Recently, a federal court in the United States has ordered Cornelius Johannes Steynberg to pay a total of $3.4 billion in compensation, as he is the mastermind behind the $1.7 billion retail foreign exchange and commodity pool fraud case. This amount includes $1.7 billion in compensation paid to the deceived investors and an additional $1.7 billion in civil penalties.
The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) stated in a statement that Judge Lee Yeakel of the US District Court for the Western District of Texas issued an order. Previously, the US derivatives market regulator filed a civil enforcement action against Steynberg in July 2022, accusing him of operating an unregistered commodity pool between May 2018 and March 2021. CFTC stated that the pool has defrauded at least 23000 people among other investors in the United States and globally.
According to regulatory authorities, Steynberg, who founded and operated Mirror Trading International Proprietary Limited (MTI) as the CEO, requested participation in the mining pool through Bitcoin (BTC) payments. However, the company is neither registered as a commodity pool operator (CPO) nor does it comply with CPO regulations.
This case is the largest action taken by regulatory authorities against BTC fraud and has received cross-border support from regulatory agencies in South Africa and Belize. Regulatory authorities point out that Judge Yeakel's $1.7 billion fine is the highest civil fine imposed in the CFTC case.
CFTC stated in a statement that Steynberg is a fugitive who is evading South African law enforcement agencies. However, according to the arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol), this CEO was arrested in December 2021. The regulatory agency added that he has been restricted to Brazil since then.
When explaining how Steynberg operates the plan, the derivatives regulatory agency pointed out that he has deployed the "International Fraudulent Multilevel Marketing Plan".
CFTC explained that "MTI and Steynberg controlled the commodity pool and allegedly engaged in over-the-counter retail foreign exchange trading through their proprietary 'robots' or software programs," adding that the founders and their colleagues "directly or indirectly" misappropriated all the Bitcoin they collected from investors.
