Cryptocurrency king Bitcoin (BTC) nosedived to less than $27,000 following a United States Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) lawsuit against the world’s biggest crypto exchange.
Binance and company founder Changpeng Zhao face charges from the US agency, who cited allegations the crypto exchange had violated US law by offering unregistered derivatives.
Following the news, trading data revealed, BTC fell to fresh lows at roughly $26,525 USD. Numerous cryptocurrencies such as Ether (ETH) and BNB Chain fell to $1,703 and $310 USD the same period.
Responding to the complaint, Changpeng Zhao said: “Upon an initial review, the complaint appears to contain an incomplete recitation of facts, and we do not agree with the characterization of many of the issues alleged in the complaint. While we will only be able to give full responses in due time, we will address a few key points below.”
Binance-US Regulator Row
The CFTC filed the lawsuit in the US District Court of Illinois. The lawsuit is the latest in a major crackdown from the US regulator. Cryptocurrencies such as Binance USD (BUSD), Tether (USDT), BTC, Ether (ETH), and others were designated as commodities in the lawsuit.
Authorities, including those at the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), have targeted numerous exchanges, including KuCoin, Coinbase, CoinEx, and many others for allegedly selling unregistered securities.
In recent months, US Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) have also claimed that Binance also had ties to Russian darkweb financing, sparking strong condemnation from the crypto platform.
Additional crackdowns on the cryptocurrency exchange include an SEC lawsuit against Paxos, which supplied BUSD, causing Coinbase to suspend trading the latter.
