In a scathing rebuke of federal overreach, a New Jersey judge on Friday ordered the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to pay more than $3.1 million in legal fees to a foreign exchange trading firm and its owner, citing the regulator’s “bad-faith, sanctionable conduct” in a now-dismissed fraud case.
The ruling stems from a 2023 lawsuit the CFTC filed against Traders Global Group Inc. and its owner Murtuza Kazmi, accusing them of wrongfully collecting $300 million in customer fees through fraudulent promises of forex market access. But U.S. District Judge Edward Kiel didn’t just throw the case out — he slammed the agency with a multimillion-dollar fee order after finding its prosecution riddled with intentional misstatements and strategic abuse.
High-Powered Defense, High-Stakes Outcome
The court awarded:
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$2.5 million to Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP
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$500,000 to King & Spalding LLP
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$175,000 to McCarter & English LLP
The firms represented Kazmi and Traders Global in what Judge Kiel called a “complex” and “high-liability” federal enforcement action, noting the defense team’s size and experience were warranted under the legal siege mounted by a government agency.
“This wasn’t just any lawsuit — it was a $300 million takedown attempt by a powerful federal agency,” the judge said in his order. “The defense’s investment in top-tier representation was both reasonable and necessary.”
