Mango Storm a-Comin’

Avi Eisenberg, of Mango Markets incident fame, has been arrested and charged with “commodities fraud” and “commodities manipulation.”

We previously wrote about this case suggesting that the exchange itself, Mango, was likely at more risk than Eisenberg if they wished to pursue him for the money. What has happened now is quite a bit different. Though the documents do also make plain that Mango Markets is likely committing the kinds of violations we discussed.

The US government is charging that Eisenberg was involved in manipulative and fraudulent commodities trades at least in part because they involved USDC. There is some reasonably-well-settled law that USDC, as a “virtual currency” is a “commodity” within the meaning of certain US laws prohibiting this sort of conduct.

This is kind of an odd one. But, as we are going to see, the legal argument appears strong.