The U.S. government has charged Guo Wengui, a Chinese billionaire fugitive living in New York, with wire fraud, securities fraud, bank fraud, and money laundering. Guo is one of the wealthiest men in Donald Trump’s orbit and has been associated with figures in conservative politics since arriving in the U.S. in 2014. He allegedly bilked $262 million out of his victims through his Himalayan Exchange, a cryptocurrency “ecosystem” that included a stablecoin called the Himalaya Dollar and a crypto token called Himalaya Coin. Guo had presented the exchange as an opportunity for investors to make money and overthrow the Chinese government via crypto, but their investments were going directly into his bank accounts.
Guo was also a major financial backer of GETTR, a brand new alternative social media platform for conservatives launched by former Trump administration communications director Jason Miller in July 2021. While Miller claimed that Guo wasn’t a direct investor in the company, a large chunk of Guo’s ill-gotten funds were held in a bank account in the name of “GETTR USA, Inc.” According to The Daily Beast, a host on Guo’s own media outlet, GTV, claimed that GETTR was “the concentration of [Guo’s] whole life work” and that Guo had created GETTR’s torch logo.
Guo formed a relationship with former-president Trump’s 2016 political strategist Steve Bannon, as both are major critics of China’s ruling Chinese Communist Party. In fact, when Bannon was arrested by authorities on fraud charges in August 2020, it was on Guo’s yacht that he was apprehended. A business partner of Guo’s, Kin Ming Je, was also indicted on Wednesday and was hit with an additional obstruction of justice charge.
U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said that Guo led a complex conspiracy to defraud thousands of his online followers out of over $1 billion dollars and used his fraudulently gained riches to buy himself and his close family members expensive luxuries such as “a 50,000 square foot mansion, a $3.5 million Ferrari, and even two $36,000 mattresses, and financing a $37 million luxury yacht.” Officials in New York are investigating a fire that broke out at the hotel where Guo was arrested earlier Wednesday morning.
In conclusion, Guo Wengui has been charged with multiple counts of fraud and money laundering by the U.S. government. He allegedly bilked $262 million out of his victims through his Himalayan Exchange and was a major financial backer of GETTR, a brand new alternative social media platform for conservatives launched by former Trump administration communications director Jason Miller. Guo formed a relationship with former-president Trump’s 2016 political strategist Steve Bannon and used his fraudulently gained riches to buy himself and his close family members expensive luxuries. Officials in New York are investigating a fire that broke out at the hotel where Guo was arrested earlier Wednesday morning.
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