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Former Coinbase PM charged in cryptocurrency insider trading tipping scheme

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Re: Former Coinbase PM charged in cryptocurrency insider trading tipping scheme

#301

Post by profmonocle »

smsm42 wrote: post #283
acchow wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you should really drive to central america, I guess?

They probably have computers on the outgoing checkpoint too. Maybe walk across Rio Grande or something. Or just go to Florida and swim for a really long time.

> They probably have computers on the outgoing checkpoint too.

Does the US have outgoing checkpoints on its land borders? I thought you only dealt with the Canadian/Mexican customs agents on your way out, and only dealt with US CBP on your way back in. (I haven't crossed a US land border since a road trip to Canada when I was a kid, so I could be very wrong.)

Re: Former Coinbase PM charged in cryptocurrency insider trading tipping scheme

#302

Post by smsm42 »

blocked_again wrote: post #204

> As a result of the insider trading scheme, NIKHIL WAHI and RAMANI collectively generated realized and unrealized gains totaling at least approximately $1.5 million. Is this a joke? Seriously. I thought this case was about people inside trading hundreds of millions of dollars.

It's nice that $1.5 million is pocket change to you, but it's still against the law to get even such as small - for you - sum by fraud, so SEC will prosecute it.

Re: Former Coinbase PM charged in cryptocurrency insider trading tipping scheme

#303

Post by zionic »

paulpauper wrote: post #268
zionic wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, not that I would ever do anything like this… but if I was accused of such a thing the last thing I would do is book a flight for tomorrow .

There was no way they were going to let him leave the country, no matter when he booked the flight. booking the flight made it easier to arrest him. the meeting was set-up by the feds to arrest him there instead, but he thought that leaving the country would work, which it obv. didn't.

I mean I don’t intend on ever being a fugitive lol, but do they even check ID digitally when crossing the southern border on foot?

Re: Former Coinbase PM charged in cryptocurrency insider trading tipping scheme

#304

Post by dvt »

hamter wrote: post #299
cuteboy19 wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The person was lazy. There are many ways to obfuscate this even when the ledger is public

yeah but it was private and presumably a pretty limited number of people knew about it at the time which narrows down the number of potential candidates pretty considerably.

There are so many other ways to do this that are infinitely harder to track. Suppose token X is going to hockey stick. You can short a derivative that shorts X. You can long a derivative that longs X. You can leverage a lending protocol that contains X. Etc.

"Buying X when X will go up" has got the be the most unsophisticated way possible one can leverage insider information. Not to mention a basically guaranteed way to get caught.

Re: Former Coinbase PM charged in cryptocurrency insider trading tipping scheme

#305

Post by jsemrau »

thehappypm wrote: post #282
walrus01 wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He could've taken out cash from his local bank account, turned off his phone, driven to San Ysidro and walked through the public turnstile into Tijuana. And then tried to get a flight from Mexico City to somewhere in south asia. Would have been much better than going through the US/Canada border which has a full data sharing agreement between CBSA and US CBP/ICE. (note: this is a stupid, humorous theoretical, not rea…

Taking a large sum of cash would have probably been a trigger for the folks surveilling him, though. Maybe he could get away but that is going to trigger something.

Why the need for the large amount of cash? It's not that you can't access banking websites from abroad. Sure, his bank accounts might be frozen or off-boarded as a result of the investigation. But in general, you can always transfer your money and don't need to bring cash.

Re: Former Coinbase PM charged in cryptocurrency insider trading tipping scheme

#306

Post by xsmasher »

c7DJTLrn wrote: post #81
mtoner23 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a psycho take. We banned insider trading. Allowing insider trading would obviously help the ruling class. CEOs cannot insider trade. And obviously we should just ban congress to trade stocks.

>CEOs cannot insider trade Well, they do. All the time. And they get away with it.

Most CEOs can not sell stock without announcing it well ahead of time, or during scheduled periods.

What form does this insider trading take?

Re: Former Coinbase PM charged in cryptocurrency insider trading tipping scheme

#307

Post by skylabmelody »

jmoak3 wrote: post #235

This is nothing new for Coinbase employees: https://bitfinexed.medium.com/coinbase-insider-trading-litec...

That was a painful read. An "investigation" made by an anonymous twitter user based on cherry-picked tweets, hearsays and full of speculations. Many factual errors as well he didn't sell at all time high and the timeline doesn't match either. The claim regarding Litecoin increase and a supposed Bitfinex escape is made up as well.

Re: Former Coinbase PM charged in cryptocurrency insider trading tipping scheme

#308

Post by hackernewds »

uncomputation wrote: post #272

Great example of how most of the fluff around decentralized finance being more fair just because it is public and “open” is naive at best and a wolf in sheep’s clothing at worst. They claim that regulated banks are a moral evil and “wouldn’t you want something neutral and open and transparent,” conveniently forgetting that this will always favor those with money to market, attract, and sell to potential “buyers” (sca…

You have a point, but also this wouldn't have been unraveled as easily in traditional financial systems. here's the tweet that is cited in the indictment, that a layman could trace (and did)

https://twitter.com/cobie/status/1513874972552355846?s=20&t=...

Another debate why people on Twitter can do this, but the SEC can't do it at scale.

Re: Former Coinbase PM charged in cryptocurrency insider trading tipping scheme

#309

Post by hackernewds »

cuteboy19 wrote: post #258
mikeyouse wrote: post #11

One perk of a public blockchain is that crimes like these are more transparent! A Twitter user 'discovered' the fraud a few months ago: https://twitter.com/cobie/status/1513874972552355846

The person was lazy. There are many ways to obfuscate this even when the ledger is public

How would one do this?

you're right in that, the illusion of transparency actually gives the sophisticated players cover.

Re: Former Coinbase PM charged in cryptocurrency insider trading tipping scheme

#310

Post by SamReidHughes »

vishnugupta wrote: post #56

It talks volumes about the internal controls at CB that it took a tweet to expose this. Given the speed with which they grew last two years I expect their financial and security processes to be next to nothing. This is just tip of an iceberg. Insiders would have made tens of millions over last two years of bull run, if not more. This dude just got greedy and unlucky to get caught just as the crypto bubble began burst…

The information was on a secret chat limited to a short list of employees, that this one was on.

There isn't any internal control, short of bionic implants, that can prevent this.

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