Billionaire Trevor Milton – who founded electric truck film Nikola – is charged with fraud

BREAKING NEWS: Billionaire Trevor Milton – who founded electric truck firm Nikola – is charged with three counts of fraud for ‘misleading investors and lying about nearly ALL aspects of the business’

  • Trevor Milton was charged with three counts of making false and misleading statements Thursday
  • It is claimed he lied to investors about his embattled electric truck start-up
  • Milton earned an estimated $1 billion when Nikola went public in June 2020
  • A grand jury said he should forfeit those earnings while the probe into his alleged offenses continues  
  • Shares in Nikola plummeted more than 9% to below $13 a share

The billionaire founder of electric truck firm Nikola has been charged with three counts of fraud for allegedly misleading investors and lying about ‘nearly all aspects of the business.’ 

Trevor Milton was indicted on two counts of securities fraud, including making false statements about the company, and wire fraud, the US Department of Justice announced Thursday.  

The newly-unsealed grand jury indictment said that, from November 2019 to September 2020, Milton schemed to defraud investors into buying Nikola shares through misleading statements about the company’s product and technology development. 

Under the indictment, the billionaire is ordered to forfeit all property ‘traceable to the commission of said offenses,’ which will likely include more than $1 billion he pocketed went he took Nikola public last June. 

Trevor Milton, pictured, has been charged with wire fraud over claims he lied about his electric truck start-up Nikola

Shares in Nikola plummeted more than 9 percent to below $13 a share before Thursday’s opening bell as news of the charges broke. 

Nikola did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Last September, Hindenburg Research said in a paper that it was short-selling Nikola stock and labelled the company a ‘fraud’, a charge it denied.

In February, Nikola disclosed, following a review by an outside law firm, that both it and Milton had made several statements that were partially or completely inaccurate. 

Breaking story, check back for updates   

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