FG Imposes $10 Billion Fine on Binance

The Federal government is demanding at least $10 billion as retribution from the owners of Binance amid crackdown on the crypto exchange platform in desperate moves to salvage the value of the nation’s local currency, the naira.

Bayo Onanuga, special adviser on information and strategy to President Bola Tinubu, made this known Friday morning in an interview with the BBC.

Binance profited substantially from its “illegal transactions” in Nigeria while the nation suffered huge losses, Mr. Onanuga said

Earlier on Friday, the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA) confirmed that the crypto exchange platform was being investigated by the Nigerian authorities.

In its first official confirmation of the clampdown efforts on the activities of Binance and other crypto platforms, a top official of the ONSA confirmed that the security adviser’s office was coordinating an inter-agency investigation into the operations of Binance.

“I am confirming that the office of the national security adviser, as part of ongoing operations in the foreign exchange market with the CBN and other law enforcement and security agencies, is coordinating an interagency investigation into the operations of Binance,” Zakari Mijinyawa, head of Strategic Communication at the Office of the National Security Adviser, said on Thursday.

The Nigerian government’s retribution claim is coming months after Binance pleaded guilty and agreed to pay $4.3 billion to settle criminal money laundering charges levelled by the U.S. Department of Justice.