Aleksei Andriunin, founder of crypto consultancy Gotbit, has been sentenced to eight months in prison followed by five years of probation for orchestrating fraudulent schemes involving meme coins.
Andriunin pled guilty to charges of fraud and market manipulation after using wash trading techniques to artificially inflate prices of tokens including Saitama (SAITAMA) and Robo Inu (RBIF). As part of his plea agreement, he surrendered $24 million worth of cryptocurrency assets and cooperated with investigators, resulting in Gotbit’s operational shutdown.
Two additional Gotbit executives—Fedor Kedrov and Qawi Jalili—remain under indictment with outstanding warrants. The Federal Bureau of Investigation continues its probe into the firm’s activities while pursuing the fugitives.
The sentencing has drawn supportive reactions from the crypto community as a necessary step toward market integrity. Several projects, including Neiro, publicly severed affiliations with Gotbit following the revelations. This case underscores regulators’ intensified focus on combating crypto market abuses and enforcing accountability.