Bitcoin qualifies as money, a US judge ruled on Monday, in a decision linked to a criminal case over hacking attacks ag-ainst JPMorgan Chase & Co and other firms.

US district judge Alison Nathan in Man-hattan rejected a bid by Anthony Murgio to dismiss two charges related to his alleged operation of Coin.mx, which prosecutors have called an unlicensed bitcoin exchange.

The judge, like her colleague Jed Rakoff in an 2014 case, said the e-currency met that definition. “Bitcoins are funds within the plain meaning of that term,” she wrote.