Dormant Ethereum wallet moved funds from $2 billion PlusToken scam

Hundreds of wallets began moving 2,800 tokens from a $2 billion ethereum cache linked to the 2020 PlusToken Ponzi scheme in China.

ethereum (eth) fell by around 2% after several wallets began transferring funds from a vault of 789,533 Ether early on Wednesday, August 7. According to EtherscanThe addresses were dormant for over three years and last received assets from a wallet labeled “Plus Token Ponzi 2” in April 2021.

PlusToken was a multi-billion-dollar Ponzi scheme dismantled by Chinese law enforcement in 2020. Authorities seized cryptocurrencies currently worth $14 billion, including 194,775 bitcoin (btc) and 833,083 eth, valued at $11.2 billion and $2.11 billion, respectively.

Chinese police also seized tens to hundreds of millions of coins including Ripple (XRP), bitcoin Cash (BCH), Litecoin (LTC), EOS (EOS), Dash (DASH), Dogecoin (DOGE), and Tether (USDT).

A lower district court in Yancheng, China, has sentenced 15 people in the case that allegedly affected 2 million investors.

Will ethereum buckle under selling pressure?

ethereum may be having its Mt. Gox moment, as data showed large amounts of Ether were moving around. According to crypto.news, market maker Jump crypto also sent $277 million worth of eth to exchanges like Binance and Coinbase.

The Chicago-based firm has also withdrawn thousands of Ether from Lido Finance and may be prepared to liquidate assets.

While no reports have emerged of Chinese authorities selling eth or Jump dumping the asset for stablecoins, such an outcome could increase selling pressure on ethereum following a widespread market sell-off.

In fact, Ether lost 25% over the past seven days and remained above $2,400 for less than 48 hours at press time. eth’s market price remained virtually unchanged, showing a 0.7% increase in 24 hours.