Grant Thornton's auditors expect to initiate the process of accepting refund requests from users of the crypto exchange Cryptopia by the end of the year.
According to Grant Thornton's report, for this purpose Cryptopia has completed the preparation of an asset claim procedure for the exchange's former clients. They will have to verify their accounts as well as their data in a specialized portal. Grant Thornton will not be able to continue with the refunds until this process is completed. The auditors write:
"We have to establish a claims process and cannot just open up the Cryptopia exchange: the exchange was hacked prior to the liquidation. With the source of the hack still not identified we cannot open up an exchange that has been compromised."
Grant Thornton must also reconcile the balances:
"With over 900,000 active customers and up to 900 different coins, this is not a quick process."
Grant Thornton added that after that it will have to agree on the details with the courts:
"The Court decision means that Cryptocurrency is ‘property’ and coins were held on express trust by Cryptopia. A separate trust exists for each type of cryptocurrency and they are beneficially owned by the account holders so will not form part of the pool of assets available to unsecured creditors."
According to the court's decision, the refunds should be made in cryptos if possible. The auditor has highlighted that it is the only one with access to Cryptopia's database, which means that any offer of assistance from third parties to receive refunds should be considered a scam.
Trading was suspended on Cryptopia in May 2019 after suffering a hacker attack.
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