Little known to many investors, cryptocurrency reviews are for sale

NEW YORK: When cryptocurrency issuers want positive coverage for their virtual coins, they buy it.

Self-proclaimed social media personalities charge thousands of dollars for video reviews. Research houses accept payments in the cryptocurrencies they are analyzing. Rating “experts” will grade anything positively, for a price.

All this is common, according to more than two dozen people in the cryptocurrency market and documents reviewed by Reuters.

Earlier this year, Ukrainian start-up Hacken was looking to promote its new coin after raising $3 million online in late 2017. Chief Executive Dmytro Budorin and his team identified a list of almost 200 cryptocurrency social media personalities they thought could help them, he said.

Hacken paid $7,500 for Christopher Greene, host of Alternative Media Television – a YouTube channel with more than 500,000 subscribers – to review its coin in a video, Budorin told Reuters. In the 25-minute video, published on June 22, Greene raved about…