The eXch crypto exchange has announced that it will cease operations on May 1 following allegations that it helped money laundering hackers who stole from Bybit $1.5 billion. The majority of the management team voted for this decision. The hack of Bybit was the largest in the history of the crypto industry, and the North Korean Lazarus Group is behind the attack THORchain earned $5.5 million on money laundering and eXch — $35 million. An engineer from Nine Realms under the nickname Pluto (9R), who is behind the development of THORChain, initially defended his project, but then quit.
The eXch exchange announced that it was the subject of an «active transatlantic operation» aimed at shutting it down and potentially bringing charges.
Interestingly, eXch’s management initially denied crypto detectives’ reports that it was laundering digital assets for the Lazarus Group, but later admitted to processing «a small portion of the funds».
Meanwhile, Bybit is operating, as the exchange reported that it has enough resources to cover the losses. Later, the crypto exchange announced that it would close its Web3 service and NFT marketplace. As of April 10, Bybit has regained about 7% of its market share. This was the level it had before the hack.
Source: eXch