China-based crypto exchange platform hot bits announced The company’s ongoing investigation required it to freeze its assets and suspend all trading, deposit and withdrawal capabilities until the assets were released.
An August 10th post on the company’s website stated:
“Unfortunately, we would like to inform you that Hotbit will have to suspend trading, deposits, withdrawals, and fundraising functions.
The exchange will ensure that all customer funds are safe and secure and will return to normal operations once the investigation is completed.
Investigation freezes company assets
A management-level employee was involved in the project in 2021 and law enforcement now suspects it is in violation of criminal law, according to the announcement.
HotBit claims that the project violated the company’s internal principles and that the manager’s involvement in the project was unknown to Hotbit. The employee in question left HotBit in April 2021.
Anyway, an investigation started on the alleged project found its way to HotBit due to his relationship with HotBit’s former manager. The announcement clarified that no other of his HotBit employees were involved in the project under investigation. However, they are supporting an ongoing investigation from July 2022. In the process, the company froze some of its assets, preventing the exchange from operating normally.
The HotBit team has confirmed that the assets are safe. The post states:
“Hotbit will resume normal services as soon as the assets are unfrozen. All user assets and data on Hotbit are safe and correct.”
Meanwhile, the exchange said it is working on a compensation plan that users can roll out soon. In addition, all leveraged ETF positions will be forced to liquidate based on the relevant net price at 12:00 UTC on August 10th to prevent losses due to holding positions.
