The founder of the Gotbit Market Maker, Alexei Andryunin, concluded an agreement with the US authorities on guilty authorities, agreeing to the confiscation of crypto activists in the amount of $ 23 million in the case of manipulation of the market.
According to the judicial document, GOTBIT has caused a financial “damage to the distracted market participants” who bought cryptocurrencies at “fraudulent high prices”.
Recall that Andryunin was extradited to the United States in February 2025 after the arrest in Portugal in October 2024.
He was faced with a conclusion of up to 20 years on charges of fraud and conspiracy to manipulate the market. In October last year, Gotbit and three more cryptocurrencies received official accusations of market manipulations.
In a letter to the court and lawyers of the defense, the terms of the agreement on guilty recognition are set out. If the court does not approve of any part of it, any of the parties has the right to abandon the agreement.
As part of this agreement, the accused may not appoint a prison term and additional fines, except for confiscation of assets, although the final decision on the sentence remains with the court.
Federal prosecutors noted that the maximum punishment for these crimes includes fines up to $ 500,000 or a double amount of received or lost income, mandatory compensation for losses and confiscation of property. In addition, a trial period of up to five years is possible.
Among the confiscated assets are $ 23 million in USDT and USDC stabilcoins, stored on four wallets, which Andryunin “led the one -man”.
According to the prosecutor’s office, Gotbit acted as a complex manipulation enterprise in the market in the period from 2018 to 2024, offering artificial overstating services for tokens for various crypto projects, including American companies.
As noted in judicial materials, Gotbit widely used “Wash Trading” – fictitious transactions that created a deceptive impression of high trade activity.
In a separate lawsuit of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) against Gotbit and Fedor Kedrov, specified as the company’s marketing director, the regulator said that the company led detailed statistics, comparing artificially “created volumes” with real “market volume in crypto people.
According to the declassified indictment of the US Ministry of Justice, the company openly attracted customers, telling them how its services will help to hide manipulative actions on public blockchains.
Andryunin will serve a three -year trial period with strict restrictions on any activity in the field of cryptocurrencies, the statement said.
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Source: Cryptocurrency
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