Robinhood Engineers Accused of Trading Ahead of Crypto Listings

Two engineers at Robinhood, Hefu Chai and Huaisong Xiang, have been charged by federal prosecutors with using their inside knowledge of the company's crypto listings to trade ahead of the rest of the market.

The US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York unsealed criminal complaints against the pair, accusing them of wire fraud and commodities fraud. The two men had access to nonpublic information about which tokens Robinhood Crypto would list, and they allegedly used this knowledge to buy perpetual futures tied to specific tokens on Hyperliquid just before Robinhood publicly announced it would list those tokens.

Prosecutors say the pair made more than $50,000 from these trades between 2025 and 2026. This case is notable because Chai and Xiang are accused of betting on the prices of upcoming listings through perpetual futures, rather than buying the tokens themselves.