Hong Kong police reportedly took actions in the case related to crypto exchange Atom Asset Exchange (AAX). Two executives of the exchange were arrested under the allegations of fraud and misleading. In addition the bank account related to the exchange was also shut down.
Police arrested CEO of Weigao Capital, Liang Haoming and founder and former chief executive officer of AAX, Thor Chan. Both the executives were accused by the local authorities that the said citing ‘system maintenance’ for delaying the customer assets withdrawal at the time of liquidity issue was an excuse from the company.
The crypto exchange platform said to halt its withdrawal operations in November and called “system maintenance” as the reason behind the halt that continues till date. Suspension of operations made about 2 million users of the platform unable to access funds. The police received more than 330 reports from victims across different countries including China, Taiwan, Italy and several others.
When the exchange put a halt on its operations, it said to the community that the move came in the wake of a glitch in the system upgrade and not because of FTX crypto exchanges’ untimed collapse.
AAX vice president for global marketing and communications Ben Caselin announced resignation from the company. While leaving the exchange he cited his disagreement with the management over carrying out the contemporary issues.
Caselin noted on Twitter about his leaving the company despite the efforts that he put in while fighting for the community. His proposals were not accepted and he even said his role in the company was hollow.
Users in Nigeria started assaulting former staff members of the cryptocurrency exchange’s Lagos branch after AAX’s operations were shut down.
Additionally, one of the executives is accused of intentionally misleading law authorities by lying to them about the timeline of his activities while working for the company.
The executive’s residences and two of AAX’s bank accounts have all been blocked. Police estimate that a third executive traveled abroad with an AAX wallet and private keys that contained about $30 million in digital assets. The police took his properties in Hong Kong. Hong Kong authorities are actively collaborating with international investigators to trace the funds as part of the inquiry.
Source: https://www.thecoinrepublic.com/2022/12/24/hong-kong-based-crypto-exchange-executives-got-arrested-report/