By Soma Biswas


The U.S. government has appealed a court ruling approving a Voyager Digital Ltd. restructuring plan that allows Binance's American affiliate to take over thousands of customer accounts.

The U.S. attorney's office for the Southern District of New York sent a notice of appeal on Friday and has yet to file papers spelling out the rationale.

The U.S. government objected to provisions in the plan that it says immunize parties against any government enforcement actions for conduct associated with the Voyager restructuring transaction, Peter Aronoff at the U.S. attorney's office in Manhattan, said in a letter to Judge Michael Wiles of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in New York the day before the judge approved the plan last week.

In the letter, Mr. Aronoff also said that his office has "no current understanding of" Voyager's restructuring plan, but that it is improper to shield an unknown number of parties from legal liability in relation to the transaction.

Judge Wiles approved the deal on Tuesday, saying the provisions shielding Voyager and other parties from legal liability are routine and were included in thousands of bankruptcy plans. The deal would give Voyager customers the option to transfer their crypto accounts to Binance.US.

The plan won Judge Wiles' approval despite opposition from the Securities and Exchange Commission, which revealed during the hearing that its staff has determined that Binance.US is operating an unregistered securities exchange.

Representatives of Voyager didn't respond to a request seeking comment and a spokeswoman for Binance.US had no immediate comment.


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03-10-23 1545ET