According to BlockBeats, on November 2, according to official news, the U.S. Department of Justice sued Aleksei Andriunin, founder and CEO of crypto financial services company Gotbit, accusing him of wire fraud and conspiracy to manipulate the market. Aleksei Andriunin, a Russian citizen living in Portugal, was arrested on October 16.
According to court documents, Gotbit provided market manipulation services to create artificial trading volumes for multiple cryptocurrency companies, including those located in the United States, in order to get cryptocurrencies listed on CoinMarketCap. Gotbit conducted millions of dollars worth of fake trades on behalf of its clients and made tens of millions of dollars in proceeds through these fraudulent services. Andriunin transferred millions of dollars of Gotbit proceeds to his personal Binance account.
BlockBeats previously reported that Gotbit officials posted on social media on October 16 that the company's CEO Alex Andryunin had been arrested in Portugal. There are no further details at the moment, and users' accounts on Gotbit are safe.