Key Highlights
- CFTC Chair Michael Selig said the agency is correcting a flawed enforcement case against Gemini and claims past crypto actions were unfair.
- The agency is trying to undo a 2025 settlement after reviewing the case and finding issues like weak evidence and unreliable whistleblower claims.
- The Gemini case started in 2022 over alleged false statements about a bitcoin futures product, but the CFTC now says it should not have been filed.
The Chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), Michael Selig, said the agency is correcting what he described as a flawed enforcement action against Gemini Space Station, the crypto exchange run by the Winklevoss twins.
During an interview on CNBC’s Squawk Box on Tuesday, Selig said the case was part of a pattern where, under the Biden administration, crypto companies and some other industries were hit with unfair legal pressure through government agencies. “The Biden administration weaponized the federal agencies against the crypto industry and many other industries,” he said.
Selig says Gemini was targeted politically
Selig said the government went too far in how it treated the crypto industry. He also said that people like the Winklevoss twins were unfairly targeted for political reasons. According to him, the agency is now trying to correct those actions.
“We’re righting those wrongs. We’re going to start fresh,” he said. He added that government agencies should not be used to attack companies through legal cases or pressure tactics.
He also made it clear that the agency does not intend to repeat such actions in the future. “That’s not going to happen again. It can’t happen again under my administration or a future administration,” Selig said.
He did not go into full case details because the matter is still active in court. But he said the agency is reviewing past decisions and reversing actions that were not handled properly.
CFTC moves to undo Gemini settlement
The comments come shortly after the CFTC asked a federal court in New York to cancel a settlement it made with Gemini in January 2025.
The settlement included a $5 million fine and a permanent rule stopping Gemini from making false or misleading statements to the regulator. Gemini already paid the $5 million fine, and that money cannot be returned. However, the court may still remove the rule if it agrees with the request.
How the Gemini case first started
The case began in 2022 when the CFTC sued Gemini, alleging that the exchange made false or misleading statements in 2017 when seeking approval for a bitcoin futures product. The agency claimed that Gemini did not clearly explain how the product could be affected by market manipulation, especially in the way fees and auctions were set up.
In January 2025, the case was settled just before it went to trial. Gemini agreed to the deal but did not admit or deny the claims. This happened in the final days of the Biden administration. Former CFTC chair Timothy Massad later described the order as “very unusual,” according to earlier commentary.
Full review of the case process
After the settlement, the CFTC carried out a full review of how the case was handled. The review looked at how the investigation was done, what evidence was used, and how the legal team built the case. It came to a strong conclusion that the case should never have been filed in the first place and would not be filed under today’s standards.
The review pointed to six big problems:
- First, it said the case relied heavily on a whistleblower who was not seen as reliable.
- Second, it said the evidence against Gemini was weak.
- Third, it said Gemini may have been wrongly treated as a main target even though parts of the review described it as a victim of fraud.
- Some key evidence was not shown during internal voting inside the agency.
- Fifth, the agency used legal privilege to block Gemini from getting information it needed to defend itself.
- Sixth, it said staff may have used the threat of regulatory power to push Gemini into settling.
Because of all this, the CFTC said it now wants to update how it handles enforcement, especially in crypto cases. It said any action taken in the future should be fairer, more open, and based on stronger proof.
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