Allegations of insider trading have been leveled against the ex-product manager of OpenSea. These allegations are connected to the collectibles of digital type that were transacted on the NFT marketplace during September 2021.
The prosecutors of the United States charged the 31 years old Nathaniel Chastain with insider trading in Manhattan on Wednesday. He was the previous product manager of OpenSea which is the biggest NFT (nonfungible token) marketplace. This might emerge as the very first case in relation to digital assets as well as criminal investigations of the traditional kind.
OpenSea Employee In Legal Complications
The prosecutors have claimed that Nathaniel Chastain has bought about 45 NFTs from unnamed hot wallets along with OpenSea accounts. Following this, he quickly sold them and made a huge profit. Chastain allegedly also bought them back soon after they came on the marketplace homepage of OpenSea and sold them once again with a large sum of profit.
Since he was the product manager of OpenSea at that time, he had some authority to feature NFTs. This gave direct access to insider trading and making profits.
The claims also have 11 different NFT trading on 14th September 2021 under “Spectrum of a Ramenfication Theory”. This would allow him to sell the very next day at a profit of four times.
Charges Against Chastain
OpenSea has stated that they came to know of Chastain’s activities and will co-operate with the investigations. They had even asked for resignation for violating the policy of the company. Following this, Chastain resigned and started working on an Oval project that is his own.
Brian Armstrong, Coinbase CEO, recently said that he was also accused of insider trading. He stated that Coinbase employees are not involved in any such activities. Moreover, Coinbase will soon revise its listing process to avoid insider trading activities.
