Re my third favourite coin, after gold and platinum
Folks with plausible agenda might have pounded on the perhaps relatively illiquid CSPR during a possibly crypto bear market. They might have have been read the riot act. Who can know.
In any case CSPR seems to have bottomed, and bouncing a bit coinmarketcap.com
law360.com
Blockchain Execs Put Profits Over Tech, Investor Says
By Elise Hansen
Law360 (July 21, 2021, 6:04 PM EDT) -- Executives at blockchain company CasperLabs damaged the company's prospects and misled investors by putting personal gain over technological development, a CasperLabs investor has told a California federal court.
Investor Coordination Technology Ltd. accused CasperLabs executives and board members of approving investments that benefited company insiders rather than the company, of engaging in a pump-and-dump scheme around the digital "Casper" coin, and of sacrificing key elements of Casper's purported technology in favor of a cheaper option. CasperLabs LLC is listed as a nominal defendant in the suit, which was filed Monday.
"The defendants violated their fiduciary responsibilities to shareholders [in order] to maximize their personal gain, including, but not limited to, schemes to get to market by sacrificing the advertised technology … looting from the company's investment funds, misleading the investing public, and violating securities laws," the complaint said. "The defendants have crossed the line from legitimate business and into fraud and abuse."
Coordination Technology Ltd., or CoorTech, is an entity associated with blockchain researcher Vlad Zamfir. Zamfir claims the company also wrongly used the "Casper" name — which he says is associated with his work — to describe its technology. Zamfir had a research agreement with CasperLabs to work on its technology, but he says his proposals were rejected in favor of a lower-cost option.
Yet the company violated various agreements by continuing to use the "Casper" name despite implementing a technology that Zamfir disapproved of, the suit said. Zamfir has filed a separate intellectual property suit in California federal court alleging trademark infringement stemming from the use of the Casper name. That suit is ongoing.
According to the latest suit brought by CoorTech, the executives knew their choice of technology had "shortfalls," but "chose to push forward anyway in the hope that the association with Mr. Zamfir's past work would be enough to support their various schemes and to mislead the public."
A CasperLabs representative called the complaint "deeply flawed" and described Zamfir as a "disgruntled former consultant." The representative added that the company "remain[s] laser focused on our enterprise adoption work."
"It appears that Mr. Zamfir is going to continue to troll us through meritless litigation," the representative told Law360 on Thursday.
In another alleged instance of wrongdoing, CoorTech accused a CasperLabs board member of striking $2 million in investment deals with another company that he controlled. The board member planned to have CasperLabs pay part of the consideration out of its Series A fundraise, but did not properly disclose to Series A investors that that was how the money would be used, the complaint said. The deals were also overpriced and siphoned cash from CasperLabs, the complaint said.
CoorTech also accused company executives of hyping the company's CSPR coin, then dumping it. Executives generated buzz for the coin before its release, causing the prices of "IOU tokens" — similar to options and futures contracts — to skyrocket. When the coin was released, the price tanked, and the executives "dumped" many coins onto various exchanges in a move that further depressed the price, CoorTech alleged.
CoorTech is alleging breach of fiduciary duty to itself, as a CasperLabs shareholder, and breach of fiduciary duty to the company. CoorTech is seeking damages plus interest.
Christopher Ott of Rothwell Figg Ernst & Manbeck PC said CasperLabs' rejection of Zamfir's technology was misguided.
"The technology at issue in this case has the potential to transform the manner in which we do business," Ott told Law360. "However, many of the non-technical people in this industry are more interested in short-term gain than fully developing the technology. This suit attempts to address that disconnect."
CoorTech is represented by Christopher Ott, Leo M. Loughlin, Daniel McCallum, Jennifer Maisel, Caitlin M. Wilmot and Dylan Haversack of Rothwell Figg Ernst & Manbeck PC.
Counsel for the defendants was not immediately available.
The case is Coordination Technology Ltd. v. Brock Pierce et al., case number 3:21-cv-01295 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California.
--Editing by Peter Rozovsky.
Update: this story has been updated with comment from CasperLabs.
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