US federal courts have handed down a total of about 83 years in prison terms to crypto company leaders since early 2024, with Terraform Labs co-founder Do Kwon receiving 15 years in December 2025 for fraud related to the TerraUSD and Luna collapse. This sentencing wave, driven by major platform failures like FTX and Celsius, suggests a run rate of roughly 41 prison-years per year. The figures highlight a shift from civil penalties to custodial outcomes in crypto enforcement.
The cumulative prison time imposed on crypto executives reflects intensifying US regulatory scrutiny following high-profile collapses. Do Kwon's 15-year sentence, handed down after he pleaded guilty to two fraud charges, exceeded prosecutors' recommendations, as reported by AP News. The Terra ecosystem's 2022 failure wiped out over $40 billion in market value, a loss prosecutors emphasized in court.
Major cases dominate the total. FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried received 25 years on March 28, 2024, following his trial conviction for fraud. Celsius founder Alex Mashinsky got 12 years in May 2025 for fraud and market manipulation. In contrast, Binance founder Changpeng Zhao served just four months, ending April 30, 2024, for anti-money laundering violations. Within FTX, cooperating executives like Ryan Salame (90 months) and Gary Wang (no prison time mentioned, but Ellison at 24 months) illustrate how pleas influence outcomes.
Smaller cases add to the tally: AML Bitcoin's Rowland Marcus Andrade got seven years on July 29, 2025; Wolf Capital's Travis Ford, five years on November 14, 2025, for a $9.4 million fraud; and Samourai Wallet founders, five and four years in November 2025, for unlicensed money transmission and laundering. Together, these account for about 83 years since early 2024, equating to a 41-year annual run rate.
This metric, derived from federal sentences excluding probation, underscores diverging enforcement tracks: longer terms for fraud involving customer deception versus shorter ones for compliance lapses. President Donald Trump pardoned Zhao in October 2025 after his term, introducing political variability. The data excludes international cases, like Turkey's extreme sentence for Thodex's Faruk Fatih Özer, due to differing systems.
