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CoinMetrics Data: The True Extent of PlusToken BTC Dumping on Huobi

Anatol Antonovici | Dec 11, 2019 | 09:39

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In the last few months, media reported on several occasions that Singapore-based crypto exchange, Huobi, had processed a huge amount of PlusToken withdrawals. Crypto market data firm, Coin Metrics, has recently presented some on-chain data to back those findings.

Data Confirms Huobi Has Been Used by PlusToken Scammers

PlusToken was one of the greatest ponzi schemes in the 10+ years history of the crypto market. The scheme operated mostly in South Korea and China. It acted as a digital wallet and crypto investment opportunity that offered high yield monthly returns in exchange for deposits in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. In the end, scammers got away with about $3 billion worth of crypto funds.

At the end of August, blockchain analytics firm Elementus said that Huobi had processed almost half of all PlusToken withdrawals. Other exchanges receiving large capital outflow from PlusToken-related addresses were Upbit, ZB.com, OKE, and Gate.io.

Yesterday, Coin Metrics presented an estimate of Huobi’s BTC supply over the past year. The dynamic coincides with the PlusToken sell-off. Specifically, Huobi’s Bitcoin supply started to go up in mid-2019 and surged towards the end of the year.

Reports going back to August claim that Huobi has processed a large amount of PlusToken withdrawals, and on-chain data appears to back that up.

Read more in this week's issue of SOTN:https://t.co/8Th5Yoangk pic.twitter.com/Wh8YzHDF6d

— CoinMetrics.io (@coinmetrics) December 10, 2019

The finding was presented as part of Coin Metrics’ research post titled “State of the Network: Issue 29,” which discusses on-chain governance.

The Scam Didn’t Affect Bitcoiners Only

While the Coin Metrics data touches upon Bitcoin to make the link between Huobi and PlusToken, the scam affected investors who held altcoins as well, including Ethereum, EOS, and XRP.

In fact, Elementus estimated that the ponzi scheme managed to defraud about 800,000 Ethereum holders, most of whom were Asians, of 10 million ETH. This is an incredible amount, with 10 million ETH accounting for about 10% of the entire Ethereum supply. This makes the PlusToken scam probably the greatest crypto con in history.

Huobi was used for ETH withdrawals as well. Elementus said that most of the ETH payouts moved to crypto exchanges, with half of them going to Huobi.

Do you think that PlusToken has influenced the Bitcoin price? Share your thoughts in the comments section!

Images via Shutterstock, Twitter @coinmetrics