In brief
- The SEC under Gary Gensler notified Unicoin in December that it plans to bring charges against the firm.
- The Miaimi-based crypto company was given a deadline of April 18 to settle with the Commission.
- Unicoin CEO Alex Konanykhin plans to take the matter to court, and insists the charges are being “driven by staff holdovers from the Gensler days.”
Crypto investment firm Unicoin is gearing up for a courtroom clash with Wall Street’s top cop, as the Securities and Exchange Commission has signaled plans to press ahead with its pursuit of the Miami-based company, Decrypt has learned.
According to co-founder Alex Konanykhin, the SEC’s Division of Enforcement gave Unicoin until April 18 to enter into settlement talks over allegations that the company knowingly violated both registration and antifraud provisions of federal securities law.
That deadline has now passed, and Konanykhin says he has no intention of settling, vowing instead to fight the claims in court.
“I fully intend to win this case in the courtroom,” he told Decrypt in an interview. “I think it’s grotesque that the most compliant crypto company in the U.S. remains the only one being persecuted by the SEC.”
Konanykhin, who says the company has been reporting financial disclosures to the SEC for over three years, also hasn’t ruled out preemptively suing the agency for what he calls “massive, multi-billion-dollar damage” to Unicoin’s shareholders and business.
An SEC spokesperson declined to comment.
The SEC’s pursuit of Unicoin comes as the agency, under new Republican leadership, has rescinded several enforcement actions brought by former SEC Chairman Gary Gensler against high-profile crypto companies—such as Coinbase, Ripple, Kraken, and Consensys—over alleged unregistered securities violations. The new crypto-friendly Trump administration has pledged to end the Biden Administration’s so-called war on crypto and has directed Congress to craft legislation that creates compliance standards for crypto companies and investors.
Unicoin, however, is facing a broader and potentially more serious set of accusations including violating antifraud provisions of the Securities Act and Exchange Act. SEC leadership under Acting Chair Mark Uyeda has in recent public statements signaled its intention to continue to pursue cases involving fraud.
According to a Wells notice sent in December, the agency claims Unicoin gave away the firm’s native token, UNIC, through airdrops without first verifying the recipients’ accredited investor status. It says it misrepresented the tokens as “asset-backed,” and “SEC compliant,” while claiming the firm inflated token sales figures, and falsely claimed to own or control real estate in multiple countries.
The agency also says Konanykhin improperly resold restricted securities without meeting exemption requirements.
Konanykhin, who vehemently denies the claims, insists the case has less to do with the law and more to do with internal resistance at the SEC to a changing regulatory climate under the Trump administration. He says the push to penalize Unicoin is being driven by staff holdovers from the Gensler days, determined to cement at least some enforcement wins amid the mass rollback of crypto litigation. Specifically, Konanykhin identified an assistant director in the enforcement division, Brad Ney, a 10-year employee of the SEC, who has been leading the agency’s investigation into Unicoin.
“I don’t think this reflects the views of the new SEC leadership,” he said. “This is being driven by rogue officials left over from the Gensler administration who are trying to cover themselves by bullying us into a false admission of guilt.”
The interview with Decrypt was the first time Konanykhin has spoken out since the firm decided to forego settlement talks with the enforcement division.
Unicoin recently requested a face-to-face with the Crypto Task Force, which has held meetings with more than sixty crypto firms since February, but has yet to hear back.
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