ABUJA— The Federal Government, on Wednesday, withdrew the money laundering charge it preferred against a detained top official of a crypto currency trading platform, Binance Holdings Limited, Mr. Tigran Gambaryan.

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, delisted Gambaryan’s name as a co-defendant in the charge it entered against the firm before the Abuja Division of the Federal High Court.

The anti-graft agency based its action on the fact that Gambaryan, who is a citizen of the United States of America, USA, was merely an employee of Binance whose transactional activities he was being tried for.

The firm, which is facing separate cases bordering on alleged tax fraud and money laundering, had since appointed a Nigerian, Mr. Ayodele Omotilewa, as its representative.

FG’s decision to remove Gambaryan’s name from the case was not opposed by his counsel, Mr. Mark Mordi, SAN, who noted that his client was not involved in the company’s broader financial actions.

Consequently, trial Justice Emeka Nwite struck out his name from the charge.

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It will be recalled that Gambaryan was arrested and detained alongside his colleague, Nadeem Anjarwalla, over alleged involvement of their firm in money laundering and terrorism financing.

Even though their international passports were seized, however, Anjarwalla, who is the Africa Regional Manager of Binance, escaped from custody and fled to Kenya.

Despite the development, both the EFCC and the Federal Inland Revenue Service, FIRS, slammed separate criminal charges against the duo and the company.

Whereas the EFCC placed the company and Gambaryan on trial for alleged financial malfeasance, the FIRS, in its own charge, accused the defendants of engaging in tax fraud.

FIRS also withdrew its charge against Gambaryan and Anjarwalla, after the company appointed its representative.

Gambaryan had been in Kuje prison since April as the court denied him bail on the premise that he posed a flight risk.

He collapsed inside the court room on May 23, even as his counsel notified the trial judge that he suffered ill-health in prison.

The defendant was on July 16, brought to court on wheelchair for the continuation of his trial.

FG had in one of the charges before the court, marked: FHC/ABJ/CR/115/2024, alleged that Binance, which has many subscribers from Nigeria, operated illegally in the country as it neither registered to conduct businesses in Nigeria nor paid any tax to the FIRS.
It alleged that while offering taxable services to subscribers on the trading platform known as Binance, the defendant failed to issue invoices to those subscribers for the purposes of determining and payment of their value added taxes (VATs).

The FIRS accused Binance of offering services ( in the buying and selling of cryptocurrencies and in the remittance and transfer of those assets) to Nigerians, while failing to deduct the necessary Value Added Taxes, VAT, arising from its operations.

One of the counts in the charge, read: “That you BINANCE HOLDINGS LTD on or about the 1st February, 2024, in Abuja, FCT within the Jurisdiction of this Honourable Court, whilst involved in the offering of services to subscribers on your trading platform, known as Binance did aid and abet those subscribers on your trading platform to unlawfully refuse to pay taxes, or neglect to pay those taxes and in so doing committed an offence contrary to and punishable under the provisions of S.94 of the Companies Income Tax Act (as amended).”

Binance is a crypto currency exchange platform that lists more than 350 digital currencies that serve as alternative form of payment, created, using encryption algorithms.

The court earlier ordered the company to furnish the EFCC with the comprehensive data or information of all persons from Nigeria trading on its platform as we as all its transaction history for the past six months.

The Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, Mr. Olayemi Cardoso, on February 27, disclosed that about $26billion passed through Binance from unidentified sources.

FG said it was investigating the possibility that the platform was used for money laundering and terrorism financing.

However, following a failed negotiation, the crypto firm, on March 8, discontinued all transactions in naira on its exchange platform, with reports indicating that the government demanded $10bn from the company as its retribution for profiting from “its illegal transactions” in Nigeria.

Offences allegedly committed by the firm were said to be punishable under sections 8 and 29 of the VAT Act of 1993, as amended, section 40 of the FIRS Establishment Act, 2007, as amended, as well as under the provisions of section 94 of the Companies Income Tax Act, as amended.