The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has concluded its long-standing fraud case against crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun, resulting in a $10mn settlement that dismisses all personal claims against the Tron founder.
SEC Dismisses Claims Against Tron’s Justin Sun, Fines Rainberry Unit $10mn
6 March 2026 - 10:50 CET
The SEC has dropped several of its initial claims, including charges related to deceptive marketing and the unregistered offering of BTT. While the case against Justin Sun personally has been dismissed, the settlement requires Rainberry to pay a $10mn civil penalty to resolve the remaining allegations.
The resolution marks the end of one of the most high-profile crypto enforcement actions to date. The SEC’s focus on the failure to disclose payments for celebrity endorsements highlights the agency’s ongoing scrutiny of social media-driven marketing in the digital-asset space.
Last celeb standing
Six of the eight celebrities settled nearly immediately when the SEC filed the case in 2023. Two of the holdouts, Austin Mahone and Soulja Boy (real name: DeAndre Cortez Way), were originally listed as defendants in the final judgment. Mahone reached a settlement in Aug 2023, agreeing to pay approximately $46,000 in disgorgement and penalties. Soulja Boy remained the final celebrity defendant until 5 Mar, when his charges were dismissed with prejudice by the SEC as a matter of discretion. The dismissal with prejudice means that this is a final and permanent ruling that prevents the same claims from being filed again in the future.
Marketing stunts
Rainberry is the rebranded BitTorrent, which Sun acquired in June 2018 and which operates the BitTorrent protocol. The SEC had also charged Sun, the Tron Foundation, and the BitTorrent Foundation for the unregistered offer and sale of the TRX and BTT digital-asset tokens. Sun, who is seen as polarizing for his marketing stunts, was also accused by the regulator of orchestrating a scheme to artificially inflate the trading volume of TRX through wash trading.
This involves the simultaneous buying and selling of a security to create the false appearance of high market activity. While the SEC initially alleged Sun directed more than 600,000 such trades, all fraud and market manipulation claims against Sun personally were dismissed with prejudice in the March 2026 settlement.
Ties with Trump family crypto ventures
The defendants agreed to the settlement without admitting or denying the allegations. In a 5 Mar post on X, Sun said he was "very pleased" at the outcome. "Today’s resolution brings closure, but I never stopped building. I will continue to focus on accelerating innovation in the United States and around the world and look forward to working with the SEC to develop guidance and regulations for crypto going forward."
Sun is closely intertwined with the Trump family's crypto interests. He was among the few to publicize his attendance at a May 2025 dinner for top holders of the $TRUMP meme coin, identifying himself at the time as its largest investor. He has also reportedly invested $75mn in World Liberty Financial (WLF), the venture behind the USD1 stablecoin controlled by the Trump family.
Buffett lunch, and a banana
His attention-grabbing antics include winning the annual eBay charity auction in 2019 for a lunch with legendary investor Warren Buffett with a record bid of $4.57mn. In Nov 2024, he bought a conceptual artwork titled "Comedian", a banana duct-taped to a wall, for $6.24mn at a Sotheby's auction in New York.
He topped the purchase of the art piece nine days later by eating the fruit at a press conference in Hong Kong.
