EXCLUSIVE: KuCoin Open To Cooperating With South Korea To Freeze Bitcoin In Do Kwon Fiasco, Says CEO

Amid reports that the beleaguered founder of Terra blockchain Do Kwon moved 3,313 Bitcoin BTC/USD to two cryptocurrency exchanges outside South Korea just after an arrest warrant was issued against him, KuCoin CEO Johnny Lyu on Monday said the crypto exchange was working to cooperate with the government and regulators “as things go on.”

According to reports, the transferred Bitcoin was worth over $69 million.

Also read: Terra Crisis: Family Bonds Shattered, Dreams Ripped Apart

Crypto market in a crisis far worse than earlier ones

In an exclusive interview with Benzinga, Lyu also said the ongoing crisis in the crypto market was “a lot worse” than earlier ones and that it will take a major event or rational economic policies to help the ailing markets.

“As a crypto exchange, we are open to cooperating with all prosecutors or regulators around the world but for a specific incident, we would like you to clarify with South Korean officials or regulators. Also, it is not our position to clarify this issue because as a crypto exchange, we are not in a position to figure out this whole thing, and we are just working to cooperate with the government and regulators as things go on,” Lyu said.

Asked to comment if regulations will help drive up the prices of major crypto tokens, the CEO of the Seychelles-based company said the ongoing crisis is going to end differently than the previous ones because earlier, new projects came up in times of crisis that would bring the whole industry back to life.

Only a major event can stabilize market

“But this time we are seeing a lot of different challenges and crises coming up that are a lot worse. As we are witnessing the war between Russia and Ukraine and having market crashes in the traditional finance and crypto markets. We are also seeing a big shuffle of regulatory policies around the world, especially in terms of the crypto industry,” he said.

Overall, the crypto winter is bound to end sometime, but Lyu says he's not sure when. "It might take a major event or rational economic policies to bring us back to life and stabilize the economy, but we still have to wait and see. We think for this particular crypto winter, the external factors may matter more than internal factors happening inside the industry," he added.

ETH Merge will help drive Bitcoin price

Asked to elucidate his stand on the future of Ethereum ETH/USD after The Merge, Lyu said the protocol’s shift to a Proof of Stake mechanism, rather than helping it, will instead help drive up the price of Bitcoin eventually.

“Both have been based on the PoW model and their work ensured fair, open, and decentralized trading of all cryptos. In terms of why ETH exists in the first place is because miners supporting ETH all this time that mattered the most,” he said.

He further added that The Merge will hurt their interests, and they will feel betrayed.

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