Former CEO of Digitex Futures Exchange, Adam Todd, has admitted guilt in federal court for neglecting to establish an Anti-Money Laundering (AML) program at the firm. Todd's plea follows U.S. authorities' indictment of him in February for failing to implement effective AML measures.

According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida, Todd pleaded guilty to intentionally causing Digitex to breach the Bank Secrecy Act. The indictment states that Todd operated an unregistered futures platform for U.S. customers from 2018 to 2022 without implementing proper AML and Know Your Customer (KYC) procedures.

Todd faces a potential sentence of up to five years in prison and a fine of $250,000. This case mirrors the one involving former Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao, who pleaded guilty to similar charges in a separate federal district in November 2023 and was subsequently sentenced to four months in prison in April.

Todd's sentencing hearing date has not been announced by the U.S. Attorney’s Office. He resigned as CEO of Digitex in October 2022 and has since been working as the lead developer at Digitex Games.

In 2020, Todd announced that Digitex would not enforce any KYC identity verification requirements following a data breach at the exchange, where a former employee reportedly stole users' passport and driver's license information. Despite claims of blocking U.S. IPs and requesting users to confirm they were not based in the United States, the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) filed a lawsuit against Todd and Digitex in 2022. The following year, the CFTC won the case, ordering $16 million in disgorgement and penalties.