EmpiresX
A purported crypto hedge fund that promised ~1% daily returns from an 'EX BOT' trading robot. The SEC and DOJ called it a Ponzi scheme with ~$40M+ in investor losses; head trader Joshua David Nicholas pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 51 months.
Also known as: EmpiresX, Empires X, EX BOT
Summary
EmpiresX marketed itself as a crypto hedge fund that generated about 1% daily profits via a proprietary trading robot (the "EX BOT") and the skills of its "head trader." According to the SEC and DOJ, the bot was fake, the trading lost money, and EmpiresX operated as a Ponzi scheme — paying earlier investors with later investors' funds. [1][2]
Losses and misuse
The CFTC said EmpiresX took in about $40.6 million from roughly 12,500 investors. Operators diverted investor money to personal luxuries (a leased Lamborghini, Tiffany & Co. purchases, a home payment) and laundered funds through a foreign crypto exchange. [1][2]
Outcome
Head trader Joshua David Nicholas pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit securities fraud and was sentenced to 51 months in prison plus $3,379,527 in restitution. Co-founders Emerson Sousa Pires and Flavio Mendes Goncalves were charged and, per the SEC, became fugitives. [1][2]
Bracketed numbers refer to the numbered sources listed below.
People & entities involved
Sources (2)
- SEC v. Joshua David Nicholas, et al. (EmpiresX) — litigation release — U.S. SEC
- EmpiresX Scammer Gets 51 Months For Crypto Ponzi Scheme — CoinMarketCap (DOJ release summary)
See also
World Liberty Financial (WLFI) — Justin Sun token freezeProjectsWLFI, a DeFi project linked to Donald Trump and his family, blacklisted/froze the wallet of major investor Justin Sun in Sept 2025 — ~540–595M unlocked WLFI tokens (~$107M) plus ~2.4B locked. Sun sued, alleging an undisclosed admin 'blacklist backdoor'; WLFI denied it and threatened a countersuit. The dispute is ongoing.
Gala Games exploitTokensOn May 20, 2024 an attacker abused a privileged minter account on the GALA token contract to mint 5 billion GALA (≈$200M+ nominal) and dumped ~600M of them for ~$22M of ETH before Gala froze the address. Gala Games called it an internal access-control failure; the attacker later returned the ~$22M.
This page was last updated on Jun 15, 2026. View revision history.
