OKEx, a popular cryptocurrency exchange based on Malta, is seeing a massive number of Bitcoin outflow since it resumed full crypto assets withdrawal on Thursday. Mason Jang, the COO at CryptoQuant, shared on Twitter that some of the cryptocurrencies were moved to Binance mostly and other exchanges, while some took direct custody of them via hardware wallets.
The increased outflow of Bitcoin from the exchange somewhat shows the users haven’t gotten over the sudden suspension of withdrawal, which locked them out of their cryptos for about five weeks.
OKEx Halted Crypto Withdrawals for Five Weeks
Precisely on October 16, the cryptocurrency exchange suddenly informed users that withdrawals would be temporarily halted, as one of their private key holders was out of reach. The absent staff happened to be the founder, Star Xu, who was reportedly cooperating with the Chinese authorities in an investigation. However, OKEx has resumed the withdrawal services on Thursday, as the founder was later released by the police.
Things looked somewhat awkward when the services were resumed. About 2,822 BTC flowed out of the exchange in block number 658,728 just a few hours after the resumption. This accounted for the largest single-block outflow last seen in May 2019. In total, about 24,631 BTC was transferred from the exchange on Thursday alone, accounting for the highest outflow record on OKEx not seen for the past eight months.
Outflows vs. Inflows
According to Glassnode, an on-chain crypto analytics platform, OKEx recorded a total of 29,300 BTC outflow in combination with today’s Bitcoin moves. Within the same period, however, about 21,600 BTC was deposited on the exchange, which reduced the Bitcoin balance to approximately 212k BTC. It remains unknown if the whole development with OKEx relates to the declining price of the cryptocurrency. At the time of writing, Bitcoin was trading at US$16,737 on Coinmarketcap.