iFinex Inc needs another 30 days to produce trial documents for the New York Attorney General.
iFinex Inc — the parent company of crypto exchange Bitfinex and stablecoin issuer Tether (USDT) — has written to the New York Supreme Court requesting that its upcoming trial date be pushed back even further.
According to a filing
submitted to the New York court system on Jan. 19, the legal counsel
for iFinex Inc requested another 30 days to produce the documents
demanded by the Office of the Attorney General (OAG).
The document production process was supposed to be completed by Jan. 15 — a date which itself was an extension on the original deadline
of Dec. 16. Legal counsel for the defendant, Charles Michael, said in
Tuesday’s court filing that a “substantial volume” of material had
already been handed over to the OAG, but that there remained
“supplemental agreed-upon items” that still had to be sourced.
The
filing noted that, in addition to the time it will take to produce the
documents in question, extra time will also have to be set aside for the
OAG to analyze their importance. The filing states:
“The
parties will need a few more weeks to produce the supplemental
information, for OAG to review the production, and to discuss further
among themselves what if any further proceedings may be necessary.”
The
ongoing legal battle extends back to April 2019, when the New York
Attorney General alleged that Bitfinex had attempted to cover up the
loss of $850 million of customers’ funds by taking illegal loans from
Tether, with which it shares executive leadership. The defendants are
also alleged to have operated an illegal securities offering.
The investigation by the NYAG had previously revealed
that no more than 74% of Tether stablecoins were actually backed up by
real cash reserves. This hasn’t stopped over $24 billion worth of USDT
being issued to date, and the stablecoin is still involved in the
largest volume of crypto market spot trading on a daily basis.
Chief
technology officer of Bitfinex, Paulo Ardoini, recently took to his
Twitter account to remind observers that Tether was registered and
regulated under the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, and that any
suggestion that USDT represented a security was just an example of fear, doubt and uncertainty, or FUD.
Reminder: #Tether
— Paolo Ardoino (@paoloardoino) December 30, 2020
is registered and regulated under FinCEN as all the centralised
competitors. Strict KYC/AML is applied to all Tether direct users, as
the other main issuers are doing. Less regulated is just FUD. Ask
yourself who benefits from spreading such misinformation? https://t.co/0izlgpJ75r
Given Tether’s perceived influence in driving up the price of Bitcoin (BTC),
and the extent of its everyday use by cryptocurrency traders, many fear
a negative outcome on behalf of iFinex Inc, however justified, may
wreak havoc on the value of BTC and the rest of the cryptocurrency
market.
source link : https://cointelegraph.com/news/tether-and-bitfinex-seek-further-30-days-to-produce-critical-trial-documents
