--- title: "The FBI is Investigating Long Island Iced Tea’s Blockchain Pivot" description: "Ex-beverage firm Long Island Iced Tea — now a blockchain company — is being investigated by the FBI for insider trading and securities fraud." date: "2019-07-25" modified: "2019-07-25" authors: - name: "Victor Tangermann" job_title: "Senior Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/fbi-investigation-long-island-iced-tea-blockchain" categories: - "Blockchain" - "Future Society" tags: - "blockchain" - "cryptocurrency" - "fraud" - "the digest" --- # The FBI is Investigating Long Island Iced Tea’s Blockchain Pivot ![Ex-beverage firm Long Island Iced Tea — now a blockchain company — is being investigated by the FBI for insider trading and securities fraud.]() *\Image: Unilever/Victor Tangermann\* ## Sweetening the Deal Beverage firm Long Island Iced Tea — now known as Long Blockchain — is being investigated by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation for insider trading and securities fraud. Court records [obtained by *Quartz*]() show that the FBI is investigating suspicious dealings that date back to December 2017 — around the time when the beverage company changed its name and shifted its "primary corporate focus" from selling sweetened iced tea to blockchain. The company's stock shot up by almost 300 percent after it announced the pivot in late 2017. ## Secretive Messages The FBI is focusing in on secretive phone message conversations about Long Island Iced Tea between two men, Oliver Lindsay and Gannon Giguiere, who were previously arrested for securities fraud related to a different company, according to *Quartz*. The FBI suspects that they were directly involved with insider trading of the company's stock. Search warrants were also sent out to other individuals who shared sensitive information via WhatsApp and traded company stocks around the time of the pivot. The Bureau also suspects that Long Island Iced Tea was involved in a pump-and-dump scheme wherein investors bought cheap stocks, promoted them, and then sold them after their value shot up. **READ MORE:** [The FBI thinks Long Island Iced Tea’s infamous pivot to blockchain was sweetened by insider trading]() \[*Quartz*\] **More on blockchain fraud:** *[Crypto Exec Arrested for “Multibillion-Dollar Pyramid Scheme”]()* ## Author I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()