The raid took place simultaneously in 21 provinces and 127 suspects had been arrested and 177 properties and 61 assets worth 1 billion lira (about €30 million) had been seized, Turkish Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya posted on his X account.

The company named Smart Trade Coin, which had been operating since at least 2018, when it started advertising on Twitter (now X), although it was active on that social media mainly in 2021.

It offered investments and trading operations coordinated by automated programs and incentives to investors who attracted new customers, in a classic pyramid scheme, in which new investments covered the alleged profits of previous ones.

The company swindled investors out of approximately one billion dollars in this way, the minister assured.

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