Yuki Takenaka, the 31-year-old founder and head of a company operating the Ripple cryptocurrency exchange, was arrested Wednesday for alleged swindling, Japan Times reports.
The Japanese manager is suspected of defrauding a male depositor in Miyagi Prefecture of the 1.4 million yen ($12,470) in March 2015.
He allegedly collected the money even though his firm was in a state of collapse and unable to make refunds at that time.
He is also suspected of issuing fictitious IOUs worth around 120 million yen and making profits. Takenakahas admitted to most of the charges.
The currency exchange was set up by Takenaka in Hamamatsu, Shizuoka Prefecture, in May 2014, but users were unable to withdraw cash or contact him around March the following year.
As of Monday, Ripple’s market capitalization stood at more than 1 trillion yen following bitcoin at over 10 trillion yen and Ethereum (ETH/USD) at over 3 trillion yen.