
CFTC och FTC stämmer tidigare Voyager-VD för bedrägeri
- The CFTC claims that Ehrlich made several misleading statements about the safety of users’ assets.
- Både FTX och Binance.US hade planer på att köpa ut Voyager, men affärerna misslyckades.
- The bankruptcy court approved Voyager’s repayment plans in May.
The Commodities and Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) filed a lawsuit against Stephen Ehrlich, the former CEO of the now-defunct cryptocurrency lender Voyager Digital, on Thursday for deceiving the platform’s users about the security of their holdings. The CFTC also laddad Ehrlich med bedrägerier och registreringsfel för att driva en oregistrerad varupool.
Byrån planerar att sträva efter permanenta handels- och registreringsförbud, utslagning, restitution och civila penningrättsliga påföljder. Kommissionen skrev i en påstående on Thursday that “Ehrlich and Voyager falsely touted the Voyager platform as a “safe haven” to earn high-yield returns to induce customers to purchase and store digital asset commodities.”
Enligt CFTC:s verkställande direktör Ian McGinley:
While representing that they would treat customers’ digital asset commodities safely and responsibly, behind the scenes, they took shockingly reckless risks with their customers’ assets, leading to Voyager’s bankruptcy and huge customer losses. When their business began to collapse, they continued lying to their customers, concealing Voyager’s true financial health.
In a parallel action, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced that it had struck an agreement with Voyager “that will permanently ban it from handling consumers’ assets” and had sued Ehrlich for erroneously claiming that Voyager accounts were “safe” and insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). The proposed settlement will see Voyager and its affiliate pay a $1.65 billion fee.
The charges claim that Ehrlich illegally transferred millions of dollars from Voyager to his wife, Francine, who was listed as a relief defendant in the FTC lawsuit. The focus of both lawsuits was Ehrlich’s misleading statements about Voyager’s financial situation in 2022.
Voyager var en av de framstående kryptoutlåningsplattformarna innan dess kollaps sommaren 2022. På sin topp lovade Voyager kunder så höga vinster som 12% på sina tillgångar.
Voyager filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in July 2022, citing unfavorable market conditions. The case remains unresolved as of this writing. However, the bankruptcy court approved Voyager’s repayment plan in May.
Amerikanska tillsynsmyndigheter har vidtagit verkställighetsåtgärder mot flera kryptoföretag och deras grundare. CFTC och FTX har pågående fall mot kryptochefer som de tidigare vd:arna för Celsius och FTX, Alex Mashinsky och Sam Bankman-Fried.