Binance Temporarily Halts Deposits for Bridged Tokens, Requests Clarification from Multichain Team

Affected Token Pairs

Affected token pairs include:

• Polkastarter (POLS)
• Alpaca Finance (ALPACA)
• Travala.com (AVA)
• Spell (SPELL)
• Fantom (FTM)
• Alchemy (ACH)
• Beefy (BIFI)
• SuperVerse (SUPER)
• Harvest Finance (FARM)
• DeXe (DEXE)

The move impacts users of bridged tokens on the BNB Smart Chain, Fantom, Ethereum, and Avalanche blockchain networks.

Withdrawals and Deposits

According to Binance’s deposit page, withdrawals of these tokens and deposits on other networks are still available.

Uncertainty Surrounding Multichain

Multichain’s (MULTI) silence about the ongoing issues has been fueling uncertainty. Transactions on the protocol have been delayed across multiple cross-chain bridges.

In a tweet from May 24, Multichain said that some cross-chain routes were unavailable “due to force majeure,” noting that the time for service restoration was unclear. It was the last communication from the protocol on the social media platform. Previously, the delay was attributed to a backend node upgrade.

Actions Taken by Binance and Fantom Foundation

Binance was not the only company to take steps amid the unexplained downtime. A wallet address linked to the Fantom Foundation reportedly removed 449,740 MULTI ($2.4 million) from liquidity on the decentralized exchange SushiSwap. Additionally, blockchain analytics firm Lookonchain reported MULTI outflows related to smart money accounts worth $3 million.

On Twitter, rumors circulated that Multichain’s team had been arrested by the Chinese police, with $1.5 billion of smart contract funds under authorities’ control. Cointelegraph reached out to Multichain but did not receive an immediate response.

Binance’s Investment in Multichain

Binance’s venture arm is one of Multichain’s investors. In December 2021, the cross-chain protocol raised $60 million in a seed funding round led by Binance Labs, along with other venture capital investors such as Sequoia China, IDG Capital, Primitive Ventures, DeFiance Capital, Circle Ventures, Hypersphere Ventures, HashKey, and Magic Ventures.