Robinhood to pay $30M to settle US regulator probes

Online trading platform Robinhood has agreed to pay $29.75 million to settle several probes from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) related to the company’s supervision and compliance practices.
The settlement figure consisted of a $26 million civil fine and $3.75 million restitution to customers, FINRA said on March 7. Robinhood failed to “respond to red flags of potential misconduct,” FINRA said, leading to Anti-Money Laundering and supervisory and disclosure violations.
FINRA found that Robinhood Financial failed to reasonably supervise its clearing system despite there being noticeable processing delays due to increased demand between March 2020 and January 2021, which coincides with when Robinhood restricted trading in so-called meme stocks such as GameStop (GME) and AMC Entertainment Holdings (AMC).
FINRA said Robinhood Financial and Robinhood Securities also failed to detect, investigate or report manipulative trades, suspicious money movements and instances where customer accounts were taken over by third-party hackers.
Robinhood Financial was also found to have opened “thousands of accounts” when it had not reasonably verified the customer’s identity, FINRA said.
As such, Robinhood failed to establish and implement reasonable Anti-Money Laundering programs, the financial regulator added.
Robinhood also failed to “reasonably supervise and retain” social media communications by promoting posts from paid social media influencers, FINRA added.
“Some of these communications included statements that were promissory or not fair and balanced, and thus misleading to investors.”
Excerpt from FINRA’s investigation into Robinhood. Source: FINRA
The $3.75 million in restitution resulted from Robinhood Financial providing customers inaccurate or incomplete disclosures through “collaring” market orders by converting them to limit orders.
Both Robinhood Financial and Robinhood Securities consented to the entry of FINRA’s findings without admitting or denying the charges.
Related: DeFi’s Missing Link: Fixed Income (feat. Treehouse)
It comes just two months after two Robinhood entities reached a $45 million settlement with the US securities regulator on Jan. 13 after an investigation accused the company of violating more than 10 securities law provisions.
Robinhood Financial and Robinhood Securities “admitted to certain findings” in that investigation, which accused them of failing to maintain and preserve electronic communications from customers between 2020 and 2021, among other things.
Meanwhile, Robinhood reported a company-record $916 million net income and over $1 billion in revenue in the fourth quarter of 2024.
Crypto revenue accounted for $358 million of Robinhood’s $672 million transaction-based revenues — a 200% year-on-year increase — while crypto trading volumes rose 450% year-on-year to $71 billion.
Magazine: Meet lawyer Max Burwick — ‘The ambulance chaser of crypto’
Bitcoin (BTC) $ 117,805.00
Ethereum (ETH) $ 3,136.69
XRP (XRP) $ 2.92
Tether (USDT) $ 0.999918
BNB (BNB) $ 688.87
Solana (SOL) $ 162.79
USDC (USDC) $ 0.999836
Dogecoin (DOGE) $ 0.197135
Lido Staked Ether (STETH) $ 3,132.59
TRON (TRX) $ 0.300802
Cardano (ADA) $ 0.741094
Hyperliquid (HYPE) $ 47.27
Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) $ 117,622.00
Stellar (XLM) $ 0.462324
Sui (SUI) $ 3.97
Wrapped stETH (WSTETH) $ 3,786.69
Chainlink (LINK) $ 15.99
Bitcoin Cash (BCH) $ 496.63
Hedera (HBAR) $ 0.234748
Avalanche (AVAX) $ 21.84
Wrapped eETH (WEETH) $ 3,357.30
LEO Token (LEO) $ 8.83
Shiba Inu (SHIB) $ 0.000014
Toncoin (TON) $ 3.12
WETH (WETH) $ 3,134.51
Litecoin (LTC) $ 95.70
USDS (USDS) $ 0.999768
Binance Bridged USDT (BNB Smart Chain) (BSC-USD) $ 1.00
WhiteBIT Coin (WBT) $ 44.43
Polkadot (DOT) $ 4.06
Monero (XMR) $ 334.34
Coinbase Wrapped BTC (CBBTC) $ 117,770.00
Uniswap (UNI) $ 9.16
Pepe (PEPE) $ 0.000013
Ethena USDe (USDE) $ 1.00
Bitget Token (BGB) $ 4.61
Aave (AAVE) $ 327.65
Bittensor (TAO) $ 437.23
Dai (DAI) $ 0.999925
Pi Network (PI) $ 0.444789
Aptos (APT) $ 5.15
Cronos (CRO) $ 0.107541
NEAR Protocol (NEAR) $ 2.65
Ethena Staked USDe (SUSDE) $ 1.18
Ethereum Classic (ETC) $ 19.49
Ondo (ONDO) $ 0.938884
Internet Computer (ICP) $ 5.52
OKB (OKB) $ 47.49
BlackRock USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL) $ 1.00
Jito Staked SOL (JITOSOL) $ 197.90
Algorand (ALGO) $ 0.278695
Bonk (BONK) $ 0.000031
Mantle (MNT) $ 0.710450
Kaspa (KAS) $ 0.088050
Pump.fun (PUMP) $ 0.006553
Ethena (ENA) $ 0.352621
USD1 (USD1) $ 0.999779
Arbitrum (ARB) $ 0.433611
VeChain (VET) $ 0.024927
Cosmos Hub (ATOM) $ 4.65
Sei (SEI) $ 0.368511
POL (ex-MATIC) (POL) $ 0.231034
Pudgy Penguins (PENGU) $ 0.031851
Render (RENDER) $ 3.86
Artificial Superintelligence Alliance (FET) $ 0.755995
Fasttoken (FTN) $ 4.49
Binance-Peg WETH (WETH) $ 3,134.83
sUSDS (SUSDS) $ 1.06
Gate (GT) $ 15.88
Official Trump (TRUMP) $ 9.43
Worldcoin (WLD) $ 1.06
Filecoin (FIL) $ 2.62
Lombard Staked BTC (LBTC) $ 117,440.00
Sky (SKY) $ 0.078522
Binance Staked SOL (BNSOL) $ 173.08
Jupiter (JUP) $ 0.515878
Jupiter Perpetuals Liquidity Provider Token (JLP) $ 4.75
Kelp DAO Restaked ETH (RSETH) $ 3,287.76
KuCoin (KCS) $ 11.62
Rocket Pool ETH (RETH) $ 3,573.23
SPX6900 (SPX) $ 1.59
USDtb (USDTB) $ 0.999909
First Digital USD (FDUSD) $ 0.997643
Celestia (TIA) $ 1.95
USDT0 (USDT0) $ 0.999930
NEXO (NEXO) $ 1.31
Story (IP) $ 4.41
Injective (INJ) $ 13.07
Stacks (STX) $ 0.803267
Optimism (OP) $ 0.696875
XDC Network (XDC) $ 0.076712
Flare (FLR) $ 0.017342
Fartcoin (FARTCOIN) $ 1.19
StakeWise Staked ETH (OSETH) $ 3,293.42
Mantle Staked Ether (METH) $ 3,357.40
Sonic (S) $ 0.356318
Solv Protocol BTC (SOLVBTC) $ 117,473.00
Polygon Bridged USDT (Polygon) (USDT) $ 0.999936
Virtuals Protocol (VIRTUAL) $ 1.63
dogwifhat (WIF) $ 1.05