- A Nigerian court has postponed Binance’s $2 billion tax evasion case to April 30 as the crypto exchange contests the legality of document service.
- Nigeria claims Binance’s P2P trading harmed the economy and facilitated capital flight, demanding $2 billion in taxes and $79.5 billion in damages.
- Two Binance executives were detained, with one escaping custody and another alleging detention linked to a rejected $150 million bribe.
Nigeria has once more escaped a public court face-off with the Binance global cryptocurrency exchange, postponing the tax evasion issue until after April 30. The wait, as noted in a recent report by Reuters, is due to a delay stemming from a Binance lawsuit in regards to a prior court ruling allowing the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) to serve court documents through email.
A representative from Binance argues that the FIRS did not have jurisdiction over the tax evasion issue, stating that, “Without an office in Nigeria, legal documents cannot be served in Nigeria.” As a company incorporated in the Cayman Islands, Binance asserts that legally speaking, the documents serve borders and should qualify under international law pertaining to offshore registration.
The case also forms part of a Nigeria-wide political and communistic auction of power-driving efforts to control cryptocurrency trading in Nigeria, a country that once ranked among the highest in global crypto adoption.
Binance Executives Caught in Legal Crossfire
The tax case now has a dramatic twist due to the involvement of two executives from Binance, Tigran Gambaryan and Nadeem Anjarwalla. A U.S. citizen, Gambaryan was held in Nigeria from 2024 until his release in October after the country’s anti-corruption agency dropped trumped-up charges. He later claimed that his detention was supposedly due to Binance refusing to pay a bribe of 150 million dollars, something Nigerian officials have publicly denied.
Anjarwalla, a British-Kenyan dual national, was also detained but was able to evade arrest while under house arrest. He left the country using a second passport, which further heightened the already tense relationship between Binance and Nigerian authorities.
With the date of the court hearing coming up, there’s a massive focus on whether Nigeria’s attempt to implement tax compliance on crypto platforms will succeed or whether Binance’s legal challenges will draw the line. Either way, the decision could, in fact, be global first in setting crypto regulations for the continent.