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Robinhood engineers accused of using confidential data for Hyperliquid trades
The two engineers each face one charge under the Commodity Exchange Act and one count of wire fraud.
Former Robinhood employees have been charged with fraud for allegedly misappropriating confidential information about upcoming crypto listings and using it to trade perpetual futures on Hyperliquid, federal prosecutors said Tuesday.
According to the complaints, Hefu Chai and Huaisong Xiang, who worked as engineers at Robinhood, had access to nonpublic information about which crypto assets Robinhood Crypto planned to list and when those listings would be announced.
Prosecutors allege that from 2025 through 2026, the pair repeatedly traded perpetual futures tied to the relevant tokens before Robinhood disclosed the listings publicly. Each allegedly made more than $50,000 from the trading activity.
Chai, 36, of Menlo Park, California, and Xiang, 30, of Jersey City, New Jersey, each face a Commodity Exchange Act count with a maximum 10-year prison sentence and a wire fraud count with a maximum 20-year sentence.
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Commenting on the case, a Robinhood spokesperson said the company investigated the matter immediately, notified law enforcement and regulators, and plans to continue cooperating with ongoing investigations.
“Robinhood takes market integrity seriously and has zero tolerance for insider trading. We have robust insider trading policies and procedures in place, including for new crypto listings. We immediately investigated and reported this matter to law enforcement and regulators, and will continue to cooperate with the investigations,” said the spokesperson.
This article has been updated with a comment from Robinhood.