$1.3 Billion Crypto Fraud: New York Demands Money Back

The US state of New York wants to recover more than a billion dollars from the founders of crypto platform NovaTech. According to prosecutor Letitia James, they scammed hundreds of thousands of investors worldwide with a fraudulent investment program. Thousands of victims lost large parts of their savings in the process.

On Thursday, James asked the judge to make founders Cynthia and Eddy Petion and their companies pay about $1.37 billion. Of that, $1.13 billion is investor money and $232.5 million is interest.

According to the prosecutor, investors deposited about $1.16 billion in crypto coins with NovaTech between August 2019 and May 2023.

Of that amount, however, only about $26 million was transferred to trade service provider B2Broker. The vast majority was therefore not used for the promised trade.

NovaTech promised investors weekly returns of two to four percent. New participants were recruited via WhatsApp, social media and prayer groups, among others.

Haitian and other migrant communities in particular were targeted. In New York alone, more than 11,000 people lost tens of millions of dollars.

NovaTech collapsed in May 2023, leaving tens of thousands of investors unable to withdraw their money.

In June 2024, New York filed a lawsuit against NovaTech, the founders and the previous investment program AWS Mining. That platform had already collapsed in 2019.

The judge held the founders liable in absentia in August 2025, after they had not responded to the indictment. The amount requested has yet to be determined by the court.

Four people who recruited investors for the programs have now agreed to settlements totaling almost $6 million. That money is meant for victims. In addition, they may no longer be active in the American securities trading, commodities trading and crypto sector.

For AWS Mining, James is separately claiming approximately $6.15 million, including interest.