OpenSea insider trading case: The final verdict is ‘guilty’

• Former OpenSea employee was proven guilty in insder trading case.
• The ex-employee used confidential knowledge to make profits illegally. 

OpenSea, one of the largest marketplaces for NFTs, was in the limelight again. However, this time around, the news was related to an ex-employee. On 3 May, a former manager at OpenSea was convicted of fraud and money laundering as per a report from Reuters.

Nathaniel Chastain, the former product manager at OpenSea, was convicted on Wednesday of fraud and money laundering for using inside knowledge of which assets would be featured on its home page to trade NFTs. Reuters reported. He was accused of buying NFTs he had decided to…

— Wu Blockchain (@WuBlockchain) May 3, 2023

The ex-employee managed to launder money by using OpenSea internal information. The culprit knew the projects that would be featured on the marketplace’s home page.

A quick dive into the specifics

The accused, Nathanial Chastain had allegedly bought NFTs that he decided to feature on the OpenSea website. He then sold the NFTs shortly after and made at least $50,000.

Prosecutor Thomas Burnett stated that,

“He abused his status at OpenSea to line his own pockets, and he lied to cover his tracks.”

The case initially began in June 2022 when the charges were brought against Chastain and he pleaded not guilty. Furthermore, the lawyers of the accused argued that he didn’t consider the knowledge of NFTs featured on the home page as confidential.

“You can’t hold Nate to a standard that didn’t exist. Nobody told Nate that he couldn’t use or share that information”, stated Daniel Filor, Chastain’s lawyer.

However, the prosecutor stated that the ex-employee knew what he was doing and did so via an anonymous OpenSea account.