Litecoin Founder Steps Forward to Clarify the Whole Incident, Admits: "We Really Messed Up This Time"

On the evening of the 13th, a fake press release stating "Walmart will accept Litecoin payments" was reported by several major media outlets. Litecoin (LTC) experienced a rapid surge and fall within a short period of time. In response, Litecoin's founder Charlie Lee personally spoke to Bloomberg to clarify the situation, admitting that he was also briefly deceived and that they really messed up this time.

Charlie Lee: Really? That's Great

Charlie Lee claimed that he woke up to the news and thought to himself, "Wow! That's great!" However, it turned out to be fake news. He stated:

Media outlets like Reuters published fake news, and our community manager believed it to be true. He retweeted the news and deleted it 15 minutes later. The issue is that even though we do not have a partnership with Walmart, Litecoin is a decentralized currency, and anyone can announce support for Litecoin without going through me or the foundation.

Who is Behind the Manipulation?

Regarding the mastermind behind the scenes, he believes that the news service GlobeNewswire can track down who initially published the fake news. Reports indicate that GlobeNewswire will implement stricter identity verification measures in the future. Lee lamented:

For Litecoin Foundation, it is helpless against such incessant fake news, but in reality, this also happens in traditional stock markets; it is not exclusive to the cryptocurrency field.

Litecoin Foundation Clears the Air

Some have questioned whether this was orchestrated by the official team. Lee emphasized that this incident was not orchestrated by anyone from the official team. He also acknowledged that Litecoin's official Twitter account carries significant influence, and henceforth, they will carefully review posts before publishing. He stressed:

The Litecoin Foundation is committed to combating fake news, but this time we really messed up.

Charlie Lee famously sold off most of his assets at the peak of Litecoin in 2017, which drew significant criticism from the community. The host also mentioned this and inquired about how much Litecoin he currently holds. Lee responded:

I only hold about 20 Litecoins or fewer, depending on my daily usage needs. This means I have no motivation to instigate events like today's.

Finally, Lee promoted Litecoin's latest launch of the on-chain open-source platform, OmniLite, which will bring smart contract functionalities, token creation, NFTs, and more to Litecoin. He revealed that they have been in talks with Tether and may issue stablecoins on the Litecoin chain.