Following unauthorised transactions potentially worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, the new CEO of the troubled cryptocurrency platform FTX said on Saturday that the company was making “every effort to secure all assets.”
A statement made by CEO John Ray that was shared on Twitter by FTX’s general counsel, Ryne Miller, said, “Unauthorized access to certain assets has occurred.”
Ray added that FTX US and FTX.com “continue to make every effort to secure all assets, wherever located.”
The amount of fraudulent transactions has not been specified by FTX officials, however, according to AFP quoting a study by cryptocurrency analysis company Elliptic “$477 million is suspected to have been stolen.”
As per a tweet by the company’s general counsel, Ryne Miller, the exchange was hastening the move of putting all digital assets into cold storage “to mitigate damage upon observing unauthorized transactions.”
Sam Bankman-Fried, 30, the platform’s chief executive, who was once seen as a star in the wild cryptocurrency world, also tendered his resignation. The founder of the exchange allegedly transferred $10 billion in customer assets from FTX to his trading firm Alameda Research in secret, according to a Reuters report citing unnamed sources.
Only 24 hours after declaring bankruptcy, more than “$663 million in various tokens” had been removed from FTX’s wallets, according to Elliptic, with the remainder “believed to have been moved into secure storage by FTX themselves.”
The announcement comes a day after FTX declared bankruptcy, part of a spectacular collapse that has shaken the still-young industry, sending rival cryptocurrencies into freefall and attracting regulatory investigation.
