Ha Ha Ha...


‘The Lord told us to’: US pastor says he stole $1m from Christians to remodel home

Couple are charged with creating and selling their cryptocurrency, known as ‘INDXcoin’, to Christian community in Denver, Colorado



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https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/jan/23/us-pastor-1m-cryptocurrency-scheme-christians-denver


A Colorado pastor who is charged with stealing more than $1m from his Christian community in a cryptocurrency scheme has admitted to the fraud but argued that God instructed him to carry it out.

Eli Regalado and his wife, Kaitlyn, are charged with creating and selling their cryptocurrency, known as “INDXcoin”, to Christians based in their home town of Denver, Colorado, allegedly telling would-be investors that the Lord had told him people would become rich if they invested, the state’s division of securities announced in a press release on Thursday.

But INDXcoin was “practically worthless” in reality, prosecutors said in the statement. Investors lost millions of dollars while the Regalados used their investments for lavish living.

In a video statement about the charges, Eli admitted that the couple had squandered $1.3m that was raised through cryptocurrency.

“The charges are that me and Kaitlyn pocketed $1.3m,” Regalado said in the video published to INDXcoin’s website on Friday. “I just wanted to come out and say those charges are true.”

Regalado added: “A few hundred thousand dollars went to a home remodel the Lord told us to do.

“We took God at his word and sold a cryptocurrency with no clear exit.”

Regalado added that the couple still believes that God will “work a miracle in the financial sector”.

In total, INDXcoin raised about $3.2m from more than 300 people between June 2022 and April 2023. The Regalados took at least $1.3m of that – more than half – for personal, luxury purchases, including jewelry, an au pair and a pricey home renovation project.

The Regalados also pocketed at least $290,000 for their online-only church, Victorious Grace church, despite there being no physical location for it, BusinessDen reported.

The Regalados additionally had no experience with cryptocurrency. A third-party auditor also said the INDXcoin code had significant technical problems, but the Regalados continued to market the cryptocurrency as a low-risk, high-reward option.


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I suppose it seemed like a good idea at the time.

>> But INDXcoin was “practically worthless” in reality, prosecutors said in the statement.

Practically worthless in comparison to what, exactly? Crypto only carries the worth that people assign to it.

You are spot on.

"Money", is a medium of exchange. Current society puts a value on paper notes and metallic coins, but in essence you could deem dog poop as a medium of exchange if people accepted it as having value.

Pretty gutsy preacher doing what he did and passing it off as gods word, but in essence the people he sold his pitch to put a value on the virtual coin. Same reason for many of us during a time in our life put a value on tithing, since we deemed the purported blessings worth the donation.

Was it moral and honest? Not by a long shot, just another big time grifter in priests clothing. Are we as a society going to learn anything?

Never assume anything, and never take the term "have I got a deal for you" as something to be trusted.

summer Wrote:
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> I suppose it seemed like a good idea at the time.
>
>
> >> But INDXcoin was “practically worthless” in
> reality, prosecutors said in the statement.
>
> Practically worthless in comparison to what,
> exactly? Crypto only carries the worth that people
> assign to it.

You are correct of course. We live in a society full of fiat money. Crypto is no worse than that, in fact it is more stable than some Third World currencies but there has to be the demand for it in the first place.

Is this your War on Cash 2.0?

You will find it considerably less funny when you find you have zero financial independence. Count yourself lucky that you still have some. Full grown adults should take responsibility for their decisions instead of handing them over to some parent substitute — including churches.

You've said before that personal freedom is "atavistic". If you believe that, it is your personal choice but you should not have the right to impose it upon others.

> You will find it considerably less funny when you
> find you have zero financial independence. Count
> yourself lucky that you still have some.

Why are your views now more credible than when in past months you kept telling us that if we lose the War on Cash, the government and corporations would give us all identification numbers that determined our ability to buy and sell?

You know, like drivers licenses and credit ratings?


-------------------
> Full
> grown adults should take responsibility for their
> decisions instead of handing them over to some
> parent substitute — including churches.

That's ironic, given that it comes from someone who has handed over his moral judgement, such as it is, to second-rate political hacks and their rags.


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> You've said before that personal freedom is
> "atavistic".

Show us where I said that, Fash.


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> If you believe that, it is your personal choice but you should not have the right to impose it upon others.

I have all the influence of a second-grade school teacher and yet you think I'm powerful enough to "impose" my views on others?

I threaten you that much?

Still waiting. You said I called personal freedom "atavistic" and even used quotation marks. Surely that means I said it and you know where to find it.

You know, because you never say things that are untrue.

"fiat money" is a libertardian term.

Dave the Atheist Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "fiat money" is a libertardian term.

No, it isn't. You'll find the phrase was around long before so called "libertarians" were.

