According to a report by “The Block”, the US Department of Justice announced on Tuesday (26th) that it has filed charges against the cryptocurrency exchange KuCoin and its two founders, alleging that they violated anti-money laundering laws.
According to the indictment released by the US Southern District of New York Attorney’s Office, KuCoin and its two founders, Chun Gan and Ke Tang, are accused of operating an unlicensed money transfer business and violating the Bank Secrecy Act. The US prosecutors claim that the exchange failed to maintain adequate anti-money laundering programs, did not establish “reasonable procedures” to verify customer identities, and did not submit suspicious activity reports.
The indictment states that KuCoin deliberately evaded US anti-money laundering and KYC regulations by falsely claiming that it had no US customers, but in reality, KuCoin has a large number of US customers. Authorities allege that KuCoin allowed its platform to be used to launder over $9 billion.
The Department of Justice also stated that the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) filed a parallel civil lawsuit against KuCoin on Tuesday. According to the announcement, KuCoin is accused by the CFTC of operating an illegal digital asset derivatives exchange.
After news of the indictment broke, KuCoin claimed on its platform X that it is operating well and user assets are secure. They are currently investigating the details through lawyers and state that KuCoin respects the laws and regulations of all countries and strictly adheres to compliance standards.
