The US has suspended the issuance of the Telegram cryptocurrency

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has announced a temporary injunction against two offshore companies that allegedly conduct unregistered initial offerings (ICO) of tokens in the US and abroad.

We are talking about Pavel Durov's company Telegram Group Inc. and its "daughter" TON Issuer Inc. Since January 2018, they have attracted more than $1.7 billion from investors to create the TON blockchain platform with the Gram cryptocurrency, the commission reports.

Offshores have already sold about 2.9 billion Gram tokens to 171 buyers worldwide (including over a billion Gram to 39 buyers in the United States). Telegram has pledged to launch the blockchain platform by October 31, 2019, according to the SEC lawsuit.

The commission’s complaint states that the creators of TON did not register the sale and further circulation of the Gram cryptocurrency, which is a violation of the provisions of the US Securities Act of 1933.

Telegram has not yet commented on the situation.