WazirX Financial News

Cryptocurrency exchange WazirX on Friday said it has frozen the first tranche of assets which were stolen during last year's cyberattack worth USD 3 million. In a statement announcing the freezing of about USD 3 million in stolen assets (USDT), Founder Nischal Shetty said WazirX is fully committed to recovering the stolen funds «leaving no stone unturned to maximise recoveries under a scheme». «As part of the ongoing recovery efforts following last year's cyberattack, WazirX has been successful in freezing the first tranche of assets that were stolen during the cyberattack worth USD 3 million USDT,» according to WazirX statement.

Singapore court has granted cryptocurrency exchange WazirX a four-month conditional moratorium. This ruling provides the embattled exchange with temporary relief, allowing it to focus on resolving the aftermath of a major hack that led to the loss of over $230 million, about 45% of customers' funds. The court's decision followed WazirX’s request for a six-month moratorium under Section 64 of the Insolvency, Restructuring, and Dissolution Act (IRDA). However, the court granted a shorter, four-month period.

Liminal Custody stated on Monday, September 9, that an independent audit conducted by Grant Thornton has cleared them of any involvement in the $230 million cyberattack that occurred on July 18, 2024. According to Liminal Custody, the breach of the multi-signature (multi-sig) wallet was most likely due to vulnerabilities at WazirX’s end, not their own. Grant Thornton’s audit clears Liminal Custody

Cryptocurrency exchange WazirX said on August 19 that its laptops were not compromised in the recent cyberattack, which resulted in the theft of digital assets exceeding $230 million (Rs 2,000 crores) from one of their Multisig wallets. To investigate the breach, WazirX engaged Mandiant Solutions, a Google subsidiary, to conduct a forensic analysis. Mandiant's report, submitted on August 14, stated, “We did not identify evidence of compromise on the three laptops that were used for signing transactions.” The detailed report is still pending, and WazirX has indicated that the preliminary findings suggest the issue may have originated from Liminal.

The $230 million hack on Indian crypto exchange WazirX last month, has alerted CoinDCX to plan ahead in case of such security breach. CoinDCX, India’s leading crypto exchange, has established a $5.9 million fund for customer protection to compensate users during such events.

WazirX’s recent security breach, which saw the theft of approximately $230 million, the exchange’s decision to distribute the loss among all users has sparked intense criticism. Sumit Gupta, Co-Founder of CoinDCX, has condemned the move, labeling it as “utter nonsense.” Sumit Gupta voiced his criticism on X (formerly known as Twitter), stating, «The first contribution to losses should ALWAYS come from the Company (i.e. WazirX in this case) and the treasury and assets the company holds. I have not seen any such commitment around this from the company side, instead making customers directly absorb the 45% losses is utter nonsense. The poll options are also framed in a manner to protect the business first and not the customers.»

In response to the recent $230 million security breach on WazirX, the Bharat Web3 Association (BWA) is ramping up efforts to strengthen cybersecurity and enhance consumer protection within India’s crypto industry.

cryptocurrency exchanges, recently faced a significant security breach, resulting in a loss of over $230 million. In response, WazirX announced on Saturday a controversial solution: distributing the loss among all customers. Following the cyberattack, which resulted in the theft of approximately $230 million, equivalent to 45% of user funds, WazirX is implementing a «socialized loss» strategy.

Indian crypto exchange WazirX which lost over $230 million of users’ funds in a massive hack has proposed a controversial recovery plan that involves distributing the loss to all WazirX users.

cyber villain invades to cripple a system, it is a calamity as unstoppable as an earthquake or pandemic. Traders whose coins and funds are frozen at WazirX — the Indian crypto exchange that was recently hit by a massive cyber heist — are now discovering this from the fine print of the terms and conditions they had hitherto ignored. What is coming to the fore in the wake of the WazirX fiasco is that unlike banks or stock exchanges most local crypto platforms categorise ‘cyber breach’ as a ‘force majeure’ event (or, an ‘Act of God’) in their ‘terms of use’ that investors signing in to open accounts rarely read. But for traders a ‘force majeure’ clause may legally shut the doors for claiming lost assets after such a disaster.

A preliminary investigation into the July 18 hack of the $235 million WazirX cryptocurrency exchange found no evidence of compromise within its infrastructure.

