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Judge denies Gemini's bid to vacate a $5 million CFTC order
The CourtListener docket for the Southern District of New York records Document 223 as filed at 20:33 UTC on October 15, 2026. Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein's eight-page order denies a joint motion by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and Gemini Trust Company, LLC, a limited purpose trust company that the New York State Department of Financial Services lists with a charter dated October 2015, to undo a consent order entered on January 6, 2025 and a $5 million civil monetary penalty that Document 223 records as paid.
A BitLicense is the other New York route into virtual currency business, the path Strike took for its New York BitLicense. Gemini is on the trust-charter line of that list, not the BitLicense line. The denial matters because the regulator and the exchange asked together for the judgment to go, and the judge refused. The order sets no later hearing, and it does not move customer balances.
What Document 223 refuses to undo
Hellerstein signed in New York on October 15, 2026 and closed entries 215 and 219 in case 22 Civ. 4563 (AKH). The CFTC sued on June 2, 2022 over statements during review of a proposed Bitcoin (BTC) futures contract. The parties settled three weeks before trial. The consent order is dated January 6, 2025. On May 28, 2026 they asked under Rule 60(b)(5) to vacate it, or under Rule 60(b)(6) to drop only the forward-looking terms. Agreement, the order holds, is not itself a ground for relief.
Four statements the January order already found
Section 5c(c) lets a designated contract market self-certify a contract, and Core Principle 3 forbids one "readily susceptible to manipulation." The proposed contract settled to Gemini's own auction, so staff relied on the firm's account. Customers traded on affiliate loans and an employee's advances and credits despite a "fully (pre-)funded" claim. Self-trading was called "prohibited," but no safeguard existed before around May 2017, and some continued after. Two customers used bespoke rebate fees in collusive trading. The employees responsible were suspended, then terminated as untrustworthy. Part of the filed volume reflected that activity. The violation was Section 6(c)(2). Relief was an injunction against false or misleading statements or omissions to the Commission, the $5 million, and a bar on denying the findings. Gemini did not admit the allegations.
A policy shift was not a change in law
The May papers made two arguments: inappropriate tactics inside the Division of Enforcement, and a policy climate in which the complaint would not have been filed.
"Neither of these arguments provides sufficient grounds for relief under Rule 60(b)(5) or 60(b)(6)," wrote Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein, United States district judge. (CourtListener, Document 223, filed October 15, 2026)
What the parties called new was already true on January 6, 2025. Old facts newly learned are not a change in circumstances. With counsel, Gemini litigated about three years, then on its own account settled on December 24, 2024, fewer than three weeks before trial. By August 2017, the order states, the firm knew its chief operating officer had enabled a fraud scheme, and its highest officials willingly misrepresented material facts anyway. Later documents do not make the order inequitable to keep. Executive Order 14178 (90 Fed. Reg. 8647, January 23, 2025) and the "Ending Regulation by Prosecution" memorandum are a change in priorities, not in law. Rules 60(b)(2) and 60(b)(3) had a one-year limit that the May 28, 2026 catch-all could not reopen. Gemini affirmed that it agreed voluntarily.
What still binds Gemini Trust
The injunction remains, and so does the bar on public denials. The $5 million stays recorded as paid. Decrypt reported that result on October 16, 2026. The October 15 order does not find the original statements true, and it does not send the penalty back. A later view inside the CFTC, and papers Gemini obtained after it signed, are not grounds to wipe the judgment.
One point stays open. The CFTC keeps discretion over its priorities and may weigh current policy in deciding whether to seek enforcement. Hellerstein cited Heckler v. Chaney for that point. Declining to enforce is not the same as vacating the judgment.
- Vacatur of the January 6, 2025 consent order: denied.
- Vacatur of only the prospective terms: denied.
- The $5 million penalty: recorded as paid, and not undone.
- The injunction and the non-denial bar: still in the consent order.
- Rules 60(b)(2) and 60(b)(3): outside the one-year window by May 28, 2026.
- Next date: none. Enforcement discretion stays with the CFTC.
This motion is over. The order does not tell the CFTC whether to police the injunction. For a classification a regulator has just put on the books, rather than a US judgment the parties failed to lift, see how the European Banking Authority classified USDC.
This article is informational analysis only and is not financial advice. Figures are as attributed in the text.
Karthik Subramanian is a founder, writer, and technology consultant with nine years in the crypto ecosystem. He covers token economics, L1/L2 infrastructure, DeFi protocols, wallets/custody, and the bridge between crypto and forex—broker technology, liquidity, and macro drivers. Karthik’s writing focuses on clear, practical frameworks that help professionals evaluate new products and on-chain innovation alongside FX market realities.
