FTX Japan promises to return funds but still won’t say when

FTX Japan has confirmed that its customers will be able to withdraw funds from “an unspecified moment in February.”

In a post published this week, the company informed users that their assets will be made available via Liquid, a Japanese crypto exchange that was acquired by FTX in February 2022.

Senior officials at Japan’s Financial Services Agency speculated back in January that the collapsed exchange’s Japanese unit would make assets available this month, and that the delay in doing so was due to “technical issues.”

It also clarified that there was “no objection at all” to the withdrawal plan despite FTX’s Chapter 11 filing in the United States.

Read more: FTX bankruptcy: A complete failure, worse than Enron

Tighter regulations mean FTX Japan funds were safe

As reported by The Register, Japan is one of the few countries to have implemented robust and defined regulations around cryptocurrency and exchanges. It’s due to this regulatory oversight that FTX customers in the country are even in with a chance of seeing their funds again.

Crypto exchanges in the country must register with the FSA and prove that they are in line with all anti-money-laundering (AML) laws and keep customer and exchange assets separate.

FTX Japan was relatively well placed to survive its parent company’s dramatic implosion but isn’t completely immune.

According to an earlier court filing, the unit is being auctioned as part of the US bankruptcy process and more than 40 parties have registered their interest.

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