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… Investors complain, the century warns of unregistered online forex schemes
Daud Olatunji
According to reports, the Nigerians have lost more than N1.3 trillion in an unregulated digital resources trading platform, CBEX, which crashed on Monday, arousing indignation and pain through social media.
The platform, which operated without the approval of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), would have swept away the funds of the investors by their virtual wallets before blocking access to its telegrams channels and suspend the withdrawals.
Since then CBEX has offered a controversial “verification” package, which asks $ 200 or $ 100 from users interested in accessing $ 2,000 and $ 1,000 respectively, raising further fraud suspicions.
The preliminary analysis of the cryptocurrency and computer security expert, Taiwo Owolabi, revealed that the platform may have stolen up to $ 847 million (about N1.3 trillion of n.
Owolabi described the CBEX operation as a classic Ponzi -style scam.
“They designed a weak website to create the impression of a security violation,” he said during a discussion on Live X Space.
“The payments were directed to a TRX portfolio, quickly moved and converted to USDT, so to Eth. The balance saw users on their dashboard were false – only numbers manipulated by the platform.”
He added that the so -called commercial activities of AI and daily activities designed to increase users’ sales have been manufactured.
“When people requested withdrawals, they were paid with new deposits of other users. It was a typical masked pyramidal scheme as a cryptographic innovation,” he observed.
Public anger broke out on X (previously Twitter) following the accident, with many users that express frustration for repeated investment scams in the country.
A user, Steve Fred, complained, “Are we not just incredibly stupid in Nigeria? The Nigerians are Crenduloni like their leaders. How many times will they be scammed before they make sense?”
Another user, identified as Oku, has indicated the non -realistic returns promised by cbex, affirming: “You have no activities that make a company that promises you from 50 % 100 %. The smaller the profit, the more I trust you.”
The collapse of CBEX comes in the wake of a renewed warning from the century, which warned the Nigerians to invest in unregistered commercial platforms.
The Commission, referring to the investment and the Securities Act (ISA) 2025 recently issued, signed in law by President Bola Tinubu, stressed that it is now a crime for any entity to offer a forex online or related trading services without formal registration.
“By virtue of this law, it is a crime in Nigeria due to any entity that is not recorded by the Commission to carry out the activity of online change trading platforms or related services,” said the century in a recent advice.
He also urged potential operators to commit himself to his regulation and digital monitoring department (Hod DRM) to ensure compliance and avoid penalties.
As the digital investment space continues to expand, the experts warn that without an education of the strongest investors and the regulatory application, the Nigerians remain vulnerable to the fraudulent patterns masked by Fintech innovation.
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