Unicoin has rebuffed the U.S. Securities and Change Fee’s (SEC) try to barter a settlement settlement to shut an ongoing probe into the Miami-based crypto firm, its CEO Alex Konanykhin revealed in a Tuesday letter to buyers.
In his letter, Konanykhin mentioned Unicoin was given an “ultimatum” by the SEC to attend a settlement negotiation assembly final week, on April 18.
“We declined to indicate up,” Konanykhin advised CoinDesk, including that the SEC had made calls for forward of the assembly that he discovered “unacceptable.” He declined to share specifics, telling CoinDesk that the communication between Unicoin’s legal professionals and the SEC was confidential.
Unicoin obtained a Wells discover — a form of official heads-up from the SEC that it intends to file an enforcement motion in opposition to the recipient — in December, shortly earlier than former Chair Gary Gensler stepped down, alleging violations associated to fraud, misleading practices, and the supply and sale of unregistered securities. No official enforcement motion has but been filed.
Since President Donald Trump took workplace, the SEC has reversed its once-aggressive stance towards crypto regulation, backing off from a lot of its open investigations into crypto firms, together with blockchain gaming agency Immutable and non-fungible token (NFT) market OpenSea, and even a few of its ongoing litigation, together with in opposition to Coinbase and Cumberland DRW.
Different SEC enforcement circumstances in opposition to crypto firms, together with its circumstances in opposition to Binance and Tron, have been paused whereas the events try to barter a settlement. The company just lately reached a settlement settlement with Nova Labs, the dad or mum firm behind the Helium blockchain, that noticed Nova Labs pay a $200,000 high quality to settle civil securities fraud fees, and the SEC dropped its claims that Helium (HNT) and different associated tokens have been securities.
In his letter to buyers, Konanykhin claimed that the SEC’s probe has induced “multi-billion-dollar injury” to the corporate and its buyers.
“We’d probably be a $10B+ publicly traded firm by now if the SEC had not blocked our ICO, inventory alternate itemizing and fundraising,” Konanykhin wrote, including that the SEC had prevented Unicoin from performing on the “very favorable market alternatives.”
“We have been compelled right into a standstill,” Konanykhin wrote.
The SEC didn’t reply to a request for remark.
