On September 20, an unknown actor transferred all funds held in the WEX cryptocurrency exchange wallet, amounting to 9,916 ETH (a little over $30 million at the time) to a new address.
The gas price for the transfer was set at 20 Gwei, with the recommended level of 84 Gwei at the time of writing. The fee amounts to 0.00042 ETH ($1.27).
“The fact that the transaction was executed with only 20 Gwei suggests, most likely, that it was carried out by someone not very versed in crypto. For example, a random person who happened to know the key,” said ForkLog CEO Indefibank Sergey Mendelyev in a comment.
Due to the low fee, the transaction was confirmed only on October 2.
Earlier, on August 11, police at Warsaw’s airport detained the former owner of WEX, Dmitry Vasilyev, at Kazakhstan’s request. He has been detained until September 21. The prosecutor’s office later confirmed this.
A month later, on September 15, an unknown withdrew 100 ETH from the exchange wallet ($345,385 at the time).
In July 2018, due to “maintenance work” the WEX exchange halted full withdrawals. At the same time, according to Dmitry Vasilyev, a contract transferring ownership of WEX was signed to ex-DPR militant Dmitry “Moryachok” Khavchenko.
In August of the same year, it became known about the bankruptcy of the exchange and suspension of its operations. An initiative group of clients estimated that the damage exceeded $400 million. Vasilyev personally is credited with a withdrawal of $200 million.
In spring 2019, Kazakh law enforcement authorities, in absentia, named him a suspect in fraud and issued an international arrest warrant.
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