One of the largest banks in the United States, JP Morgan Chase, has found itself the subject of a federal class-action lawsuit. The complaint alleges that after hindering customers from buying cryptocurrencies, the bank went as far as to charge enthusiasts extra fees and higher interest rates, Reuters reported.
Brady Tucker et al v Chase Bank USA, filed in U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, 18-3155, Manhattan, was initiated by San Diego-based law firm, Finkelstein & Krinsk LLP, a class action specialist. Tucker of Idaho, the plaintiff, claims he incurred $143.30 in fees and $20.61 in sudden interest charges over five crypto transactions during the months of January and February. Tucker also claims “upon purchasing a cryptocurrency from Coinbase.com or another online crypto merchant,” he was hit with cash advance fees in violation of his original terms and conditions.
Tucker attempted to dispute the charges but JP Morgan outright refused any consideration, he insisted. According to Reuters, without warning the bank “stuck the plaintiff with the bill, after the fact of his transactions, and insisted that he pay it,” the lawsuit is quoted. The suit was filed in federal court, and accuses the bank of “charging surprise fees when it stopped letting customers buy cryptocurrency with credit cards in late January and began treating the purchases as cash advances.”
“Chase silently smacked them with instant-cash-advance fees, plus much higher interest rates than normal, and left them without any recourse,” Mr. Tucker is quoted in the complaint. Furthermore, the lawsuit alleges JP Morgan Chase to have flagrantly usurped the Truth in Lending Act, legislation requiring customer notice when substantial changes are made to an account’s terms. “The lawsuit is asking for actual damages and statutory damages of $1 million.”
According to the complaint, “The complete lack of fair notice to Chase’s cardholders caused them to unknowingly incur millions of dollars in cash advance fees and sky-high interest charges on each and every crypto purchase.” Mr. Tucker continued, “It appears that in addition to firing its ‘stupid’ employees, Chase elected to start fining its ‘stupid’ customers: unilaterally.”
In March, JP Morgan admitted they were scared of cryptocurrency disrupting their business model. Now we can see what they tried to do to disrupt cryptocurrency as this lawsuit proceeds.
Last year, Jamie Dimon bashed Bitcoin and cryptocurrency in general for months increasing the fud then in September JP Morgan purchased the Bitcoin exchange-traded note (ETNs) trading on Nasdaq’s Stockholm exchange on the dip. As a result, Dimon was accused of market manipulation violating European market abuse laws causing a flash crash according to a complaint filed to the Swedish financial regulator.
JP Morgan doesn’t just purchase Bitcoin ETFs, the company is also heavily involved with the ‘blockchain fever’ that has infected banks across the world. The financial firm has applied for a “Bitcoin alternative” patent with the U.S. over 175 times in 2013 being rejected every time. JP Morgan is also working on an Ethereum-based blockchain alongside, according to people familiar with the matter, working with Zcash development as well.
Earlier this year, Dimon admitted that he was wrong and regretted calling Bitcoin and cryptocurrency a fraud in general. As JP Morgan’s annual report details, Dimon is just scared that cryptocurrency will surpass his bank, with good reason since the whole cryptocurrency market cap has surpassed JP Morgan’s own evaluation. The entire market cap of cryptocurrencies has even surpassed that of Apple’s own market cap.
Bitcoin is currently trading at [FIAT: $8,166.92] according to Coin Market Cap at the time of this report.
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