Thodex was left unable to access its digital assets by hundreds of thousands of Turkish exchangers after Wednesday’s trade platform shut down abruptly and spurred up fraud and thousands of criminal charges.
Thedox on Thursday announced it would be closed 4 to 5 days due to the sale process on its website.
“When the share transfer is completed, Services will continue to be closed for five working days, but users do not need to worry about their investments.”
The trade was the first stop for “six hours planned maintenance work” before the so-called explanation.
However, users who were unable to withdraw their money or access their accounts were told on Twitter that they were scammed.
Thodex said “negative” press reports on the company had been in operation since 2017. “We wish to invest in our company and for a long time to offer a partnership to renowned banks and fund whose names we will announce when the agreement process is over.”
“To complete this process it is necessary to stop the transactions and complete the sales process.”
However, Thodex CEO Faruk Fatih Özer flew from Istanbul Airport on Tuesday afternoon during a preliminary police review. He has reportedly fled to Thailand with digital assets worth $2 billion. He also sparked speculation about allegations of fraud when he shut down all his social media accounts.
Ozer broke his silence later on Thursday, and issued a new statement on the Twitter Thodex account.
Özer, rejecting the accusations, says it has never taken advantage of or will exploit the platform, with some 700,000 users conducting cryptotrading.
In 2018, when the company underwent a cyber attack, he said that it tolerated a total loss of 25 million TLs without reflecting this loss on any one of its users. But he continued that “ungusual fluctuations” have recently occurred in company accounts during the nearly three-month long partnership negotiations.
This has demonstrated that the cyber attacks have continued and that only 30,000 of the 700,000 accounts of users were exposed to this according to their preliminary determination.
He added, that it is true that he left the country on 19 April, but it has been for a meeting abroad and that he will soon be returning to Turkey in the coming days.
However, on the same day, the Turkish Financial Crimes Investigation Board suspended all Thodex accounts.
Turkish security and persecutors previously investigated the case, leaving at least 390,000 users without access to transactions or withdrawal of money. A search of the Physical Office in Kadıköy district on Anatolian side of town has been carried out by the Istanbul Security General Directorate anti-cybercrimes unit.
The Chief Public Prosecution Office of Anatolia in Istanbul announced Thodex’s initiation of an investigation on Tuesday.
The Chief Procurator’s Declaration states that the Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office has “inaugurated an investigation into the crypto-money exchange called Thodex and the alleged victimization of many citizens in the field of crime and the legal intervention of criminals” and has ensured that the investigations are continued.
A separate criminal complaint was brought against Özer by Abdullah Üsame Ceran, a lawyer, who allegedly “aggravated fraud.”
Ceran stressed that there are 400 thousand members of the platform, 390 thousand of which are active in trade, and noted that the platform is currently close to withdrawales.
He said there are certain allegations that Özer left Turkey by Istanbul Airport on the social media platforms on April 20.
The complaint demanded the confiscation of the assets of the platform, including vehicles, bank accounts, holdings and shares.
2 million Dogecoin
After it recently announced that it will distribute 2 million investors, it grew rapidly. Dogecoin, a digital asset initially placed on the market as a joke, but later its value was enhanced by declarations made by leading names like Elon Musk of Tesla’s boss. It is known that “such campaigns” have previously been launched, including the distribution of luxury vehicles with names.
Suspension on the website led to a direct outcry by exchange users, who reported on data published on coingecko.com that they track prices, volumes and capitalization on crypto markets, tripling daily volumes up over $1.2 billion (TL 9.92 billion).
Lawyer Oğuz Evren Kılıç told users on Wednesday that they had lodged a criminal complaint in Ankara for several people. He said that there were thousands more in the country who filed complaints. “Where this is going is not clear. In many places around Turkey there have been thousands of criminal complaints, “He told Reuters that there were 400,000 users on the platform, of whom 391,000 were active.
Kılıç added that the Thodex CEO was leaving the country from Istanbul Airport on Tuesday afternoon following a preliminary police assessment.
“We will immediately file a case with the consumer court. Both processes – criminal and the case – will take place at the same time, “Saying Kılıç.
When Özer left the country, users claimed that they could have taken up their money to trad on the platform with him.
According to Coinmarketcap, the 24-hour volume of Thodex trading was $538 million on its last trade day.
In addition to thousands of people in the Twitter exchange, a popular consumer complaints forum (sikayetvar.com) has received dozens of other complaints.
Many have written that their investments are “stuck,” when they say they would just close their accounts or withdraw their assets.
The already increasing boom in the crypto market in Turkey has continued to gain momentum over the recent period as investors participated in the global Bitcoin rally, hopping for both Bitcoin gains and inflation protection, which in March stood at above 16 percent.
Earlier this month, the Central Bank of Republic of Turkey (CBRT) said that from April 30 cryptocurrencies and crypoassets were banned from paying for goods and services, citing the “irrevocable” damage and significant transaction risks associated with the level of anonymity behind digital toks.
Cryptocurrencies and other digital equipment based on distributed ledger technology could not be used as a means of payment either directly or indirectly.
The move also prohibits firms handling payments and electronic funds from processing cryptocurrency platform transactions.
