OKEx customers still cannot take out their funds after the cryptocurrency exchange suspended indefinitely its users’ ability to withdraw last Friday after a police investigation in China. The markets reacted to this news with a slight drop in Bitcoin and a massive drop in the price of OKB, the exchange’s native token. While the leading cryptocurrency Bitcoin recovered, OKB’s price plunged and is still down 22% prior to its value before the news broke out.
OKEx founder Star Xu is reportedly dealing with police in China.
As reported earlier, OKEx suddenly suspended withdrawals, citing that the exchange could not contact one of the holders of the keys needed to sign and authorize withdrawal transactions. OKEx CEO Jay Hao assured customers this particular key holder needed to cooperate with the police due to personal issues. It was later revealed that this person was Star Xu, the founder of OKEx. Earlier reports, citing Chinese news site Caixin, said he was arrested. However, it was later clarified that Caixin’s news actually said Xu was “taken away” by the police.
Proud to be an ex-Caixin writer but the original tweet got something wrong: he was not ARRESTED. He was "taken away" https://t.co/yQoYY13XGe
— Shuyao (@SK_black_dot) October 16, 2020
OKEx assured its customers that their funds are safe with the exchange.
For the crypto exchange to authorize withdrawals, it would need Star Xu and other private key holders’ cryptographic signatures. Without Xu, who holds one of the private keys, the withdrawals could not be facilitated. The crypto exchange assured its customers that the funds were safe, and the exchange was not hacked. “We will resume digital assets/cryptocurrencies withdrawals immediately once the concerned private key holder is able to authorize the transaction,” OKEx said in a statement. After the OKEx news, Bitcoin fell from $11,501 to as low as $11,200 on Friday before closing at $11,330. The crypto community showed frustration over the OKEx decision to suspend withdrawals.
