Investor Reports $100,000 Blocked on HitBTC

User uncovered legal status issues with the exchange.

A client of the cryptocurrency exchange HitBTC reached out to ForkLog, reporting the blocking of $100,000 in assets and uncovering issues with the company’s legal status.

In April 2025, when attempting to withdraw part of the funds, the user’s account was blocked “due to suspicious activity.” He immediately contacted support but received no response. 

“Only after I began publicly complaining on the exchange’s official X account was I informed of the need to undergo re-verification,” the investor said.

He provided a passport, a photo with the passport and necessary data, as well as a “utility bill from the management company to confirm the residential address.” However, HitBTC did not accept the latter document. 

The user then sent a photograph of an official bank statement with a stamp. The exchange’s representatives rejected this as well. The investor noted that the platform’s own rules allow for scans and photos of documents.

Subsequently, the investor obtained an official tax resident certificate with a digital signature from the tax office. Following this, according to him, HitBTC made a new demand—to confirm the source of the last three account deposits.

Two transactions in USDT were accepted. However, the third—0.2 BTC—was rejected, citing the absence of a conversion rate in the provided invoice. 

“The exchange demanded a statement from a partner on official letterhead confirming the legality of these funds. This concerned a payment I received in the summer of 2020, which I kept in a cold wallet until January 2025, when I deposited it on HitBTC to buy altcoins. Five years have passed since the service was provided, but the exchange demands an unreasonable document that is practically impossible to obtain after such a time,” he added.

The investor also emphasized that after six months of blocking, the platform began deducting funds from his account monthly for inactivity. He now estimates the frozen assets at $100,000.

Other users have faced similar situations. One HitBTC client reported on Trustpilot that he had “several hundred dollars” in his account but hadn’t logged in for a couple of years. Eventually, the exchange deducted all his funds without warning. 

A Reddit user reported that HitBTC refused to return 0.157 BTC, even though he met all the platform’s requirements. Another user complained about the deduction of 2000 DOGE without his knowledge. 

Legal Issues

During attempts to challenge the exchange’s actions in court, the investor and his representatives could not establish HitBTC’s legal address. According to him, the information on the platform’s page about registration in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines is inaccurate. 

He referred to a warning from the Financial Services Authority from 2023: 

The warning notes that all documents issued in the name of these companies are “forged.”

The investor also pointed out the exchange’s terms of service, which “absolve it of any legal responsibility.”  

“Upon discovering false information on the HitBTC website and establishing the widespread nature of such actions by the exchange’s administration, the accompanying lawyers decided to file a police report,” the user stated. 

According to him, the Hong Kong police have taken up the case. 

ForkLog reached out to HitBTC for comment, but no response was received at the time of writing.  

Back in August 2021, the blockchain project Sentinel Network accused the exchange of losing 40 million tokens. Its representatives claimed the incident was due to a vulnerability on the platform’s side. 

In November of the same year, users complained about an issue with the denomination of SUN tokens on HitBTC.