Crypto Company Founder Receives Long Sentence for Fraudulent ICO
Michael Stollery, the CEO of Titanium Blockchain Infrastructure Services (TBIS), has been sentenced to four years in prison for his role in a fraudulent initial coin offering (ICO) that defrauded investors of $21 million in 2018.
Investors had invested in BARs, a cryptocurrency token, to participate in the ICO, which raised around $21 million from the US and overseas. Stollery faced allegations of various wrongdoings related to the ICO, including failing to register it with the regulator.
The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed a complaint against Stollery in 2018, accusing him of falsifying whitepapers and testimonials and making false claims of business associations with the US Federal Reserve to deceive investors about TBIS’ credibility and profit potential.
Stollery admitted to intermingling the funds from ICO investors with his own and using a portion to cover his expenses, such as credit card bills and Hawaii condominium payments.
This case highlights the issue of cryptocurrency fraud, which has become a growing concern in recent years. According to a report by the Federal Trade Commission, Americans lost over $1 billion to fraud involving cryptocurrencies from January 2021 through March 2022.
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Crypto fraud can take many forms, from Ponzi schemes to fake ICOs and fraudulent investment opportunities. The promise of high returns often lures the victims, but they lose their entire investment.
As the crypto market continues to gain popularity and mainstream adoption, more people are at risk of being duped by these fraudulent schemes.
In response to this growing threat, regulators are stepping up their efforts to combat crypto fraud. The SEC has launched multiple investigations into ICO scams, resulting in high-profile cases like Stollery’s.
Alexander Stefanov
Reporter at CoinsPress
Alex is Editor-in-Chief of Coinspress and co-founder of Millennial Media Group, with nearly a decade of experience covering financial markets - crypto first, then everything else. It started in 2016 with Bitcoin. Like most people at the time, he didn't fully understand it - so he kept digging. Blockchain, tokenomics, the projects, the cycles. That curiosity never stopped, and eventually pulled him into traditional markets too: equities, commodities, macro. Not because he left crypto behind, but because you can't properly understand one without the other. What drives him is straightforward: he wants to know why something is happening, not just that it's happening. Most market coverage stops at the headline - price up, price down, here's a chart. Alex finds that kind of reporting actively unhelpful. If you walk away from an article without understanding the mechanism behind the move, what did you actually learn? He holds a degree in Tourism from New Bulgarian University - not the most obvious path into financial markets, but markets have a way of pulling in people who are simply too curious to stay out. He has authored over 200 in-depth analyses and more than 10,000 articles across crypto and traditional finance. He still thinks every day in markets teaches him something new. That's probably why he hasn't stopped.
