Alexander Vinnik, the imprisoned former operator of the influential bitcoin exchange BTC-e, is set to be released from U.S. custody as part of a prisoner exchange with Russia.

Vinnik, who is 44 years old, will be swapped for American teacher Marc Fogel, who returned to the U.S. last night following a breakthrough negotiation with the Kremlin. The specifics of who was involved in the deal were not immediately evident.

BTC-e was one of the pioneering exchanges that enabled the trading of the world’s leading digital currency, attracting over 1 million users and facilitating transactions exceeding $9 billion between 2011 and 2017.

However, its immense popularity also engendered a criminal underworld reliant on its services for laundering Bitcoin from illicit activities, according to allegations from U.S. prosecutors. Vinnik has been accused of managing BTC-e with the intent of aiding drug dealers, money launderers, and other cybercriminals, which purportedly led to a loss of $121 million.

After his arrest in Greece in 2017, Vinnik was extradited to the U.S., where he pled guilty to conspiracy to commit money laundering in 2024 and faced a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. His legal team has previously sought unsuccessfully to include him in other high-profile U.S.-Russia prisoner exchanges.