PODGORICA -- A court in Montenegro's capital, Podgorica, has approved the extradition of Do Kwon, a South Korean entrepreneur known as the "Cryptocurrency King" who is wanted in both the United States and South Korea for his alleged role in the loss of investments worth more than $40 billion.
Kwon and his business partner Hon Chang-joon, who have been in custody in Montenegro for the past eight months, were sentenced by a court in June to four months in prison for traveling with forged passports.
They were arrested on March 23 as they were trying to board a plane to Dubai.
Kwon said in his defense at the time that he did not know the document he was using to travel -- a Costa Rican passport he applied for while in Singapore -- was forged.
In May, a Montenegrin judge canceled an 800,000-euro ($872,000) bail for the two, ruling that they presented a flight risk once released.
The court on November 24 said Kwon had agreed to be extradited to South Korea but that the final decision as to which country he will be extradited rests with Montenegrin Justice Minister Andrej Milovic.
TerraformLabs, a company founded and headed by Kwon, was behind the stablecoin TerraUSD that collapsed in May 2022, shaking the cryptocurrency market.
Kwon was subsequently charged in the United States for what the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) called "orchestrating a multibillion-dollar crypto-asset securities fraud."
The U.S. District Court in Manhattan has issued an eight-count indictment against Kwon for securities fraud, wire fraud, commodities fraud, and conspiracy.
In his native south Korea, Kwon is wanted for fraudulent unfair trading and fraud.
TerraformLabs co-founder Daniel Shin was indicted in South Korea in April for violations of capital-markets law.