Robinhood Engineers Charged with Crypto Scheme Tied to Confidential Listing Information

Two engineers at Robinhood, Hefu Chai and Huaisong Xiang, have been charged with commodities fraud and wire fraud over a $50,000 crypto scheme.

The charges allege that between 2025 and 2026, the two employees used confidential information about upcoming cryptocurrency listings on Robinhood to trade perpetual futures on Hyperliquid, making more than $50,000 in profits.

Prosecutors claim that Chai and Xiang exploited their access to internal information to open positions linked to the planned listings before they were publicly announced by Robinhood.

The absence of an expiry date for perpetual contracts allowed them to hold their positions until the expected price movements occurred, according to prosecutors.