OKEx, the cryptocurrency exchange, alongside Bibox has been charged with being involved in wash trading among other cryptocurrency exchanges in the September report by the Blockchain Transparency Institute.
The Blockchain Transparency Institute has whitelisted the three crypto exchanges completely, namely, Kraken, Poloniex, Coinbase, and Upbit. According to the Blockchain Transparency Institute, 2019 has seen a thirty-five (35.7%) percent decrease in wash trading figures among the top crypto trading firms. They boast of their findings being of use in the past and responsible for having many wash trading accounts to be kicked out of business.
Wash trading allegation countered
The research stated that the crypto firms that are knee-deep in wash trading still have a good trade volume without the wash trading transactions taken into account. ‘Other’ shady measures are also being employed that still keep the exchanges’ volumes seventy-five (75%) percent above the original figures and thus having the crypto exchanges enjoy their positions among the top twenty (20) contenders.
The CEO of OKEx, Jay Hao Tweeted shortly after the report was published and countered the allegations slanted against his Firm with facts. Jay Hao stated that OKEx has no room for such shady practices and that the results yielded do vary on the methods employed for calculating trading volumes.
Jay Hao is not wrong in theory and to back it he had even more vague reasons to give as a defensive tact. Hao stated that the traditional market setup isn’t what OKEx has acquired over the years of their hard work, instead, the firm works on a market structure completely different from that of other exchanges.
The allegations of wash trading from @BTI___ is false. At OKEx, we do not tolerate any wash trading activities.
— Jay Hao (@JayHao8) 23 September 2019
The head of OKEx Hon Kong too took it to twitter and defended the crypto exchanges reputation by stating that the BTI’s methods should have been stated to avoid any kind of confusion. He was adamant to back up Jay Hao’s sentiment over the matter by saying that the same ruler can’t be used to measure everything.
The methodology used is highly questionable, as there are no details as to how they came to these figures. Block Transparency Institute doesn’t seem very transparent on their website.
— Andy Cheung (OKEx) (@AndyC0125) 23 September 2019
