The Celestial (CELT) coin was the subject of “malicious market manipulation,” as stated by cryptocurrency exchange OKX, which reported seizing $2,014,381 worth of Tether (USDT) from five trading accounts.
According to the Seychelles-based crypto trading platform, Celestial developers announced the creation of a new blockchain game on February 26. Soon later, according to the company, the Celestial creators allegedly started an unauthorized social media marketing effort for the new game using OKX’s branding.
The advertising activities caused the CELT token’s value to nearly double in only two days before dropping more than 50% in the last 24 hours to $0.001928 at the time of publication.
In response to complaints from customers about insider trading, OKX clarified that in September 2021, the exchange’s subsidiary OKX Ventures invested $100,000 in the Celestial GameFi project.
The exchange said that the CELT tokens it received were paid into OKX Ventures’ accounts “without any transactions,” and it claimed that its inquiry had turned up “no evidence” that any staff of the cryptocurrency trading firm had engaged in insider trading.
“Everyone is welcome to monitor and provide evidence,” OKX affirmed. “If any OKX internal staff is involved in this incident, once verified, it will be dealt with seriously.”
OKX to Give Over USDT to Affected Users
The exchange subsequently froze 714,381 USDT from five accounts suspected of market manipulation, claiming Celestial would refund 1.3 million USDT associated with such actions that had previously left the platform.
Furthermore, a total of 3,014,381 USDT will be airdropped to users who suffered losses as a result of this event from the aforementioned two parts of the funds. Those who purchased Celestial (CELT) tokens between February 25 and February 28 at midnight (Hong Kong time) and suffered losses are the precise targets for the airdrop.
“Due to the complexity of the airdrop calculation rules and the time required for statistics, the specific airdrop rules will be released within 48 hours,” OKX confirmed.
It, however, urged the public to be vigilant, noting that any publicity under the banner of OKX is “false publicity.“
By donating its own funds, the exchange is strengthening its public image following the recent publication of its proof-of-reserves report, which revealed it owned over $8 billion in clean assets. In other words, the OKB token from OKX is not included in the assets.
