THELOGICALINDIAN - The analysis complex the FBI and the anew formed National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team
Nathaniel Chastain, a above agent of OpenSea was arrested this morning on wire artifice and money bed-making charges. The Department of Justice has answerable Chastain with cabal trading.
The “First Ever Digital Asset Insider Trading Scheme”
The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) appear today that above OpenSea artefact administrator Nathaniel Chastain was actuality answerable in the “first ever” agenda asset cabal trading scheme.
Chastain is answerable with “wire artifice and money bed-making in affiliation with a arrangement to accomplish cabal trading” of Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs), according to the allegation submitted by United States Attorney Damian Williams and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Assistant Director-in-Charge Michael J. Driscoll.
The DOJ advertisement stated that from June to September 2021 Chastain allegedly acclimated his position at OpenSea to advisedly acquirement dozens of NFTs afore they featured on the company’s website’s homepage, and affairs them for up to bristles times his aboriginal acquirement amount already they were displayed. Chastain allegedly approved to burrow his accomplishments by application crypto wallets that were not associated with his name.
OpenSea is an NFT exchange hosted on Ethereum. It was the aboriginal peer-to-peer exchange for crypto collectibles including gaming items, agenda art, and added basic goods. It charcoal the better such exchange in the absolute crypto amplitude and has afresh been valued at added than $13 billion afterward a Series C raise.
U.S. Attorney Damian Williams declared that “NFTs ability be new, but this blazon of bent arrangement is not. As alleged, Nathaniel Chastain betrayed OpenSea by application its arcane business advice to accomplish money for himself. Today’s accuse authenticate the charge of this Office to backyard out cabal trading—whether it occurs on the banal bazaar or the blockchain.”
Chastain, who is thirty-one years old, was arrested this morning in New York. Each calculation with which he is answerable carries a best book of 20 years in prison.
It appears the National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team assisted the FBI and U.S Attorney’s Office in the investigation. The Department of Amends had announced the conception of such a assemblage in February 2022.
Disclosure: At the time of writing, the columnist of this allotment endemic ETH and several added cryptocurrencies.
