U.S. charges OpenSea ex-employee in first NFT insider trading case
The Hindu
Nathaniel Chastain was arrested on Wednesday and charged with wire fraud and money laundering, each carrying a maximum 20-year prison term.
U.S. prosecutors in Manhattan on Wednesday charged a former product manager at OpenSea, the largest online marketplace for non-fungible tokens, with insider trading, the first such case involving digital assets.
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Nathaniel Chastain, 31, of Manhattan, was accused of secretly buying 45 NFTs on 11 separate occasions based on confidential information that the tokens, or others by the same creator, would soon be featured on OpenSea's home page.
Prosecutors said Chastain chose which NFTs to feature, and sold his NFTs at a profit shortly after they were featured, typically for two to five times what he paid.
They said that in one instance, Chastain more than quadrupled his money by purchasing the NFT "Spectrum of a Ramenfication Theory" on Sept. 14, 2021, and selling it early the next morning.
Prosecutors said the scheme ran from June to September 2021, with Chastain transacting through anonymous digital currency wallets and accounts at OpenSea, also known as Ozone Networks Inc.
Chastain was arrested on Wednesday and charged with wire fraud and money laundering, each carrying a maximum 20-year prison term. His lawyer did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
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