The Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Ola Olukoyede, has disclosed that the Commission has recovered part of the money invested by Nigerians in the recently collapsed Ponzi scheme, Crypto Bridge Exchange (CBEX).
Olukoyede disclosed this in an interview with TVC News on Sunday, but did not disclose the exact amount, saying that recovery efforts are still ongoing.
Several reports had claimed that Nigerians lost up to N1.3 trillion to the scheme that collapsed in April.
The EFCC Chairman added that the agency’s operatives had also arrested some suspects in connection with the fraud, noting that the agency is still pursuing others who are on the run.
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“We have gone far with CBEX. We have been able to recover a reasonable amount of money,” he said.
Converting crypto to cash
While noting that the stolen money was in cryptocurrency, Olukpoyede acknowledged that the agency experienced difficulties while converting the funds back to dollars in cash.
“Even though in the crypto wallet, the same way the money was taken from them, there is no way you will get them in dollars. There is no way you get the dollars in cash without necessarily going through the same process,” said the EFCC Chairman.
“We have met with people. People are talking. Like I said, we are not going to give out too much because we don’t want the process to be truncated.
“We are still after quite a number of people that we have declared wanted. We are still investigating a lot of wallets,” he said.
How the scam worked
Explaining how the CBEX Ponzi scheme operated in Nigeria, the EFCC Chairman said most of the perpetrators are foreigners that came in to engage the services of Nigerians who registered clients for them.
“At that point, we do not know whether they knew what they were going into was fraudulent or not, but from our investigation, we are getting a clue to that.
“So, they registered the clients and they used them to create awareness. In fact, they have seminars.
“We have the tape of their seminars and their conferences. They bring in professionals, people who are specialists in capital markets. Yes, there was the case that they brought a PhD holder, a specialist in capital markets,” he explained.