Share this article
23-Year-Old Who Lied to Bank About Bitcoin Holdings Pleads Guilty to Fraud
Randall Joseph Smail faces up to 30 years in prison for lying to a bank about having $640,000 in bitcoin to get a loan.
By Danny Nelson
Updated Sep 14, 2021, 9:28 a.m. Published Jul 8, 2020, 5:19 p.m.
A Pennsylvania man who told a West Virginia bank he had $640,000 in bitcoin in an effort to secure a loan pleaded guilty to bank fraud on Tuesday.
STORY CONTINUES BELOW
Don't miss another story.Subscribe to the Crypto Daybook Americas Newsletter today. See all newsletters
- Randall Joseph Smail, 23, admitted in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia that he used a phony account statement from the Kraken cryptocurrency exchange to defraud the Pendleton Community Bank of a $552,533 loan, according to plea documents.
- Smail told the bank he could only withdraw his $640,000 bitcoin in $200,000 increments “due to tax issues,” according to Jan. 27 court filings. Both statements were false, as Smail did not have any bitcoin with Kraken.
- Smail ultimately received $1,800 of the bank loan. He could face a maximum of 30 years in prison and a $1,000,000 fine for committing bank fraud.
- There were discrepancies in the amount of bitcoin the government said Smail lied about having. The Department of Justice’s Tuesday press release and the case’s first court filings gave a value of $640,000,000. However, Smail’s lawyer, Stanton Levenson, said the real figure was $640,000. The U.S Attorney’s Office did not respond to a CoinDesk request for comment.
- "Very few in the traditional banking system comprehend cryptocurrency," a Kraken spokesperson told CoinDesk. "As an industry, this is the reason we go to great lengths to educate clients and traditional banking partners about crypto."
UPDATE (July 9, 15:17 UTC): This article has been updated to include comment from Kraken.
More For You
What to know:
- As of October 2025, GoPlus has generated $4.7M in total revenue across its product lines. The GoPlus App is the primary revenue driver, contributing $2.5M (approx. 53%), followed by the SafeToken Protocol at $1.7M.
- GoPlus Intelligence's Token Security API averaged 717 million monthly calls year-to-date in 2025 , with a peak of nearly 1 billion calls in February 2025. Total blockchain-level requests, including transaction simulations, averaged an additional 350 million per month.
- Since its January 2025 launch , the $GPS token has registered over $5B in total spot volume and $10B in derivatives volume in 2025. Monthly spot volume peaked in March 2025 at over $1.1B , while derivatives volume peaked the same month at over $4B.
More For You
Bitcoin treasury firm KindlyMD puts share buyback program in place
The continued plunge in NAKA's share price has left the company valued at a steep decline to the value of its bitcoin holdings.
What to know:
- KindlyMD (NAKA), the bitcoin treasury company put together this year, has been authorized by its board for share purchases.
- NAKA's price has crashed more than 95% from its highs of a few months ago.
- Shares are higher by 9.5% in early trading on Thursday.
Top Stories
