SEC v. Longfin Corp. and Venkata S. Meenavalli, Longfin et. al (unregistered distributions, 2019)

Judgment entered

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In June 2019 the SEC filed a fraud action against Longfin Corp. and its CEO Venkata Meenavalli and announced proposed settlements with three others in an earlier unregistered-distribution case. By 3 January 2020 the SEC reported that Longfin had a $6.76 million default judgment in the new case and that Meenavalli had agreed to a $400,000 settlement, concluding the SEC's actions against Longfin, its CEO and three others.

The record

What was ordered

Civil penalty

$6.7m

Disgorgement

$24.7m

Prejudgment interest

—

Total relief

$31.4m

Alleged gain

—

A dash means the release did not state a figure we could extract, not that the figure is zero. Penalty and disgorgement are stored separately so aggregates across the library do not double-count the same dollars.

What is alleged to have happened

On June 5, 2019 the SEC announced a new complaint against Longfin Corp. and its CEO Venkata S. Meenavalli, alleging a fraudulent public offering and about $66 million of sham revenue, alongside an earlier case in which a court froze over $27 million of proceeds of unregistered Longfin stock. That earlier case alleged Longfin, Meenavalli, Ayaz Altahawi, Dorababu Penumarthi and Suresh Tammineedi distributed more than $33 million of stock in unregistered transactions. This library tags the matter as unregistered distributions; the tagging is ours, not the regulator's.

Outcome. Three SEC releases show how the two actions ended. The June 2019 release said Altahawi, Penumarthi and Tammineedi had agreed to settlements subject to court approval: Altahawi to return $21 million of gains, pay a $2.9 million penalty and accept a five-year officer-and-director bar, Penumarthi to pay more than $1.7 million and Tammineedi more than $241,000. A September 2019 release says a default judgment on 26 September 2019 ordered Longfin to pay $3,532,235 in disgorgement and interest and a $3,243,613 penalty in the new action, and that the court had ordered over $26 million against the three affiliates in June 2019 and entered default judgments of $284,139 (Longfin) and $28,416 (Meenavalli) in August 2019 in the earlier case. A January 2020 release says Meenavalli agreed to pay $159,000 in disgorgement, $9,000 in interest and a $232,000 penalty, subject to court approval, which the SEC said concluded its actions against Longfin, its CEO and the three others. The record's money fields add up the penalties and the disgorgement figures stated individually ($6,688,168 and $24,691,235, the latter including some interest); they leave out the amounts for Penumarthi and Tammineedi, which the release gives only as 'more than' figures, and the split of the $26 million. Dates for the June and August 2019 judgments and for the court approval of the Meenavalli settlement were not given; the date used is the release date of 3 January 2020. Meenavalli faced a parallel criminal case that was ongoing at that release, with no result in the sources read.

For the regulator's own account of the facts, read the primary documents linked above.

What technique is this, and how does it work?

This action is tagged with one technique in our taxonomy. The tagging is ours: regulators charge statutory provisions, not technique names, so the mapping is an editorial judgement described in our editorial policy.

• Unregistered distributions — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.

Timeline

1. 2019-06-05 Litigation release published
2. 2019-09-26 Default judgment entered against Longfin in the new fraud action: $6,755,848 in disgorgement, interest and penalty
3. 2020-01-03 SEC announces Meenavalli settlement ($400,000), concluding its actions against Longfin, its CEO and three others

Primary documents

Everything on this page derives from the documents below. Where our summary and the primary document disagree, the primary document is right.

• SEC litigation release
• SEC litigation release 24625 (Longfin default judgment)
• SEC litigation release 24706 (Meenavalli settlement)

The linked release is a work of the United States government and is not subject to copyright. Our summary and narrative above are our own writing.

Related actions

Other actions in the library sharing at least one technique tag with this one.

Record added September 10, 2026. submit a correction.