The CFTC: Another Good Year
The CFTC published its annual statistics, highlighting its work during the Fiscal Year 2023. The releases focus on the number of cases initiated as well as specific actions filed and litigated during the year. Overall, the agency filed 96 enforcement actions during the period. That compares with 82 such actions initiated in FY 2022 and 113 during 2021. While the number of cases initiated is only one indication of the work done by the agency, here the numbers reflect consistency, and when coupled with the wide variety of actions initiated, a solid presence in the market.
Key cases initiated by the agency include some of the largest actions involving crypto assets and others:
Crypto assets: The action charged founder Samuel Bankman-Fried, FTX Almeda, and others with fraud. The case, along with a parallel criminal case and other actions,centered on fraud claims involving billions of dollars and the actions of Mr. Bankman-Fried and his firm, FTX. In the parallel criminal action Defendant Bankman-Fried was found guilty. Sentencing has not taken place.
Crypto assets: This case charged Binance, and its founder and former CCO, with operating an illegal digital asset derivatives exchange.
Trading platforms: The case was brought against the company and its former CEO, Alex Mashinsky. It alleged fraud and misrepresentations involving commodity pool schemes tied to digital asset commodities and charged a trading platform with illegal operations.
Swap data: The case charged a number of the most prominent banks on Wall Street in a scheme centered on swap data reporting and related disclosure violations.
Confidential information: The settled action, brought against an introducing broker, its owners and affiliated firms, alleged the misappropriation of material, nonpublic information by taking the opposite side in thousands of brokerage customer block trade orders without the consent of the customer.
Commodity pool operators: This action focused on charges brought against advisors and their affiliates, along with the co-founder and former Co-CIO with deception and manipulation in a $30 million scheme to illegally trigger payouts on two large binary option contracts that were swaps.
Protecting customers: The Commission filed its first case involving a “Pig Butchering,” which involved cultivating a friendly or romantic relation with a potential customer using false statements to ultimately solicit a customer to participate in a fraud.
The actions cited above are representative of the 96 cases filed during the last fiscal year by the agency. The Commission filed a table which lists each of those action by topic (here).
The CFTC: Another Good Year
The CFTC published its annual statistics, highlighting its work during the Fiscal Year 2023. The releases focus on the number of cases initiated as well as specific actions filed and litigated during the year. Overall, the agency filed 96 enforcement actions during the period. That compares with 82 such actions initiated in FY 2022 and 113 during 2021. While the number of cases initiated is only one indication of the work done by the agency, here the numbers reflect consistency, and when coupled with the wide variety of actions initiated, a solid presence in the market.
Key cases initiated by the agency include some of the largest actions involving crypto assets and others:
Crypto assets: The action charged founder Samuel Bankman-Fried, FTX Almeda, and others with fraud. The case, along with a parallel criminal case and other actions,centered on fraud claims involving billions of dollars and the actions of Mr. Bankman-Fried and his firm, FTX. In the parallel criminal action Defendant Bankman-Fried was found guilty. Sentencing has not taken place.
Crypto assets: This case charged Binance, and its founder and former CCO, with operating an illegal digital asset derivatives exchange.
Trading platforms: The case was brought against the company and its former CEO, Alex Mashinsky. It alleged fraud and misrepresentations involving commodity pool schemes tied to digital asset commodities and charged a trading platform with illegal operations.
Swap data: The case charged a number of the most prominent banks on Wall Street in a scheme centered on swap data reporting and related disclosure violations.
Confidential information: The settled action, brought against an introducing broker, its owners and affiliated firms, alleged the misappropriation of material, nonpublic information by taking the opposite side in thousands of brokerage customer block trade orders without the consent of the customer.
Commodity pool operators: This action focused on charges brought against advisors and their affiliates, along with the co-founder and former Co-CIO with deception and manipulation in a $30 million scheme to illegally trigger payouts on two large binary option contracts that were swaps.
Protecting customers: The Commission filed its first case involving a “Pig Butchering,” which involved cultivating a friendly or romantic relation with a potential customer using false statements to ultimately solicit a customer to participate in a fraud.
The actions cited above are representative of the 96 cases filed during the last fiscal year by the agency. The Commission filed a table which lists each of those action by topic (here).