Nikhil Wahi will have to pay restitution while serving his 10-month prison sentence and 20 years after release from prison.
In an unprecedented insider trading case related to cryptocurrency, a former Coinbase employee's brother has consented to pay the crypto exchange approximately $470,000 for his involvement in the scheme.
The news was revealed in a New York District Court filing, signed on April 6th and made public on April 10th.
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According to the document, the brother of ex-Coinbase product manager Ishan Wahi, Nikhil Wahi, will have to make restitution payments during his time in prison. The entire amount of almost half of a million must be paid off within 20 years after Nikhil's release and accounts for Coinbase's legal costs connected to the Department of Justice's probe.
In September 2022, Nikhil admitted to making trades based on classified information acquired from his brother. On January 10th, 2023, the man was sentenced to a 10-month in prison for wire fraud conspiracy charges.
The news about the malicious act broke in late July 2022, with Coinbase CEO taking to Twitter to comment on the matter.
In its investigation, prosecutors found that Ishan's work position at Coinbase allowed him to access information about upcoming cryptocurrency listings on the crypto exchange, which he then shared with his brother Nikhil and a mutual acquaintance, Sameer Ramani.
According to prosecutors, the prices of the newly listed cryptocurrencies would usually see skyrocketing growth, generating a profit of $892,500 for Nikhil. It is worth noting that as a part of his sentence, Nikhil will have to repay these profits to the United States government.
However, despite the win in a legal battle for insider trading, Coinbase faces a probe by US Securities and Exchange Commission for alleged securities law violations.
