US officials arrested a former officer at Coinbase for conducting insider trading.
Related: Coinbase Takes Steps to Expand Its Presence in Europe
According to a release by the US Department of Justice, there are three charges in the first crypto insider trading tipping plot.The document says the former employee Ishan Wahi together with his brother Nikhil Wahi, and a friend, Sameer Ramani, are charged with using private data for personal profit. Allegations say they used the information about nearing crypto listings.
Ishan Wahi started working at Coinbase in Oct 2020. DoJ release says on at least 14 cases starting at least last June and continuing till April 2022, he knew beforehand which cryptos Coinbase was going to list and when. Wahi exploited his role and used the information for his benefit.
Before the company would publicly inform about the listings, he passed the private information to his brother, and friend so that they could earn gains by trading in those assets. Wahi brothers were arrested on July 21 in Washington. Ramani is now at liberty.
In addition, the US SEC published a release, according to which at least 9 of the digital currencies offered by Coinbase were securities. Coinbase legal head Paul Grewal wrote a release in return, denying the claims. He stated that the exchange doesn't list securities.