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Judge Keeps Gemini’s $5M CFTC Consent Order in Place

A Manhattan judge denied Gemini and the CFTC’s joint bid to undo the exchange’s 2025 consent order, leaving its $5 million penalty and injunction intact.

Merkle Street Newsroom#fd3c123 min read

Judge Keeps Gemini’s $5M CFTC Consent Order in Place

A federal judge in Manhattan on Oct. 15 rejected a joint request from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and Gemini Trust to undo a 2025 court order, leaving in place a $5 million penalty and an injunction against misleading the agency. The order ended a CFTC lawsuit over statements Gemini allegedly made during a review of a proposed bitcoin futures contract. The Block’s report on the ruling says Judge Alvin Hellerstein found the parties’ arguments insufficient to reopen the judgment.

What did the 2025 consent order require?

Gemini agreed to pay $5 million and was permanently barred from making false or misleading statements or omissions to the CFTC. The penalty has been paid; the injunction is the part that still operates going forward. A consent order is a court order that records an agreed resolution, so undoing it required the parties to persuade the judge to reopen a judgment already entered.

The CFTC filed its lawsuit in June 2022, alleging that Gemini made false or misleading statements to agency staff while the agency reviewed a proposed bitcoin futures contract. Gemini settled in January 2025, shortly before trial, after litigating the case for more than three years, according to the court’s Oct. 15 ruling.

Why did the CFTC and Gemini ask to reopen it?

In May 2026, the CFTC joined Gemini in asking the court to lift the order’s prospective restrictions. The agency said a review of the investigation and its evidence led it to conclude the complaint should not have been filed and would not have been brought under current enforcement standards. The parties agreed the $5 million would not be returned to Gemini.

Gemini also argued that regulatory pressure had led it to settle. The CFTC’s review raised concerns about the evidence and the agency’s handling of the case. Those were the parties’ reasons for seeking relief; the judge had to decide whether they met the standard for reopening the existing order.

Why did the judge leave the injunction in place?

Hellerstein ruled that the arguments did not justify reopening the judgment. He said the information cited by the parties concerned facts that existed when the consent order was entered, rather than significant changes that arose afterward. A later change in the CFTC’s view of its case, he said, did not itself require the court to vacate the order.

The judge also rejected the claim that Gemini’s consent was involuntary. The exchange had litigated for years and made a calculated decision to settle shortly before trial, he wrote. The ruling leaves the paid penalty settled and the injunction against false or misleading statements to the CFTC in force.

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