Feixiaohao, a major cryptocurrency market data and industry news provider in China, is reportedly under investigation by local police.
Several key executives at Feixiaohao are alleged to have been arrested within an ongoing investigation in Inner Mongolia, an autonomous region of northern China, the Chinese cryptocurrency journalist Colin Wu reported on his channel Wu Blockchain News on Aug. 28.
Source: Wu Blockchain
Wu cited a report from a local crypto channel on WeChat, which mentioned that “many key members of the Feixiaohao team” have been taken away by the Inner Mongolia police for investigation.
Reasons for alleged investigation remain unknown
According to Feixiaohao’s official website, the crypto data platform was officially launched in August 2017, becoming the largest simplified Chinese crypto market data website.
The website was often referred to as the Chinese version of CoinGecko, which is a major global platform designed for tracking the market capitalization of more than 14,000 cryptocurrencies on the market.
A screenshot from the Feixiaohao’s main page, translated by Google. Source: Feixiaohao.com
According to Wu’s sources, the reasons for Feixiaohao’s alleged investigation are currently unknown, while the investigation has reportedly lasted for more than six months.
“Many of Feixiaohao’s exchange partners said they could not contact them,” Wu noted.
Cointelegraph approached Feixiaohao for a comment regarding the alleged investigation and the arrest but did not receive a response at the time of publication.
Amid the reports on the arrests, the website has continued posting new articles in the news section, with the most recent articles dated Aug. 30.
Feixiaohao continued to operate after China’s “great Bitcoin ban” in 2021
According to data from the traffic analysis website SimilarWeb, Feixiaohao had around 200,000 monthly visits in July 2024. The biggest number of visits came from China, which accounted for 23% of Feixiaohao’s global visits last month.
Feixiaohao's user base in China could be considered significant, especially given the mainland's tough stance on the cryptocurrency market.
Top five countries in terms of Feixiaohao’s visits in July 2024. Source: SimilarWeb
China’s central bank, the People’s Bank of China (PBoC), officially enforced a set of restricting measures for the crypto market in mainland China in September 2021 in another effort to limit crypto adoption in the country.
Related: Crypto pyramid scheme leader extradited to China after global pursuit
Local industry sources claimed that the Chinese crypto ban posed no threat to the local cryptocurrency media, despite major crypto news outlets like ChainNews subsequently going offline without specifying the reasons in November 2021.
As many industry-related Chinese news channels have so far continued operating, it appears to be unclear whether providing crypto information services in mainland China was eventually deemed illegal.
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