The latest court filing, submitted on a Thursday, outlines that the state is seeking the direct return of approximately $1.13 billion in misappropriated investor funds, complemented by an additional $232.5 million in accrued interest. This aggressive legal maneuver follows a crucial procedural milestone achieved in August 2025, when a court officially found the Petions and their corporate network liable by default after they systematically failed to respond to the initial civil lawsuit brought forward by the state. With default judgment established on liability, the attorney general’s office is now firmly focused on securing the maximum financial penalty and restitution possible to address the widespread economic devastation left in the wake of the platforms’ collapses.
While the primary architects face the brunt of the multi-billion-dollar penalty, accountability is also catching up to secondary players within the fraudulent enterprise. According to announcements from the attorney general’s office, four individuals who actively served as promoters and recruiters, channeling unsuspecting investors into the NovaTech ecosystem, have separately agreed to enter into settlements. These agreements require the recruiters to pay nearly $6 million, funds that are specifically earmarked to provide some measure of financial relief and recovery for the victims who suffered direct losses.
The operational footprint of the fraudulent network was both expansive and deeply damaging, particularly within vulnerable communities. The attorney general’s office revealed that more than 11,000 residents in New York alone lost tens of millions of dollars through a combination of NovaTech and an earlier crypto mining scheme known as AWS Mining. According to the state’s detailed complaint, the promoters behind these operations deliberately targeted Haitian and other immigrant communities, utilizing trusted social networks including local prayer groups, social media platforms, and direct messaging applications like WhatsApp. Within these intimate settings, the perpetrators dangled the promise of high, guaranteed investment returns alongside lucrative recruitment bonuses, effectively weaponizing community trust to fuel the expansion of the fraudulent pipeline.
The mechanics of the fraud, as detailed in the legal filings, exposed a massive chasm between the promises made to investors and the actual handling of their capital. The recent court filing indicates that investors deposited roughly $1.16 billion directly into NovaTech’s designated cryptocurrency wallets between August 2019 and May 2023. However, despite the platform’s outward presentation as a sophisticated automated trading hub for crypto and forex markets, only a minuscule fraction of that capital ever touched legitimate trading channels. Out of the more than a billion dollars collected, the attorney general noted that only about $26 million was actually deposited with the platform’s designated trading provider, B2Broker, for actual trading activities. The vast majority of the funds were instead diverted, used to pay earlier investors in classic Ponzi scheme fashion, or funneled to enrich the founders and top recruiters.
Compounding the financial fallout, the state’s legal motion separately targets the remnants of the earlier enterprise, seeking approximately $6.15 million, inclusive of interest, specifically related to the operations and collapse of AWS Mining. The AWS Mining scheme had previously collapsed in 2019, leaving behind a trail of financial wreckage before many of the same promotional networks seamlessly transitioned into building NovaTech. The subsequent iteration of the fraud proved even more destructive before it ultimately unraveled and collapsed in 2023, leaving tens of thousands of global and local investors completely unable to withdraw their funds or access their accounts.
The escalating legal actions are a direct continuation of a sweeping crackdown initiated in June 2024, when Attorney General James formally filed lawsuits against NovaTech, AWS Mining, and a web of associated corporate entities. That initial legal action laid bare the systemic misrepresentations, unlicensed operations, and deceptive marketing tactics that underpinned both schemes for years. As the legal proceedings press forward, questions remain regarding the practical logistics of recovery and asset distribution. Inquiries directed by digital asset publication Cointelegraph to the New York Attorney General’s Office regarding the specific mechanisms for distributing any ultimately recovered funds to victims, as well as the enforcement steps being deployed to secure payment of the multi-billion-dollar judgment, remained unanswered by the time of publication.
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