During the second quarter of 2019, Karatbars International, a company
During the second quarter of 2019, Karatbars International, a company that has promised to make gold a global currency (again), hosted an event in Dubai. This event was attended by all Karatbars founders, Harald Seiz, Josip Heit, Alex Bodi, and Ovidiu Toma.
At its Dubai event, Karatbars International made bold claims, including promises to investors that the company will have a market cap of $200 billion and even a promise that each coin issued by Karatbars will be backed 1 kilogram of gold; this is a 1,000-fold increase from the company initial promise of each coin being back by 1 gram of gold.
What is Karatbars International?
Karatbars International is a German MLM company founded by Harald Seiz, Josip Heit, Alex Bodi, and Ovidiu Toma. The company entered the cryptocurrency space with the promise of creating coins backed by real gold. In an ICO that claims to have raised $100M, Karatbars issued the KaratBank Coin, which was later branded as KaratGold Coin (KGC).
To spread exposure of its ICO and coin, Karatbars had purchased advertisements on all major cryptocurrency media, including CCN, Cointelegraph, and Bitcoinist. It even purchased endorsements from Forbes.
However, recently CoinDesk has come forward with staunch allegations that Karatbars International does not have access to any gold. As a follow-up to this allegation, various other media, including Bitcoin.com, have come forward with allegations as-well. In fact, the leading cryptocurrency Key Opinion Leader and Bitcoin evangelist, Andreas Antonopoulos, has called Karatbars a mere ponzi scheme. As a fallout of these allegations, cryptocurrency media that once promoted Karatbars has now removed all content related to the company and has blocked all ads for the Karatbars brand.
In fact, CoinMarketCap and CoinGecko, the leading coin data media, have now issued warnings against Karatbars International, claiming that Netherlands Authority for the Financial Markets has released warnings against Karatbars International. This warning isn’t a lone example as authorities in Canada and Namibia have also issued concerns against Karatbars International.
The company now suffers a major blow as HitBTC, its leading exchange, has delisted KBC. The remaining markets for KBC have received a Low Trust from CoinGecko, which hints that KBC trading is being faked in an effort to show a false preface of demand; in reality there is no real demand for KBC.
Karatbars International Promises Huge Return to Dubai Investors
At the Karatbars Dubai event, company leaders made bold promises.
Following its ICO period, Karatbars International promised that all KBC will be backed by 1 gram of gold. However, at the Karatbars Dubai event, company officials promised that each KBC will be backed by 1 kilogram of gold. There are 12 billion KBC and that means backing each of this 1 by a kilogram of gold would require 12 billion kilograms of gold. This much gold is equal to almost 600 trillion dollars, which is ten times the global economy. In fact, all the gold in existence is worth a small fraction of this.
Karatbars founders also promised, at this event, that the company will reach a market cap of $200 billion. Reality is that due to recent fallout from allegations, the company has suffered a sharp fall in value and the Karatbars’ KBC is now worth far less than even its ICO price. None of the promises to Dubai investors have materialized. The company cannot prove 12 billion kilograms of gold reserves, nor has it reached a market cap of 200 billion USD.
What’s more, Karatbars International needed securities licenses to issue commodity-backed coins in Dubai. The company does not hold any such licenses in Dubai but proceeded to sell its coins in Dubai without approval from any Dubai government office or agency.
Karatbars Founders, Harald Seiz, Josip Heit, Alex Bodi, and Ovidiu Toma, have Become Rich
Karatbars International and its founders, Harald Seiz, Josip Heit, Alex Bodi, and Ovidiu Toma, have made bold promises before too. At their Gold Independence Day, held in Las Vegas, CEO Harald Seiz promised to swap each KBC for 1 gram of gold.
Given that a KBC costs about 2 cents and a gram of gold is worth more than $48, Harald Seiz had promised a return for 24x. However, this never materialized. Instead, Harald Seiz promised to return this gold at a later date. This backfired when a German media released news that Karatbars International has admitted in German court that each KBC is worthless. However, KBC investors still remain hopeful that Karatbars will keep its promise. Harald Seiz, Josip Heit, Alex Bodi, and Ovidiu Toma have made claims that gold will eventually be delivered.
In the meantime, Karatbars International’s founders have acquired great wealth.
Harald Seiz isn’t the only member of Karatbars International who has become very wealthy. Josip Heit, Alex Bodi, and Ovidiu Toma, shown above, wear nothing but luxury watches, drive only supercars, and travel in private jets and luxury yachts. The wealth of Harald Seiz, Josip Heit, Alex Bodi, and Ovidiu Toma remains mysterious as Karatbars International, the company operated by these men, has yet to deliver on its goals, despite having raised a claimed $100M in an ICO.
For now, Karatbars International owes investors of the Karatbars Gold Independence Day 1 gram for each KBC, which is 12 billion grams of gold, worth almost 6 billion USD. At the same points, Karatbars International has promised investors at its Dubai events 1 kilogram of gold for each KBC, which is 12 trillion grams of gold.