Cere Network is facing renewed legal trouble after its co-founder and board were named in a $100 million lawsuit alleging fraud and insider misconduct tied to the project’s 2021 public token launch.
The complaint, filed Tuesday in a San Francisco federal court, was brought by Vivian Liu, a former employee and investor in the crypto infrastructure platform. Liu alleges that Cere co-founder Fred Jin, along with his brother, wife, and members of the company’s board, orchestrated a pump-and-dump scheme that resulted in more than $41 million in losses for investors.
According to the lawsuit, Jin assured investors ahead of Cere’s November 2021 token launch that his own holdings and those of early backers were subject to a lockup period and could not be sold until months after the token went live.
However, Liu claims that while employees and investors were bound by vesting restrictions, Jin and his alleged accomplices secretly sold more than $41 million worth of CERE tokens on multiple crypto exchanges immediately following the public launch, funneling the proceeds into personal wallets.
The filing marks the second lawsuit against Cere Network this month, following a separate legal action initiated on Jan. 13 by Cere co-founder Kenzi Wang, who sued Jin and the board in Delaware on behalf of the company, also alleging fraud and asset misappropriation.
In her complaint, Liu further alleged that investor funds earmarked for Cere Network’s operations were instead routed through shell companies and accounts controlled by Jin and his associates, with millions allegedly lost in high-risk crypto trading.
The lawsuit also claims Jin worked with Gotbit, a market maker convicted of fraud and market manipulation in June, to deploy automated trading bots designed to artificially inflate CERE’s trading volume and obscure the alleged misconduct.
Liu is seeking $100 million in damages, arguing the amount reflects the scope and severity of the alleged fraud.
In the earlier Delaware lawsuit, co-founder Kenzi Wang accused Jin of systematically misappropriating more than $58 million in corporate assets. Wang alleged that the scheme was concealed through falsified accounting records, sham entities, and cryptocurrency wash trading.
He further claimed that approximately $41.78 million worth of CERE tokens were transferred from the company’s treasury to Jin’s personal accounts on crypto exchanges including HTX and KuCoin, and that shareholders were provided with grossly inaccurate financial statements that understated fundraising totals by more than $21 million.
As the legal battles intensify, the CERE token continues to trade near all-time lows, down roughly 99.9% from its peak of $0.47 in November 2021, according to CoinGecko.
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