BitMEX Co-founder Arthur Hayes Spared from Prison

 

In the US, BitMEX co-founder and former CEO Arthur Hayes was sentenced to two years’ probation and will spend the first six months of his sentence in home confinement.

As reported, Hayes and two other BitMEX co-founders Benjamin Delo and Samuel Reed, pled guilty to violating the Bank Secrecy Act by willfully failing to establish, implement, and maintain an anti-money laundering program at the exchange. They each agreed to separately pay a USD 10m criminal fine.

Allowing Hayes to stay out of prison “would send a message to him that the cost of doing business is merely a fine, and he could continue to violate the law for huge amounts and pay any fine,” Assistant US Attorney Samuel Raymond said before US District Judge John Koeltl in Manhattan pronounced the sentence, per Bloomberg. 

Hayes’s lawyer, James Benjamin, said that prosecutors were trying to make the case a “referendum on abstract principles they seek to endorse,” pursuing a “draconian sentence” to vindicate US policy, per the report.

Meanwhile, the former CEO reportedly told the judge that he took “full responsibility” for his role in BitMEX’s failure to implement the measures and he’s “ready to turn the page and start again.”

Delo is scheduled to be sentenced in June and Reed in July. Meanwhile, BitMEX’s former head of business development Gregory Dwyer has pleaded not guilty and is set for trial in October, per the report.

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