CFTC imposes 5-year trading ban on Ellison and Wang
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- CFTC filed consent orders in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York on Tuesday against former Alameda Research CEO Caroline Ellison and FTX co-founder Zixiao "Gary" Wang.
- The orders impose a five-year trading ban on both Ellison and Wang, plus a 10-year registration ban on Ellison and an 8-year registration ban on Wang, and require the pair to continue cooperating with the agency.
- CFTC enforcement director David Miller said Ellison and Wang "committed fraud at Alameda and FTX" but that their sanctions "reflect their material assistance" in the Commission's FTX-related investigations.
- The consent orders resolved the agency's civil enforcement actions against Ellison and Wang, who were named as defendants in the CFTC's initial December 2022 complaint alongside former FTX CEO Sam "SBF" Bankman-Fried.
- A separate August 2024 CFTC decision ordered FTX and Alameda to pay $12.7 billion in disgorgement and restitution to affected users, ending the commission's case against the two firms.
- Criminal outcomes for the same executives diverged sharply: Ellison received a two-year sentence with early release in January, Wang and former engineering director Nishad Singh received time served, and Bankman-Fried was sentenced to 25 years.
Why it matters: The consent orders close the CFTC's civil enforcement chapter against Ellison and Wang but leave the five-year trading and multi-year registration bans as lasting barriers to any future return to US-regulated crypto markets. The agency explicitly credited their cooperation in the Bankman-Fried prosecution, which secured a 25-year sentence against the former FTX CEO.
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