One of India’s largest crypto exchanges WazirX suffered a security breach that drained $234 million of users funds yesterday. The incident, which targeted the exchange’s multisig wallet on the Ethereum network, saw the theft of over 200 different crypto assets, including Shiba Inu, Ethereum, Polygon, and PEPE memecoin.

Earlier today, WazirX, a prominent Indian cryptocurrency exchange, suffered a severe security breach resulting in the loss of approximately $235 million in crypto assets, with suspicions pointing towards North Korean hackers.

crypto industry veterans, Nischal Shetty (founder of WazirX) and Avinash Shekhar (ex-CEO Zebpay) have launched their new venture, Pi42, the country's first Crypto-INR perpetual futures exchange, which aims to grow as the largest compliant crypto futures platform in the world. The exchange makes its debut in India, on Wednesday and aims to expand its reach across the key global markets by targeting the existing 30+ million Indian crypto investors over the next 2-3 years.

Mudrex, a Y-Combinator-backed crypto platform, has recently announced its registration as a recognized entity with the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU). Since the announcement of FIU registration, Mudrex has recorded a twofold increase in user growth on its platform. «Mudrex's platform has experienced a surge in user adoption, attributed to the FIU registration coinciding with a bullish market. Since the announcement of FIU registration in September, we have observed a twofold increase in user growth on our platform», said Edul Patel, CEO & Co-founder of Mudrex. In a notable development for the Indian crypto space, Mudrex became the third platform to secure FIU registration, following WazirX and CoinDCX. This move aligns with the regulatory changes implemented by the Indian government on March 7, 2023, which brought crypto service providers under the ambit of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002. Compliance with the FIU is now a requirement for all crypto service providers, including exchanges, custodians, and wallet providers, necessitating adherence to various regulatory norms such as KYC procedures, record-keeping, reporting of suspicious transactions, appointment of a compliance officer, and engagement with regulatory authorities for guidance on compliance matters.

In the rapidly evolving landscape of cryptocurrencies, India has emerged as a pivotal player, commanding global attention as the current G20 president. Rajagopal Menon, Vice President of WazirX, shares insights on India's leadership in shaping the regulatory discourse around cryptocurrencies and the evolving dynamics of the crypto market. «With its presidency of the G20, India’s voice for global crypto rules for crypto is being taken seriously. Detailed Crypto regulations are inevitable. It is a question of “when” and not “if”,» Rajagopal said. In this exclusive interview with ETMarkets, he delves into the potential impact of rate hikes, crude oil prices, and the strengthening dollar on the crypto market's near-term performance. Additionally, Menon addresses the volatility within the crypto space and discusses the significance of India's journey towards crypto regulation, shedding light on WazirX's growth and strategic priorities for the future.With rate hike concerns and firming crude oil prices and the dollar, how do you see the crypto market performing in the near term?As with any market, many variables come into play when it comes to cryptos. Like an accomplished juggler, one is expected to keep an eye on multiple balls, from central banks' rate hike concerns to firming crude oil prices and a robust dollar.

The last 24-48 hours were yet another shocker for the crypto industry with the stock crash of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB). Though not a direct impact on Indian exchanges’ business, but popular crypto tokens trading on these platforms including Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP, Binance Coin, Doge Coin, Shiba Inu among others crashed between 5-9 percent on March 10.

Zanmai Labs owned-WazirX on February 8 issued a statement disputing Binance’s claims of the crypto exchange driving a false narrative based on its use of the latter’s wallet services. This comes days after Binance said that it is stopping its wallet services to WazirX following a long-standing legal battle.

Binance has stopped providing wallet services to WazirX, asking the Indian crypto exchange to withdraw any remaining assets held in Binance wallets. 

Indian crypto exchange WazirX has released its Proof of Reserves (PoR), sharing wallet addresses and digital asset holdings. Notably, Shiba Inu accounts for the largest proportion of assets on the exchange as over 19% of its holdings are in the form of the meme coin.

WazirX has finally come up with its official clarification on the issue, blaming global economic slowdown for its dire decision. In June, however, while clarifying to ETMarkets.com that it did not intend to squeeze the team size, WazirX, on the contrary, had bragged about expanding the team six times in half-a-year. According to media reports, the company has asked 50 to 70 employees of its 150 staff strength to leave the company as they are not needed anymore, but they will be paid for 45 days. The crypto market has been in the bear grip because of the current global economic slowdown, the exchange said in its clarification. «We have had to reduce our staff to weather the crypto winter.»