$168 Million Transfer from PlusToken Sparks Investor Fears

The PlusToken scam continues its cash transfers, with network observers and crypto insiders all but defenseless in the wake of the asset movements. However, the scam is now having Ether investors scared, as many believe a possible sell-off could be on the horizon.

Massive Transfer Has Investors on Edge

Last week, the scam’s operators continued making asset movements by attempting to move 789,500 Ether. According to data from popular crypto tracking platform Whale Alert, the cash, worth about $186 million, was on the move on Wednesday.

The transfer came from a known Ether wallet address, although it was eventually split into 50 separate transactions – most likely in a bid from the PlusToken operators to hide their activities.

Considering PlusToken’s reputation for conducting asset transfers and causing the assets themselves to lose value, many are now speculating that Ether could be in for a dip. PlusToken was one of the most extensive scam operations in the history of the crypto industry. The company launched in China back in 2018, pretending to be a wallet and investment platform. It offered attractive monthly returns, and was soon able to achieve $3 billion in assets under management. 

Soon enough, however, the company’s fraudulent nature came to light, and the jig was up. Last July, law enforcement authorities arrested six Chinese citizens in Vanuatu, a country in the Pacific Islands. Per accounts, the men were suspected of having had affiliations with the company. However, PlusToken denied connections with them.

When the fallout settled, estimated showed that PlusToken stole 180,000 BTC, 6.4 million ETH, 53 OMG, and 110,000 USDT tokens from its investors. At the time, the value of the company’s loot totaled about $2.9 billion.

Market-Crushing Transactions

When the company shut down, its operators began to move cash around aggressively. They made big-money transactions in seconds, causing panic amongst investors.

Last year, market research firm Chainalysis reported that it had tracked about 45,000 BTC (worth about $302 million at the time) and 80,000 ETH (another $102 million) that the company had sent to several individual addresses. The research firm also spoke on the possibility of these transfers causing downward shifts in asset prices.

“Given this analysis and the effects we’ve observed so far, liquidations of large amounts of illicitly obtained funds are likely to drive down the price of cryptocurrencies,” it said.

Many also believe that the March 12 Bitcoin crash – which saw the top cryptocurrency plunge to a value of $3,800 – was a result of a PlusToken Bitcoin dump on spot markets. However, Chainalysis debunked the rumors.

In a research paper, the analysis firm explained that Bitcoin transfers from PlusToken slowed down before the day. So, the chances of the scam causing the March 12 price glut were very slim.

Still, a lot of industry insiders have been fearful of a possible PlusToken-inspired dump. Last Monday, Whale Alert spotted a transfer of 26,316,339 EOS tokens, all worth about $67 million, from a wallet 26,316,339 EOS tokens, all worth about $67 million, from a wallet that believed to have been associated with the scam operation.  The EOS price hasn’t taken too much of a hit since the transfer. So, there’s a hope that the Ether transfer won’t affect the asset’s price also.