Summary

  • The SEC has accused a Utah-based company of a “fraudulent” $18 million crypto mining scheme.
  • The SEC alleges that the company, Mining Store, Inc., misled investors by making false statements about the profitability of its mining operations.
  • The SEC is seeking a permanent injunction, disgorgement of ill-gotten gains, and civil penalties against the company and its CEO.


The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has accused Utah-based Green United LLC of running an $18 million “fraudulent scheme” involving the sale of crypto mining equipment.

The SEC has filed a complaint in a Utah District Court against Green United, its founder Wright Thurston, and promoter Kristoffer Krohn. The complaint alleges that between April 2018 and December 2022, the company sold investments in $3,000 “Green Boxes” and “Green nodes” purported to mine the GREEN token on the “Green Blockchain.”

Investors were told that the firm was developing the Green Blockchain to create a “public global decentralized power grid,” and the GREEN token would increase in value based on its efforts with returns of up to 50% a month.

However, the SEC claims that the hardware sold did not mine GREEN as it was an Ethereum-based ERC-20 token that could not be mined and the Green Blockchain did not exist. In reality, the SEC alleges that the funds were used to buy S9 Antminers — Bitcoin (BTC) mining rigs — which were passed off as the Green “boxes” and “nodes” to investors.

The SEC has asked for a court order to require Thurston, Krohn and Green United to cease operations, seeks civil penalties for securities law violations, and repayment of the $18 million in allegedly ill-gotten gains.

The news has sparked fears that the SEC may classify crypto mining as a security. However, crypto advocates have argued that the case does not target mining in general, but a specific ASIC that was supposed to mine an ERC-token but instead mined Bitcoin for the ASIC sellers.

“The SEC is not saying ‘all sales of mining equipment is now a security,’” said Timothy Peterson, crypto advocate and investment adviser.

The SEC’s case serves as a reminder to investors to be wary of fraudulent schemes disguised as crypto mining operations. The regulator is taking a hard stance on such activities and is seeking to protect investors from losing money to fraudulent activities.