WazirX Raid; Rs 64.67 crores in bank assets frozen

Credent TV | On August 5, the Enforcement Directorate searched the residence of one of Zanmai Labs Private Limited’s directors. Zanmai Labs Private Limited owns and runs the cryptocurrency trading website WazirX. In the wazirx raid, ED frozen bank assets worth Rs 64.67 crores.

An Indian cryptocurrency exchange called WazirX serves as a trading platform for virtual currencies including Bitcoin, Ethereum, Tron, Ripple, and Litecoin.

The WazirX Director was charged by the central agency for aiding the alleged rapid lending app firms in the acquisition and transfer of virtual cryptocurrency assets used to launder illicit money.

Wazirx Raid News

According to a report by the Times of India, the Enforcement Directorate said that when the police and ED began their crackdown, the lending app companies utilised cryptocurrencies to export money. The majority of the money is sent from crypto assets through WazirX to Hong Kong. Regarding the transfer of funds to cryptocurrency assets, we discovered proof. More than Rs 100 crore worth of WazirX’s crypto assets have been frozen by us.

The investigative agency is now looking into allegations of money laundering against many Indian NBFCs and their fintech partners for engaging in lending practises that are outside RBI standards and for utilising abusive telemarketers to get borrowers to pay exorbitant interest rates.

On August 2, the Rajya Sabha was told by the Ministry of Finance that the ED is looking into two instances involving WazirX in accordance with the Foreign Exchange Management Act of 1999. (FEMA). Furthermore, it had said that Zanmai Labs was using Binance’s walled infrastructure.

The Finance Ministry had added: “It was discovered that all cryptocurrency transactions between these two exchanges were hidden in mystery since they were not even being registered on the blockchains. As a result, WaxirX has been given a show cause notice (SCN) under the terms of FEMA for permitting the external transfer of cryptocurrency assets worth Rs 2,790 crore to unidentified wallets.

According to the government, WazirX has granted requests from overseas customers to trade one cryptocurrency for another utilising transfers from third-party exchanges like FTX, Binance, etc.

WazirX, a cryptocurrency exchange, and its directors Nischal Shetty and Sameer Mhatre received a show-cause notice from the ED on June 11 for allegedly breaking rules in connection with transactions of Rs 2,790.74 crore.