The Federal High Court in Abuja was informed about a plea bargain agreement made between Paparaxy Global Ventures Limited, Lemskin Technologies Limited, and Nigeria’s anti-graft agency, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) last week.
Following the companies’ admission of violating laws, including engaging in unlicensed financial transactions, details posit the court is expected to order the forfeiture of N160M, which the companies have agreed to refund to the federal government’s account.
This happens to be a part of a larger investigation prompted by intelligence from the National Security Adviser, where the intelligence opined that several cryptocurrency exchange platforms were involved in illegal activities such as money laundering, foreign exchange violations, and terrorism financing.
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Earlier in September 2024, the EFCC secured a court order to freeze a huge sum of N548.6M in crypto accounts on platforms like ByBit and KuCoin, which were allegedly contributing to the instability of the Nigerian Naira.
Obinna Iwuno, the reported president of SIBAN responded to the news explaining that two Nigerian crypto companies had returned N160M to the government after being accused of operating without valid banking licenses pointing out that the main issue is a “lack of regulatory clarity.”
Explaining further, he said that if there were clear-cut regulations governing cryptocurrency transactions in Nigeria, the recent issues would have been avoided. “There would not be any case of operating unlicensed or being unauthorized to do certain things,” he said.
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