The aftermath of the January 26 hack[1] of more than $500 mln worth of NEM[2] from Japanese [3]crypto exchange Coincheck[4] has led to a regulatory re-examination of Japan’s crypto industry[5], so far culminating in the $33.5 mln sale[6] of the hacked exchange to Japanese financial services provider Monex Group.
Japan had been one of the leading countries in crypto adoption when it legalized Bitcoin as a payment method[7] a year ago. The move was made in part to prevent another hacking incident such as that of the now defunct Japanese crypto exchange Mt. Gox[8] — arguably the most infamous, and previously the largest hack in crypto history, when around $473 mln in Bitcoin was stolen from investors in 2014.
However, this January’s Coincheck hack, which came four years after the almost-equally large Mt. Gox hack[9], prompted Japan’s Financial Services Agency (FSA) to inspect[10] and issue business improvement notices[11] to eight of Japan’s crypto exchanges currently awaiting registration, including Coincheck, while temporarily halting the activities of three more.
Coincheck has also been hit with several lawsuits[12] from crypto traders both over their decision to freeze withdrawals of all cryptocurrencies right after the attack as well as generally suing for damages of up to around $800,000.
Now four months after the attack, Coincheck has already begun partially refunding users[13], as well as unfreezing the withdrawals and trading of several cryptocurrencies on the exchange, not, however, including NEM.
Monex acquires Coincheck
As the latest step in Coincheck’s efforts to keep the exchange moving forward in its plan to keep operations running and
