Indian crypto exchange WazirX has threatened to take necessary steps to protect its legal rights in the ongoing dispute between Binance and WazirX over the latter’s ownership.
In a statement posted on its site, WazirX assured its customers that all its digital assets are stored in multi-signature wallets after withdrawing them from Binance Wallets.
“The allegations made by Binance in their blog are false and unsubstantiated. As far as Binance’s actions are concerned, we are taking the necessary steps to seek recourse and protect our legal rights,” WazirX said on its site.
On February 3, Binance issued a statement addressed to WazirX users, saying it would stop wallet services to Zanmai Labs’ crypto trading platform WazirX for refusing to retract “misleading” statements by its CEO Nischal Shetty.
In August last year, WazirX was being investigated by Indian law enforcement agencies, and its funds to the tune of $8 million in bank balance were temporarily frozen. At the height of this legal trouble, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao and WazirX CEO Nischal Shetty accused each other of falsehood over the ownership of the Indian crypto trading platform.
In a 2019 blog, Binance claimed that it had acquired WazirX, and the common perception until this face-off was that Binance is the owner of WazirX. But in a twist of the tale, CZ claimed that the deal was never complete and Binance’s engagement with the Indian exchange was limited to providing wallet services and technical solutions. The two executives publicly traded charges on Twitter for several days in August 2022 wherein CZ denied Binance owned WazirX and Shetty insisting that Binance indeed does so.
As per media reports, WazirX CEO asserted that Zanmai Labs had transferred the control and ownership of WazirX to Binance. It went on to claim that Binance unilaterally withdrew $67 million as fee for allowing WazirX users to use its trading platform.
