Recently, the latest situation with PlusToken has become a hot topic in the market again. This long-dormant old case has suddenly become active, and it’s quite worth reviewing.

Here's what happened: In August this year, someone discovered that wallets that had been inactive for over three years suddenly started transferring large amounts of Ethereum, which startled the market. The news said it involved about 780k+ ETH, worth around 2 billion USD at the time, causing panic. Later, on-chain analysts verified that only about 25k+ ETH were actually pending, and the panic eased somewhat.

The PlusToken case is also a classic early lesson in crypto. Launched in 2018, it claimed to be a "smart arbitrage" and cross-chain wallet, using gimmicks like "Coin King" and "Thousandfold Coins" to attract investors. In just one year, it attracted over 2.7 million members, with a hierarchy reaching over 3,000 layers—typical pyramid scheme tactics. The platform required new users to deposit at least $500, promising high returns.

By June 2019, withdrawal issues began to surface, and the platform’s operations stalled, but even then, some investors kept pouring money in. When the case broke out, it had scammed investors worldwide out of 2 to 2.9 billion USD worth of crypto assets, an astonishing scale.

How the funds were handled is also quite interesting. Most of the money moved through over-the-counter (OTC) channels, then used complex transfers and mixing services to evade tracking. Some bought real estate and luxury cars, while the rest was cashed out via OTC markets. In mid-2020, 789.5k ETH from PlusToken wallets was transferred out and spread across hundreds of intermediary wallets. By mid to late 2021, most of these ETH flowed into a now-defunct exchange, then transferred to a major exchange.

In November 2020, the court’s second-instance ruling ordered the confiscation of all involved crypto assets and their remittance to the state treasury. According to the ruling, law enforcement seized over 194k BTC, 833k+ ETH, 1.4 million LTC, 27.6 million Yuzu tokens, over 74k DASH, 487 million XRP, 6 billion DOGE, over 79k Bitcoin Cash, and 213k Tether, with a total value exceeding 15 billion RMB.

The recent wallet activity on-chain suggests it might be operated by released prisoners. Honestly, this incident reflects some early issues in the crypto market—information asymmetry, lack of regulation, insufficient investor protection. Many people got caught in Ponzi schemes back then, and now Bitcoin and Ethereum have increased by dozens of times, leaving victims with no chance to recover.

Looking back at these events, the most important lesson is to beware of promises of high returns. If a platform claims to offer stable, high yields, especially if it requires you to keep recruiting others, it’s basically a Ponzi scheme. The crypto market indeed offers great opportunities, but the key is to protect your assets and avoid falling into these traps.