A brand new crypto litigation tracker from industrial regulation agency Morrison Cohen LLP reveals particulars of greater than 300 energetic and settled courtroom instances since 2013.

Morrison Cohen is a New York-based agency that caters to giant monetary establishments, entrepreneurs and early-growth stage firms, and makes a speciality of capital markets, enterprise litigation, actual property and chapter to call a couple of. The corporate additionally has a cryptocurrency litigation staff.

The Morrison Cohen Cryptocurrency Litigation Tracker was published on Might. 3, and accommodates any case improvement associated to the U.S. Securities and Alternate Fee (SEC), Commodity Futures Buying and selling Fee (CFTC), the Division of Justice (DOJ) and sophistication motion/personal litigation.

The agency said that it’s going to frequently replace the tracker “ to incorporate the important thing rulings in these litigations,” and it additionally accommodates a number of “articles, webinars, and podcasts” and regulatory crypto bulletins from numerous authorities businesses.

Based on the tracker — which is actually a prolonged pdf doc — there have been roughly 17 crypto instances that have been both introduced earlier than the courtroom or resolved in 2022 up to now.

The SEC, CFTC and DOJ mixed account for seven of these, with some excessive profile instances being the SEC v. the Barksdale siblings, who allegedly performed a fraudulent preliminary coin providing (ICO) price $124 million, and the SEC v. digital asset platform BlockFi, who agreed to pay a $100 million penalty for failing to register its crypto lending product.

Probably the most notable of all nevertheless, is the continuing DOJ v.Ilya Lichtenstein and Heather Morgan case. The husband-wife duo are charged with an alleged conspiracy to launder funds regarding the 119,756 Bitcoin (BTC) Bitfinex hack in 2016. DOJ particular brokers have been capable of seize 94,000 BTC across the time of arrests in February.

There might also be lots extra within the works this 12 months, contemplating the SEC introduced this week that will probably be upping the headcount of its enforcement-focused “Crypto Belongings & Cyber Unit” to 50 devoted positions.

At the moment we introduced that we’re bolstering the unit liable for defending buyers in crypto markets & from cyber-related threats. The newly renamed Crypto Belongings & Cyber Unit within the Division of Enforcement will develop to 50 devoted positions.

— U.S. Securities and Alternate Fee (@SECGov) May 3, 2022

Has New York State gone astray in its pursuit of crypto fraud?

The vast majority of motion has been over within the class motion/personal area nevertheless, with SafeMoon attracting essentially the most consideration after the staff was slapped with a class-action lawsuit over an alleged pump and dump scheme.

The category motion claims the mission recruited quite a few celebrities to attract in buyers with allegedly deceptive info, with musicians equivalent to Nick Carter, Soulja Boy, Lil Yachty and YouTubers Jake Paul and Ben Phillips all mentioned to have promoted the BNB Chain-based token.

A singular case that appears to have largely flown beneath the radar is the Halston Thayer v. Matt Furie, Chain/Noticed LL, and PegzDAO from March.

The trio — which incorporates Furie, the unique creator of the beloved Pepe the Frog meme — is accused of fraudulent inducement, after allegedly promoting a one-of-one NFT that tanked in worth following an an identical NFT drop that was launched free of charge.

“Plaintiff alleges that defendants fraudulently misrepresented the worth of a Pepe the Frog NFT. Plaintiff paid $537,084 for a Pepe the Frog NFT created by Furie and offered by PegzDAO. A number of weeks after the sale, PegzDAO launched 46 an identical NFTs free of charge, which allegedly lowered the worth of Plaintiff’s NFT,“ Morrison Cohen wrote.