Nvidia has been issued a US$5.5 million fine by the US Securities and Exchange Commission for not disclosing that the growing success of its GPUs was due to cyptomining.

The SEC found that Nvidia was aware that, during FY18, a significant factor in the growing revenue for its gaming chips was actually due to people using them to mine cryptocurrency.

By not disclosing this information, Nvidia “deprived investors of critical information to evaluate the company’s business in a key market”, according to Kristina Littman, chief of the SEC Enforcement Division’s Crypto Assets and Cyber Unit.

“Nvidia’s senior management internally expressed a desire to capture the cryptomining demand, and at the same time shelter its gaming business from cryptominers and protect supply of GPUs for gamers,” the SEC report says.

“While the company could not track when and which specific gaming GPUs were purchased for the purpose of cryptomining, company personnel estimated using various assumptions that the impact of cryptomining was at levels that would indicate cryptomining was a significant factor in the year-over-year growth in gaming revenue during the relevant period.”