Alexander Mashinsky is paying $10 million. His co-founders, Shlomi Daniel Leon and Hanoch “Nuke” Goldstein, are covering $4.1 million and $2.4 million. Total damage to the trio: $16.5 million, the price the FTC set for years of lying to Celsius Network depositors.
The FTC’s original 2023 complaint laid out the con: Celsius told depositors it was “safer” than a bank, carried a $750 million insurance policy, held reserves to cover every withdrawal, and never made unsecured loans. Some depositors were promised yields as high as 18 percent annual percentage yield under the company’s Earn program. All of it was false, and executives kept repeating the pitch days before the company filed for bankruptcy.
The lifetime bans on marketing crypto deposit and withdrawal products do the real work of keeping this trio out of the industry for good.
The Leon and Goldstein orders passed 2-0; Mashinsky’s order passed 3-0, just before Commissioner Melissa Holyoak’s departure. The stipulated orders now sit with the Southern District of New York, awaiting a judge’s signature to take force of law.
— Marcus Webb