EmpiresX Head Trader Found Guilty Of $100 Million Fraud
Table of contents
Authorities claim that instead of offering a valuable service, the defendants paid out rewards to investors using funds obtained from later investors. According to the DOJ, EmpiresX also failed to get the necessary exemptions from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to register its investment program as an offering.
Charges For Conspirators
Nicholas entered a guilty plea for conspiring to conduct securities fraud. The maximum sentence for him is five years in jail. Following a June indictment, DOJ investigators accused Nicholas and the company's owners, Emerson Pires and Flavio Goncalves, of conspiring to engage in wire fraud and securities fraud. The latter two also face charges of planning an international money laundering scheme.
The SEC indicted all three people on the same day as the DOJ's indictment, claiming that they defrauded investors by presenting false claims of 1% daily earnings and misusing investor funds for personal use.
Gary Gensler, the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, stated on Thursday that he would embrace the increasing agreement that the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), rather than the SEC, should regulate cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, which he refers to as non-security tokens. However, he said that the bulk of cryptocurrency tokens are securities and should fall within his jurisdiction.