... which will.....

G/Make the companies that survive this recessions STRONGER because they have less people and lower costs.... at the SAME TIME.... The huge win will arrive...
Read 6 tweets

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