Nishad Singh, co-founder and former head of engineering at bankrupt crypto exchange FTX, reportedly pleaded guilty to six criminal charges, including conspiring to commit securities and commodities fraud on Tuesday, according to several media reports.
Singh has also agreed to cooperate against his previous boss Sam Bankman-Fried, former chief executive at FTX, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal.
“I’m unbelievably sorry for my role in all of this and the harm that it has caused,” Singh told U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan in a hearing Tuesday, according to the report.
Meanwhile, the Securities and Exchange Commission on Tuesday charged Singh for his role in defrauding equity investors of FTX, according to a statement.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission also announced actions against Singh in a parallel action, the statement said.
According to the SEC’s complaint, Singh created software code that allowed FTX customer funds to be transferred to Alameda Research, a crypto hedge fund owned by Bankman-Fried and Gary Wang, co-founder of FTX.
The SEC also alleged that as it became clear that FTX couldn’t make its customers whole for the funds it sent to Alameda, Bankman-Fried, with the knowledge of Singh, directed hundreds of millions of dollars more in FTX customer funds to Alameda, which were used for additional venture investments and loans to Bankman-Fried, Singh and other FTX executives.
What’s more, the SEC alleged as FTX neared collapse, Singh withdrew about $6 million from the exchange for personal use and expenditures, including purchase of a multimillion-dollar house.
Bankman-Fried, who was charged with eight criminal accounts, including securities fraud in December, and hit with four additional charges last week, remains confined to his parents’ home on a $250 million bond and is set to face a trial in October.
Singh and Bankman-Fried didn’t respond to requests seeking comment.
This article was originally published by Marketwatch.com. Read the original article here.
