Supreme Court to examine jurisdictional question in alleged cryptocurrency fraud case

OTTAWA — The Supreme Court of Canada will look into whether an Ontario court had jurisdiction to impose a statutory freeze on cryptocurrency in an alleged fraud case.

Three Nigerian citizens are accused of defrauding a person in Canada of about $65,000 in bitcoin.

The Ontario attorney general applied for orders to restrain and manage the virtual currency, allegedly held by corporate entities that operate as cryptocurrency exchanges.

Investigators traced the bitcoin to accounts held by one of the corporate entities, Nest Services Ltd., which had a head office in Seychelles.

In December of last year, the Ontario Superior Court said some of the requested restraint and management orders should be granted.

Nest Exchange Ltd. — as Nest Services is now known — as well as Binance Canada Capital Markets inc. and Binance Canada Ltd. then applied for a hearing at the Supreme Court.

The top court, following its usual practice, gave no reasons Thursday for agreeing to hear the matter, and no hearing date has been set.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 1, 2026.

Jim Bronskill, The Canadian Press