The point stands — most currency which is around today is intrinsically worthless (or nearly so). The value is that which is assigned to it by demand, not its practical value.

p.s. By the way, you've also used "ableist" language there, I hope you realize that. "Retard" refers to a medical condition.

Ever see De Beers vaults? There's no shortage of diamonds. Gold isn't stable either, nor is silver.

Some of the first bronze ingots used as a medium of exchange were in the shape of ox hides. Crypto is worthless and is artificially propped up by the criminal economy. A reserve currency's value is really based on the strength of the economy, the security, and stability of the government behind that currency.

You could invest your money in seons, but the supposed government that issued them never existed.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/25/2024 08:35PM by anybody.

Oh, I suppose there's no silver in quarters or copper in pennies.

. . . isn't your tone a bit irreverent?

Please remember that Fash has told us he is a financial advisor. He isn't familiar with ratings agencies, the fiat nature of all media of exchange, or credit cards, but he is a true expert.

So a bit of deference, a bit of adulation, might be in order.

Ha!

Finding Freedom Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> You are correct of course. We live in a society
> full of fiat money. Crypto is no worse than that,

It is certainly true that our currency has no intrinsic value, just like crypto. However the former is issued by the oldest functioning democracy in the world (June 21, 1788—present), which has never defaulted on it's debt, and is backed by the world's largest economy. The other is a recently new digital currency, marked by wild volatility, with minimal oversight, and continuing in large part by the criminal element. Apples, oranges.

Good points, but I offer one correction.

The US has in fact defaulted on its debt a few times. During the Civil War the Treasury ran out of money and could not redeem its bonds in gold, as promised, and paid off lenders in devalued paper currency. Something similar happened during the early 1930s, when Washington again switched from the promised gold to paper. That case actually went to the supreme court, which held that the government had the power to default if it wanted to.

Another default (or two, depending on how you define them) came in the Nixon administration, when Washington severed dollar convertability into silver and then gold in order to stop France from draining US gold reserves.

That said, the US record is better than that of almost any other country; and Fash's implicit preference for specie-based currency ignores the fact that the value of gold and silver are extremely volatile. When big deposits of gold were discovered in the Yukon, for instance, its value plummeted--and so did the wealth of all those people who had gold-backed currencies. Conversely, when the price of silver on global markets surged in the 1930s, the effect was to cause crippling deflation and to undermine the Nationalist government. We thus see how too firm a commitment to a metallic monetary standard can contribute to the success of Marxist and other revolutionary movements.

The point is that even specie, even real estate, are "fiat currencies" in the sense that their values depend on supply-and-demand conditions and public trust. dagny rightly points out that right-wingers' and goldbugs' absolute truths--whether War on Paper, War on Cash, or War on Cash 2.0--rest on the whim of De Beers and other monopolists/oligopolists who control supply.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/25/2024 04:31PM by Lot's Wife.

It may be more believable if he claimed that an angel with a flaming sword told him to do it.

Sheep gonna get fleeced.

IMO, fraud is a given when someone claims God is giving private instructions that everyone else is supposed to get second hand.

BTW, God told me you are all supposed to send me your SS and bank account numbers. Funny how God has lots of instructions about what you should do with your money through a spokesperson.

> ...the Regalados continued to
> market the cryptocurrency as a
> low-risk, high-reward option.



I prefer high-risk, high-reward options, like sex!

Which is often obtained via a low-risk, low-reward option: prayer.

This is why God keeps asking for money.

The remarkable thing about divine inspiration is that it invariably tells the recipient to do what he wanted to do in the first place.

What a coincidence!

Indeed.

At church:  "Give us what you say passes for 10% of your income or give up any chance of becoming a ghawed!  ...and NO, we will not promise to use it as you might like us to!  Now STFU and get out of my office!"


At the police station:  "You handed the money over voluntarily, even after you were told they'd do with it as they pleased...?

I’ve got some semi-genuine Confederate currency I’m willing to sell, any takers?

Now he thinks he ‘misheard God’
Can’t wait to hear how that argument holds up in court.

God sure has a lousy track record when it comes to clear unambiguous communication.

God had his back to you when he spoke, so you should have used the spirit to determine what he actually said.

So its the fault of all those who did not use the spirit of truth and discernment correctly.

the lord told me that Eli & Kaitlyn should transfer all their assets to me for safekeeping & further investments.

I don't know why everyone is so surprised. All the religions are fleecing their congregations. Remember when Kenneth Copeland justified his jet fleet?

Creflo Dollar _ The actual name of a televangelist. I believe he just got a new personal jet. Hard to comprehend why folks send him their money.

“We took God at his word and sold a cryptocurrency with no clear exit.”

Obviously God's financial advice only works for the One True Church.

It makes a change from "the Devil made me do it".