Category Archives: Cryptocurrencies

Man suspected of being crypto fugitive Do Kwon arrested in Montenegro

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South Korean CEO of Terraform Labs is accused of multi-billion-dollar fraud involving TerraUSD and Luna currencies

A man suspected of being the fugitive South Korean cryptocurrency entrepreneur Do Kwon, accused of orchestrating a multi-billion-dollar fraud that shook global crypto markets last year, has been arrested in Montenegro.

“Montenegrin police have detained a person suspected of being one of the most wanted fugitives, South Korean citizen, co-founder and CEO of Singapore-based Terraform Labs,” the interior minister, Filip Adžić, tweeted late on Thursday.

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USD Coin value falls after revealing $3.3bn held at Silicon Valley Bank

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The stablecoin fell as low as $0.87 as Circle broke the news that its reserves were at the collapsed lender

The value of the world’s fifth-biggest cryptocurrency, USD Coin (USDC), slumped to an all-time low on Saturday after Circle, the US firm behind the coin, revealed that $3.3bn of the reserves backing it were held at Silicon Valley Bank.

USDC is a stablecoin – cryptocurrencies designed to maintain a stable value – USDC’s value is supposed to mimic the dollar. But the coin broke its 1:1 dollar peg and fell as low as $0.87 on Saturday morning.

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Crypto bank Silvergate announces liquidation amid sector turmoil

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Wind-down and liquidation plan follows mass withdrawal of deposits after collapse of FTX exchange

The cryptocurrency-focused US lender Silvergate is to wind down its operations after it was hit by customer withdrawals following the collapse of crypto exchange FTX.

The California-based bank had warned last week it was “less than well capitalised” after depositors demanding their money back, adding that it was evaluating its ability to operate as a going concern.

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Russian owner of cryptocurrency exchange Bitzlato arrested in Miami

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Prosecutors allege Anatoly Legkodymov’s company became a ‘safe haven’ for proceeds of criminal activity

A Russian national who founded a cryptocurrency exchange that the justice department says became a haven for the proceeds of criminal activity has been arrested, federal officials said on Wednesday.

Anatoly Legkodymov, who lives in China, was arrested on Tuesday night in Miami and was due in court on a charge of conducting an unlicensed money-transmitting business.

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AFL partner Crypto.com accused of ‘misleading’ advertising practices in UK

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UK advertising authority’s ruling that crypto exchange breached standards invites scrutiny of its Australian promotions

The AFL’s crypto exchange partner, Crypto.com, has breached UK advertising standards on multiple occasions and been accused of “misleading” and “irresponsible” behaviour.

The UK Advertising Standards Authority (Asa) rulings may invite further scrutiny of Crypto.com promotions in Australia.

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Coinbase reaches $100m settlement with New York regulators

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Agreement caps regulator’s investigation into cryptocurrency’s compliance with requirements to prevent money laundering

US-based cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase has reached a $100m settlement with New York’s Department of Financial Services (DFS), the exchange and the regulator said in statements on Wednesday.

The settlement, which includes a $50m penalty, caps the regulator’s investigation into the firm’s compliance with requirements to prevent money laundering.

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Sam Bankman-Fried expected to plead not guilty in FTX case

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Crypto exchange founder accused of using deposits to support hedge fund, buy real estate and make political contributions

Fallen crypto billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried is expected to enter a plea of not guilty on Tuesday to criminal charges that he cheated investors and looted billions of dollars at his now bankrupt FTX cryptocurrency exchange, according to a source familiar with the matter.

Bankman-Fried is accused of illegally using FTX customer deposits to support his Alameda Research hedge fund, buy real estate and make millions of dollars in political contributions, in what prosecutors have called a fraud of epic proportions.

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FTX assets worth $3.5bn held by Bahamas securities regulator

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Authority says it is holding digital assets until they can be returned to creditors and former customers

The Bahamas securities regulator has said it has seized assets worth $3.5bn (£2.9bn) from the failed cryptocurrency exchange FTX and plans to return them to creditors and former customers.

The Securities Commission of the Bahamas said it had transferred all digital assets under the custody or control of FTX Digital Markets, a Bahamas subsidiary of the FTX operation, to its own digital wallets for “safekeeping”.

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Collapsed Australian crypto exchange Digital Surge owed $33m by FTX

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More than half of Brisbane company’s digital assets were deposited with Sam Bankman-Fried’s exchange

Collapsed Australian crypto exchange Digital Surge is owed $33m by FTX, one of the biggest cryptocurrency platforms in the world before it collapsed in November.

Brisbane-based Digital Surge passed into administration earlier this month with more than half its digital assets deposited with FTX.

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FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried agrees to US extradition

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Crypto mogul’s lawyer in Bahamas says he wanted to see indictment before consenting to travel to face fraud charges

Fallen crypto mogul Sam Bankman-Fried has now decided to agree to be extradited to the United States to face fraud charges, two of his lawyers said on Monday, just hours after one of them told a Bahamas judge the FTX founder wanted to see the US indictment against him before consenting.

On Monday afternoon, Jerone Roberts, Bankman-Fried’s criminal defense lawyer in the Bahamas, told media outlets including the New York Times that his client had agreed to be voluntarily extradited and that he hoped Bankman-Fried would be back in court later this week.

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Sam Bankman-Fried: FTX founder charged with defrauding investors

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SEC says investigation into other alleged misconduct by former CEO of crypto exchange is ongoing

Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder and former chief executive of the crypto exchange FTX, has been charged with fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to defraud the US and violate the campaign finance laws.

