An appeals court overturned a Texas federal court decision that allowed the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) to sanction cryptomixer Tornado Cash.

The appeals court ruled that the Treasury Department overstepped its authority when it imposed restrictions on Tornado Cash in August 2022 and accused the cryptomixer of facilitating the laundering of more than $7 billion for North Korean hackers and other criminals. The Court of Appeal ruled in favor of plaintiffs Joseph Van Loon, Tyler Almeida, Alexander Fisher, Preston Van Loon, Kevin Vitale and Nate Welch Welch), who in November 2023 appealed the Texas court’s decision to block the service.

The appeals court ruling stated that OFAC’s authority cannot extend to autonomous and immutable code that is not under anyone else’s control. Immutable smart contracts cannot be property because they do not belong to anyone, the court decided.

The TORN token rate soared by 203% to $23.83. Over the past 24 hours, the trading volume of the token has increased by 3899%, amounting to $5.81 million. The market capitalization of TORN now stands at $125.65 million, which indicates an increased interest of traders in the token.

Tornado Cash developer Alexey Pertsev is still under arrest – he was found guilty of laundering criminal proceeds. During the March trial, Pertsev argued that he could not be held responsible for the actions of those who used the Tornado Cash protocol for illegal purposes. However, the court rejected the argument, saying that if Pertsev and the other creators of Tornado Cash really wanted to prevent criminals from abusing the protocol, they would have taken additional security measures. In May, Pertsev appealed the court’s decision by filing an application with the appeal court.