SEC Charges Unicoin and Executives in Alleged $100M Crypto Fraud Scheme

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has filed a lawsuit against crypto investment platform Unicoin and several of its top executives, alleging they defrauded over 5,000 investors by making false claims about the backing and registration of their digital assets.

According to a May 20 statement from the SEC, Unicoin CEO Alex Konanykhin, board member Silvina Moschini, and former investment chief Alex Dominguez misled investors with promises that Unicoin tokens would be backed by billions of dollars in real-world assets, primarily international real estate. In reality, the agency said the real estate assets were only worth a fraction of what was claimed.

Mark Cave, associate director of the SEC’s Division of Enforcement, stated that beginning in 2022, the executives “exploited thousands of investors with fictitious promises,” enticing them with rights certificates supposedly redeemable for Unicoin tokens and equity shares.

A highlighted excerpt of the SEC complaint claims Unicoin and its executives misled customers in multiple aspects of the business. Source: SEC

The SEC also accused Unicoin of misrepresenting its financial health. The firm allegedly claimed it had decades of operational funding, while internal figures showed the runway was often under a year — and at times just four months. Additionally, while Unicoin stated it had sold over $3 billion in rights certificates, actual sales were approximately $110 million.

To make matters worse, the SEC says Unicoin falsely promoted these certificates and tokens as SEC-registered, despite lacking proper registration.

The complaint, filed in Manhattan federal court, charges Unicoin and its executives with multiple violations of U.S. securities laws and seeks permanent injunctions, disgorgement of ill-gotten gains, and civil penalties.

The SEC also charged Unicoin’s general counsel, Richard Devlin, who has agreed to pay a $37,500 civil penalty without admitting or denying the allegations.

None of the named Unicoin executives have issued public comments following the charges. Former FOX Business reporter Eleanor Terrett previously reported that Unicoin received an SEC Wells notice in December regarding a token airdrop. Konanykhin reportedly declined a proposed SEC settlement meeting in April, asserting that some of the agency's conditions were unacceptable and stating the company would defend itself in court.