Aleksei Andriunin, 26, a Russian national residing in Portugal, was extradited to the United States on February 25, 2025, and appeared in federal court in Boston today, where he was ordered detained pending a hearing to be scheduled at a later date.
According to court documents, Gotbit, a cryptocurrency financial services firm, was a well-known ‘market maker’ in the cryptocurrency industry. It is alleged that between 2018 and 2024, Gotbit provided market manipulation services to create artificial trading volume for multiple cryptocurrency companies, including companies located in the United States.
Aleksei Andriunin, Gotbit’s Founder and Chief Executive Officer, allegedly described how he developed a code to ‘wash trade’ cryptocurrencies to artificially inflate trading volume for the purpose of getting cryptocurrencies listed on CoinMarketCap and trading on larger cryptocurrency exchanges.
Andriunin and Gotbit’s employees, including Fedor Kedrov, Director of Market Making, and Qawi Jalili, Director of Sales, allegedly marketed these wash trading tactics to prospective clients and explained how Gotbit used multiple accounts to avoid detection of the wash trades on the public blockchain.
Gotbit allegedly made wash trades worth millions of dollars on behalf of clients and received tens of millions of dollars in proceeds in connection with these fraudulent services. Aleksei Andriunin allegedly transferred millions of dollars of Gotbit’s proceeds into his personal Binance account.
The charge of wire fraud provides for a sentence of up to 20 years in prison, up to three years of supervised release, a fine of up to $250,000 or twice the gross gain or loss from the offense, restitution and forfeiture. The charge of conspiracy to commit market manipulation and wire fraud provides for a sentence of up to five years in prison, up to three years of supervised release, a fine of up to $250,000 or twice the gross gain or loss from the offense, restitution and forfeiture.
United States Attorney Leah B. Foley and Jodi Cohen, Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Boston Division made the announcement. Valuable assistance was provided by the FBI’s Legal Attaché (Madrid) and Portugal’s Policia Judiciaria European Network of Fugitive Active Search Team (ENFAST). The Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs coordinated with Portuguese authorities to secure the arrest and extradition of Andriunin.
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Christopher J. Markham and David M. Holcomb of the Securities, Financial & Cyber Fraud Unit are prosecuting the case.
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Key Facts
- State: Massachusetts
- Category: Cybercrime|Fraud & Financial Crimes
- Source: DOJ Press Release â†â€â€
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