SEC Charges Hemp Company and Co-Founders With Fraud

The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged CanaFarma Hemp Products Corp. and its co-founders with fraudulently raising approximately $15 million from investors, and misappropriating a significant portion of the investor funds for personal use and other unrelated purposes. The SEC’s complaint alleges that in 2019 and 2020, CanaFarma, a Canadian startup hemp company with offices in Vancouver and New York City, and its co-founders Vitaly Fargesen and Igor Palatnik raised millions of dollars from investors. According to the complaint, while raising these funds, the defendants made misrepresentations to investors, including claims that CanaFarma was a fully integrated company that was processing hemp from its own farm when in fact it had not processed any of this hemp and its products used hemp supplied by third parties.