Crypto Child Fraudster Sentenced to 7 1/2 Years in Prison for Ponzi Scheme

<p>Stefan Qin's investors believed they had stumbled across a sure thing: a hedge fund that was earning 500 percent profits by leveraging price differentials between cryptocurrencies on 40 global exchanges.</p> <p>Rather than that, the 24-year-old self-proclaimed math genius spent their money on a luxury lifestyle that included a $23,000-per-month Manhattan penthouse apartment and failed investments in initial coin offerings and real estate. Federal prosecutors allege that Qin conned over 100 victims of around $90 million.</p> <p>Following comments from several of his victims that Qin should serve as much time as possible in prison for securities fraud, US District Judge Valerie Caproni sentenced him to seven and a half years in prison Wednesday, describing him as a "potentially extremely dangerous individual."</p> <p>Qin "deliberately and consciously picked a course" to defraud investors, Caproni said, fabricating account statements and misleading them about how he was spending their money. “White collar crime has the same terrible effect on victims as other sorts of crime, and it will be harshly punished.”</p> <p>Additionally, the judge stated that the penalty was designed to deter others from committing similar crimes and to safeguard the public from Qin, who had little difficulty deceiving his investors.</p> <p>Over a dozen investors had sent letters to the judge, several of whom claimed to have lost their life savings to Qin, an Australian national who dropped out of college in 2017 to create Virgil Sigma Fund LP. According to one woman, she was left "homeless and impoverished."</p> <p>Qin told the judge that reading the letters, many of which were from family, friends, or business acquaintances, left him "very heartbroken."</p> <p>“I'm embarrassed to face them in the eye and apologise, but I must,” he explained.</p> <p>Qin claimed to have created a proprietary trading algorithm called Tenjin that enabled him to benefit by purchasing cryptocurrencies on one exchange and selling them at a greater pric