The eight criminal charges filed by the US attorney’s office for the southern district of New York on Tuesday follow civil charges brought by the US Securities and Exchange Commission charging the 30-year-old former billionaire with defrauding investors in the company.

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Sam Bankman-Fried and other FTX staff allegedly had ‘Wirefraud’ chat group

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Chat group on the platform Signal was reportedly used to send end-to-end encrypted information about FTX and its hedge fund

Sam Bankman-Fried and other members of the inner circle of the collapsed crypto exchange FTX allegedly formed a chat group on the encrypted platform Signal under the name “Wirefraud”.

The Australian Financial Review reported that the Wirefraud chat group was used to send end-to-end encrypted information about FTX and its crypto hedge fund, Alameda Research, in the run-up to the implosion of the exchange. According to the newspaper, members of the secret group included Bankman-Fried, his FTX partners Zixiao “Gary” Wang and Nishad Singh, and the CEO of Alameda Research Caroline Ellison.

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Bankman-Fried ‘would give anything’ to start new business to repay FTX users

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Former boss of collapsed crypto-exchange says he has duty to try to recoup investors’ lost money

Sam Bankman-Fried, the former boss of the failed crypto-exchange FTX, has said he hopes to start a new business to help pay back the victims of his old firm’s collapse.

Speaking to the BBC from the Bahamas, he said he would “give anything” to be able to begin a new venture in order to recoup his users’ lost investments.

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FTX’s Sam Bankman-Fried to testify before Congress next week

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Founder and former CEO says he could talk about what he thinks led to crash and ‘my own failings’

Sam Bankman-Fried is set to testify before Congress next week about the collapse of FTX, as regulators investigate the cryptocurrency exchange he led until its recent demise.

The US House Committee on Financial Services said in a statement on Friday that the panel would hear from FTX’s newly-appointed CEO, John Ray, and from Bankman-Fried on 13 December.

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FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried says he ‘screwed up’ but didn’t commit fraud

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Disgraced CEO said he ‘didn’t knowingly comingle funds’ with FTX’s sister company Alameda Research

“Look, I screwed up,” fallen crypto billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried told a conference in New York on Wednesday, but he maintained he “didn’t ever try to commit fraud” and was “shocked” by the collapse of his businesses.

Bankman-Fried, with glassy eyes and visibly shaking at times, appeared via video conference from a nondescript room in the Bahamas. He told the New York Times’s DealBook Summit he was “deeply sorry about what happened” but consistently argued he did not have a full picture of what was going on within the various branches of FTX, his now bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange, and its offshoots.

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Founder of failed crypto exchange FTX apologises to ex-employees

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Sam Bankman-Fried continues to say firm’s downfall can be solely explained by misplaced $8bn

The founder of the failed crypto exchange FTX has written to its former employees apologising for his role in its collapse and continuing to insist its downfall can be solely explained by a misplaced $8bn (£6.7bn).

In the letter, first published by the industry news site CoinDesk, Sam Bankman-Fried wrote: “I deeply regret my oversight failure. In retrospect, I wish that we had done many many things differently … I’m going to do what I can to make it up to you guys – and to the customers – even if that takes the rest of my life.”

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New FTX boss, who worked on Enron bankruptcy, condemns ‘unprecedented failure’

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US corporate restructuring expert John Ray says ‘never in my career have I seen such a complete failure of corporate controls’

In a stinging court filing posted on Thursday John Ray III, the new boss of the bankrupt crypto exchange FTX, said the company had suffered an “unprecedented and complete failure of corporate controls”.

Ray has overseen some of the biggest bankruptcies ever, including the collapse of the energy giant Enron, and has 40 years of experience in restructuring companies. He said he had never seen anything as bad as FTX.

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China circles El Salvador’s economy as country edges toward crypto plunge

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President Nayib Bukele bet on bitcoin and its tumbling value has put the Central American country in a financially precarious spot

As crypto-Twitter cascaded with apocalyptic memes about the bankruptcy of cryptocurrency exchange FTX and the sharp drop in the bitcoin price, one account has remained notably silent on the topic.

Unlike in previous crashes, the president of El Savlador, Nayib Bukele, who made bitcoin legal tender a year ago, did not exhort his followers to “buy the dip”. The laser eyes, popular among crypto currency traders, have long since been removed from his Twitter profile.

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Crypto exchange FTX expects to have more than 1m creditors

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Bankruptcy filing says ‘questions arose’ about founder Sam Bankman-Fried’s leadership

The collapsed crypto exchange FTX expects to have more than 1 million individual creditors, the company has said in its first bankruptcy filing, scattered across more than 100 companies in the wider group.

According to the filing at the bankruptcy court in the US state of Delaware, where FTX US is based, Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder and chief executive, stepped down at 4.30am on Friday, “after consultation with his own legal counsel”.

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Sam Bankman-Fried’s $40m Bahamas penthouse reportedly up for sale

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Entrepreneur at center of FTX scandal put luxury residence up for sale the same day crypto exchange filed for bankruptcy

Sam Bankman-Fried, the crypto trader entrepreneur at the center of the FTX scandal, reportedly put his luxury $40m Bahamas penthouse up for sale on Friday – the same day the cryptocurrency exchange filed for bankruptcy.

Bankman-Fried’s penthouse – “the Orchid”, located in Albany, an exclusive private community in Nassau – was listed by real estate agent Seaside Bahamas at $39,500,000. The offering was first reported on Twitter by Autism Capital.

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