The Public Ledger of Corruption
German and US authorities, supported by Europol, have targeted ChipMixer, a cryptocurrency mixer used to keep crypto transactions private. The investigation was also supported by Belgium, Poland and Switzerland. On 15 March, national authorities took down the infrastructure of the platform, seizing 4 servers, and also seizing about 1909 Bitcoins in 55 transactions (approx. EUR 44.2 million) and 7 TB of data.
Guo Wengui, a Chinese billionaire known for his opposition to Beijing and ties to the administration of former US President Donald Trump, has been charged in the United States with defrauding investors out of $1bn.
Guo, also known as Ho Wan Kwok and Miles Guo, was arrested in New York on Wednesday over an alleged conspiracy involving the misappropriation of hundreds of millions of dollars obtained from his thousands of followers online, the US Department of Justice said in a statement.
Guo is accused of pocketing money raised from investors who were promised outsized returns for backing a number of his business ventures, including the media company GTV Media Group, an exclusive membership club known as G|CLUBS and a cryptocurrency called Himalaya Coin.
The Japan Securities Dealers Association said Wednesday it has imposed a penalty of 300 million yen on SMBC Nikko Securities Inc for market manipulation, matching the highest fine previously issued by the organization.
According to the JSDA, SMBC Nikko illegally propped up the prices of 10 individual stock issues to stabilize them last year in “block offering” transactions.
The fine imposed on the brokerage by the JSDA is equal to that issued to Nomura Securities Inc. in connection with an insider trading scandal in 2012.
A Southfield, Michigan-headquartered bank holding company has agreed to plead guilty to securities fraud for filing false securities statements relating to its 2017 initial public offering (IPO) and its 2018 and 2019 annual filings.
According to a signed plea agreement that will be publicly filed in court, Sterling Bancorp, Inc. (the Company) was the holding company for its wholly owned subsidiary, Sterling Bank and Trust F.S.B. (the Bank, or together with the Company, “Sterling”). Sterling – with branches located in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, New York, and Southfield – completed an IPO in 2017, and the Company’s stock began trading on the NASDAQ exchange under the ticker symbol “SBT.”
The United States Environmental Protection Agency has proposed the first federal limit on so-called “forever chemicals” in the country’s drinking water, a move officials said will save lives.
The proposal announced will limit per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, also known as PFAS.
The substances have been linked to a range of health issues, including low birth weight and kidney cancer. They do not naturally degrade in the environment and are expensive to remove from water.
ilicon Valley Bank’s parent company and two senior executives are facing a class-action lawsuit in the United States, where shareholders have accused the financial institution of failing to disclose the risks that anticipated interest rate hikes would have on its business.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court in the Northern District of California on Monday, is seeking unspecified damages from SVB Financial Group and its Chief Financial Officer Daniel Beck, as well as the bank’s Chief Executive Officer Greg Becker.
The bank collapsed and its assets were seized by the US government late last week after a mass withdrawal of funds by customers.
According to Andrew Adams, the group has focused on identifying those who are helping Russians to avoid sanctions and export controls. “I think it can be quite effective to be sanctioning facilitators,” Adams said, calling them “professional sanctions evasion brokers.” A recent report from the Treasury Department showed that more than $58 billion worth of sanctioned Russian assets have been blocked or frozen worldwide so far. Adams pointed out that KleptoCapture aims to sell the frozen yachts and other property of sanctioned Russians, despite the legal difficulties, and use the proceeds for the benefit of Ukraine. He noted, however, that this would be done in accordance with the law.
The ban will be imposed next week and reevaluated after six months, De Croo said in a statement. Government employees will be allowed to use the app on their personal devices, but not on any devices “whose purchase, subscription or use are partly or fully paid for by the federal government.” Citing reports by the Belgian State Security Service and Centre for Cybersecurity, De Croo claimed that TikTok collects large amounts of user data, manipulates the information users are exposed to, and cooperates with Chinese spy agencies. “We must not be naive,” De Croo said. “TikTok is a Chinese company that today is obliged to cooperate with the Chinese intelligence services.”
The US Justice Department announced on Wednesday having obtained a warrant to seize a Boeing 737-7JU aircraft owned by Russian oil company Rosneft and worth approximately $25 million. The court documents cited in the press release states the probable cause for the intended seizure as violations of the Export Control Reform Act (ECRA) and of the recent sanctions issued against Russia. Those sanctions bar a plane that was built or manufactured in the US from entering Russia without a valid license, the report stated. Airplanes and aircraft parts are subject to export rules because of their potential military use and national security implications. “Specifically, since February 2022, when the export controls that bar the United States-built plane’s re-entry to Russia went into effect, the plane has left and reentered Russia at least seven times, in violation of federal law,” the press release said. “The Boeing jet, which was manufactured in the United States, was last in the United States in March 2014, and is currently believed to be in, or traveling to or from, Russia,” it continued. In August, the Justice Department was approved by a US court to seize a plane belonging to another Russian energy company, a $45-million jet reportedly owned by oil major Lukoil.
The United States has imposed sanctions on 39 entities, including many based in the United Arab Emirates and Hong Kong, that Washington said facilitate Iran’s access to the global financial system, describing them as a “shadow banking” network that moves billions of dollars.
The US Treasury Department said in a statement on Thursday that those included in the sanctions had granted companies previously slapped with Iran-related sanctions – such as Persian Gulf Petrochemical Industry Commercial Co (PGPICC) and Triliance Petrochemical Co Ltd – access to the international financial system and helped them hide their trade with foreign customers.