Unikrn, Backed By Mark Cuban, Faces A Class Action Lawsuit

By Sumedha Bose

If you have binged on Shark Tank for days and dreamt of having your own products funded by billionaires, you definitely are familiar with a certain Mark Cuban. The infamous billionaire has recently courted some new controversy. Unikrn, an e-sport betting startup based out of Seattle that was backed by Mark, has just been slapped with a class action lawsuit after their last year’s Initial Coin Offering. The accusation is that they have violated security laws in the States.

One of the participants of the ICO was John Hastings, hailing from Las Vegas, who also happens to be the lead plaintiff in this legal battle. He filed the case on August 13 with a court in Washington State. The allegation was that Unikrn, along with its founder Rahul Sood, had sold securities to the public during the ICO last year, which were unregistered, in exchange for their Tokens called UnikoinGold (UKG).

Hastings is bitter over the fact that the investors were made to believe that the tokens “would increase in value and become worth more than the virtual currencies invested,”and hence they should be treated as securities.

However, Unikrn has been accused of claiming that the tokens are utility tokens and not securities, which Hastings claims is a trick on behalf of the company. Sood, the founder of Unikrn has acknowledged the fact that the company is aware of the lawsuit but they have not commented further on the matter.

The ICO held last year was a successful one and the company collected 112,720 ethers which amounted to around $31 million at the time.

Sumedha Bose

Sumedha uses words as her crutch to get by in life. She takes a keen interest in debating, dancing and destroying the patriarchy in her free time.