BKEX, a Former Top 20 Exchange on CMC, Suspected of Running Away

The centralized exchange BKEX, which was previously ranked among the top 20 on CoinMarketCap, is suspected of running away.

On May 29th, BKEX issued an announcement stating that platform users' funds were suspected of involvement in money laundering. Currently, BKEX is cooperating with law enforcement for evidence collection, and the platform will temporarily suspend withdrawals to facilitate the process.

The BKEX team has expressed their commitment to fully cooperate with regulatory investigations, ensuring utmost efforts to safeguard user assets and restore normal exchange operations.

Two months have passed, and the platform still hasn't enabled withdrawals. Currently, users are unable to receive verification codes to log into their accounts. Initially, during the announcement, there were still official personnel in the official group reassuring users, but after a few days, the official customer service disappeared.

BKEX was founded in 2018 and is a

cryptocurrency

exchange that offers services such as spot trading, derivatives, leveraged ETFs, and more. It has attracted over 8 million registered users from over 100 countries. According to TokenInsight, BKEX has a daily trading volume that can reach hundreds of millions of dollars.

It can be observed through web traffic analysis that BKEX had an average monthly website visit of 6 million before encountering issues. The majority of its users are from Asian countries.

In June, blockchain data analytics company Bitrace published an article stating that between May 2022 and May 2023, five major Trc20-USDT fund addresses of BKEX received a total of 4.99 million USDT directly from risky addresses. These funds were indirectly associated with 568 million risky USDT through user addresses. The risky funds primarily originated from online gambling platforms and illicit four-party payment platforms.

According to investigations and information gathered by WikiBit, it has been found that the funds on the BKEX platform involve risks, and BKEX has not taken proactive measures to address the issues. Many employees have already resigned from BKEX, and the exchange is reported to have outstanding unpaid wages for its employees.

There are also user reports on Twitter claiming that the former Business Development Manager of BKEX stated that the exchange is already “dead”.

Finally, WikiBit reminds users to protect your capital and exercise caution when choosing a trading platform. It is recommended to select platforms that rank within the top 10, hold financial licenses, and are subject to legal regulations. Storing tokens in a cold wallet when you are not being actively traded is also advisable to enhance security.