New Day, New FUD: Huobi Gets $100M from Justin Sun

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Earlier we wrote that Justin Sun acquired Huobi although he had first denied it.

On Jan 6 blockchain research firm Nansen reported that Huobi saw an increase in withdrawals.

In the past 24 hours, Huobi has seen a significant increase in net outflows

$60.9M* of the $94.2M* net outflow in the past week occurred in the past day alone

*Contains Ethereum, Avalanche, BNB Chain, Fantom, & Polygon flows pic.twitter.com/JV1Tg13QMY
— Nansen 🧭 (@nansen_ai) January 6, 2023

Later that day, on Jan 6^th, an Ethereum wallet connected with Sun withdrew $50 million of USDT and $50 million of USDC from Binance, and subsequently sent the tokens to Huobi.

1/ Justin Sun withdrew $100M in stables from Binance and deposited them into Huobi

50M in USDC and USDT

Might be to help with the increased withdrawals or maintain a level of confidence in the exchange

Source: @nansen_ai pic.twitter.com/PnbJxYJ0M3
— Martin Lee | Nansen 🧭 (@themlpx) January 6, 2023

Justin Sun told Bloomberg that he moved his “personal funds” which “just shows the confidence with Huobi exchange”

This wave of withdrawals could have been a reaction to the Huobi plan to lay off around 20% of staff (i.e. more than 300 people) which was confirmed around the same time as withdrawals increased. Rumours about the exchange’s insolvency and upcoming troubles might also have taken its toll.

Huobi's shadow owner is Justin Sun. Justin Sun is perhaps the most erratic billionaire in crypto. Justin has been sending billions of dollars of stablecoins around the space, including in and out of Binance. Something huge is afoot. Withdraw all coins from unregulated exchanges. https://t.co/zDDaNIqyl7
— Mike Alfred (@mikealfred) January 6, 2023

Another worrisome thing is that the value of the exchange’s native token is successively falling.

Huobi token price chart (falling). Source: CoinMarketCap — Huobi token price chart. Source: CoinMarketCap

At the moment Justin Sun keeps saying that Huobi is safe and sound and recommends to "Ignore FUD and Keep Building”. Well, it sounds all good but Huobi seems to have had troubles for a long time now. Plus it wouldn’t be the first time for Sun to lie about the state of the exchange - he denied his participation in its acquisition, denied layoffs… It’s up to you to decide, but we personally wouldn’t keep our funds there.

Stay safe, stay tuned - we will continue to observe in this turbulent time.