The ex-CEO of Mine Digital, an Australian cryptocurrency exchange, is facing charges of fraud after allegedly stealing 2.2 million Australian dollars ($1.47 million) from a customer who intended to exchange the funds for Bitcoin.
In a statement released on October 21st, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) stated that the Mine Digital customer had paid 1.5 million dollars to ACCE Australia, but never received the cryptocurrency in return. ASIC claims that Grant Colthup, the former CEO, either used the funds to pay off ACCE’s debts, bought cryptocurrency for others, or a combination of both.
This is just one of the latest accusations to be made against the company, which collapsed in September 2022. Since then, creditors have been trying to recover 16 million dollars from the firm.
The country’s securities regulator informed Grant Colthup of the fraud charge during a hearing at the Magistrates Court in Ipswich, Queensland, Australia on October 21st. The case against Colthup has been adjourned until December 16th, 2024.
Colthup has been charged under section 408C of Queensland’s Criminal Code 1899, which carries a maximum prison sentence of 20 years.
According to CoinGecko data, at the time when ASIC claims the customer made the 1.47 million dollar Bitcoin purchase, the price of Bitcoin ranged between $18,890 and $24,580. With Bitcoin now trading at around $67,460, the Bitcoin would be worth anywhere between 4 million and 5.24 million dollars.
Mine Digital operated a cryptocurrency exchange platform and provided various trading services from May 2019 until September 2022, when it went into administration. An initial investigation revealed that ACCE only had control over assets worth $20,000, significantly less than the 16 million dollars claimed by the creditors, as reported by the Australian Financial Review on October 13th, 2022.
Just over two months after the collapse of the cryptocurrency platform on December 1st, 2022, Brad Tonks, PKF’s Business Recovery and Insolvency Partner, was appointed as ACCE’s liquidator. However, PKF reportedly planned to sue Colthup in January 2023, seeking a court order to compensate the creditors who were chasing the 16 million dollars, as reported by the Australian Financial Review.
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