Coinone employees "admit to facts" in case regarding token listing bribes

A lawyer for a broker and the former director of the South Korean cryptocurrency exchange Coinone have told a court that their clients "admit the facts of the prosecution". The director, "Mr. Jeon", is accused of accepting more than ₩2 billion (~$1.5 million) in bribes in exchange for listing shady tokens on the exchange. In one case, the exchange was the only platform to list a token called "Furiever Coin", which has been linked to a kidnapping and murder investigation in Seoul.

Four executives were arrested in connection to the investigation in April, under suspicion that they had received ₩2.4 billion (~$2.2 million) in bribes in exchange for listing dozens of coins.

Coinone is one of the most popular South Korean cryptocurrency exchanges. In July 2022, it was among the seven exchanges raided by Korean authorities in the wake of the Terra/Luna collapse, as the country began applying harsher scrutiny to crypto platforms.