In early 2024, the US charged cryptocurrency entrepreneur Sam Lee with running a Ponzi and pyramid scheme called HyperVerse, alleging he defrauded people of $2 billion. But instead of facing trial in the US, Lee now lives in Dubai, where he’s pitching new crypto products. Lee denies any wrongdoing. But crypto industry experts, alleged victims and online “scam hunters” are raising questions about whether regulators in the United Arab Emirates are doing enough to combat crypto fraud as Dubai seeks to position itself as a hub of finance and technology.
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On a scorching July day in Dubai, Sam Lee was inside a climate-controlled wine bar, sipping a glass of chilled red, looking untouchable. Near the beginning of the year, US authorities announced that they’d charged Lee with conspiracy to commit securities fraud and wire fraud. They alleged that, as the co-founder of a company called HyperVerse, he’d orchestrated a cryptocurrency scam that bilked investors around the world for almost $2 billion. HyperVerse had promised returns as high as 1% a day via cutting-edge blockchain-based strategies, but according to the US Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission, it was just an old-fashioned Ponzi scheme. Lee has denied wrongdoing.
