Executives sentenced, currency prices were low, Korea's fifth largest cryptocurrency exchange COINNEST ceased operations

The Korean cryptocurrency exchange COINNEST eventually closed down.

On April 16th, COINNEST issued a notice of “official stop service” on the official website. From April 16th, COINNEST will stop the new member registration service, and the transaction and top-up service will also end from the 30th of this month. It is expected that the cryptocurrency and the Korean won's transfer service will be completely terminated by June 30th.

The COINNEST exchange has been providing services since the end of July 2017. According to the transaction amount, COINNEST is the fifth largest cryptocurrency exchange in Korea and ranks among the top 15 in the world. I have successfully attracted the attention of many people because of the initial listing of cryptocurrencies such as Tron, BTG, BCD and Qtum in Korea.

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However, in April last year, COINNEST CEO Jin Yihuan and managers were arrested by the Southern District Prosecutor's Office in Seoul for alleged corruption and fraud. The exchange was in crisis. In October last year, COINNEST was found guilty, which was the first time in the Korean cryptocurrency industry.

At the beginning of last year, Jin Yihuan and others were suspected of falsely recharging the cryptocurrency on the account in the name of the individual. If the customer orders to purchase the cryptocurrency, it will actually cause the actual transaction. It is reported that the cryptocurrency of false transactions in this way is as high as 45 billion won (about 260 million yuan). Jin Yihuan and others were questioned to misappropriate tens of billions of won from customer accounts through the above fraudulent methods and transfer them to their own accounts.

At that time, the Southern District Court of Seoul was sentenced to three years’ imprisonment for a three-year imprisonment and a fine of 4 years’ imprisonment for the suspected use of cryptocurrency as a trading commodity and misappropriation of tens of billions of won’s client’s investment money. 4 billion won (equivalent to about 23 million yuan). Hong Mou, an executive who conspired with crimes, was sentenced to 2 years and 6 months in prison, suspended for three years, and sentenced to a fine of 3 billion won (equivalent to about 17 million yuan). In addition, another company executive, Zhao, who was sued for alleged misappropriation of the company's 60 million won of public funds, was also sentenced to six months in prison and suspended for one year. In addition, Jin Yihuan and Zhao Mou were also sued for arbitrarily accepting hundreds of millions of won worth of cryptocurrencies on the grounds of facilitating the project. A separate trial is currently under way.

Therefore, some people in the industry believe that the “fraudulent storm” of CEOs and executives, coupled with the collapse of cryptocurrency prices, has made the operation of the entire exchange difficult and ultimately has to face bankruptcy.

In the announcement, COINNEST also stated the background of the termination of service and euphemistically stated that from the current situation, relying solely on the concept and enthusiasm of COINNEST, it has been unable to cope with the changes and trends exhibited by the cryptocurrency and blockchain industries.

(Compile / PANews Edith Edit / Tong Original / Blockinpress)

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