Walmart Labels Litecoin Payments Announcement Fake

Cryptocurrency Litecoin saw a sudden surge in price on Monday over a press release about Walmart accepting it for payment – which turned out to be fake. I also came across the press release and to my utter surprise, Litecoin was trending on Twitter throughout the weekend. The release, published through a legitimate press channel, claimed that Walmart would accept the currency through all its digital stores. Walmart later outlets the announcement was “inauthentic”.

Walmart spokesman Randy Hargrove confirmed that the press release is not authentic. He also said the retailer has been in touch with the newswire company to investigate how the false press release got posted.

By that time, several major news websites and press agencies had spread the supposed news. The announcement made it on to GlobeNewswire owned by telecommunications company Intrad, a service widely used to distribute press material from companies. The faked release has since been deleted, and did not appear on Walmart’s own website.

A tweet from a verified Litecoin Twitter account linking to the release has also been deleted. Hours later, the Litecoin Foundation tweeted that it had no such partnership.

But while it was being reported as fact, the price of Litecoin jumped from about £125 per token to close to £170, before falling back near its original price, at about £128.

GlobeNewswire said that a fraudulent user account was used to issue the release. It did not detail exactly what went wrong or who was behind the fake release.

“This has never happened before and we have already put in place enhanced authentication steps to prevent this isolated incident from occurring in the future,” said a spokesperson. “We will work with the appropriate authorities to request – and facilitate – a full investigation, including into any criminal activity associated with this matter.”

But so-called “pump and dump” schemes are not uncommon in the cryptocurrency world – where bad actors attempt to raise hype around a coin, inflating its price, and quickly sell off their own stock before the market corrects itself.

The Securities and Exchange Commission said it does not comment on such matters.

The news release said that Walmart, the biggest retailer in the U.S., would accept cryptocurrency for payments from shoppers using litecoin. It referenced a nonworking website in the email of one of the contacts listed, raising suspicions.

The release was never listed on Walmart’s official corporate website and has been removed from the GlobeNewswire website.