On Friday, October 15, 2021, the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) announced that it had ordered the company Tether Holdings Limited and Ifinex Inc., the parent company of Bitfinex, to pay fines totaling $42.5 million. The CFTC accuses Tether of “making untrue or misleading statements and omissions of material fact in connection with the U.S. dollar tether token (USDT) stablecoin.”
CFTC Issues Two Fines to Tether and Bitfinex, CFTC Expects ‘Honesty and Transparency in the Developing Digital Assets Marketplace’
The stablecoin issuer Tether and Ifinex have been charged by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and the two firms have been ordered to pay $42.5 million. Tether is accused of “making untrue or misleading statements and omissions” in regards to the stablecoin the firm issues.
The U.S. regulator also claims that the crypto exchange Bitfinex “engaged in illegal, off-exchange retail commodity transactions in digital assets with U.S persons on the Bitfinex trading platform and operated as a futures commission merchant (FCM) without registering as required.”
“This case highlights the expectation of honesty and transparency in the rapidly growing and developing digital assets marketplace,” the acting CFTC chairman Rostin Behnam explained on Friday. “The CFTC will continue to take decisive action to bring to light untrue or misleading statements that impact CFTC jurisdictional markets.”
In the past, Tether and Bitfinex had issues with the New York Attorney General’s Office (NYAG), but reached a settlement this year. At the time, New York Attorney General Letitia James declared in a statement:
Bitfinex and Tether recklessly and unlawfully covered-up massive financial losses to keep their scheme going and protect their bottom lines. Tether’s claims that its virtual currency was fully backed by U.S. dollars at all times was a lie.
