On Thursday, ZachXBT, a cyber detective in the decentralized finance, or DeFi, realm, accused prominent Taiwanese musician and blockchain personality Jeff Huang, also known as Machi Big Brother, of misconduct in 10 different cryptocurrency projects. Machi Big Brother is known outside of Taiwan as an avid collector of Bored Ape Yacht Club nonfungible tokens (NFTs) and possessed a collection worth an estimated $8.26 million at the peak of the crypto bull market last year.
This is misinformation. If he wasn’t anon I’d sue him for defamation.
— Machi Big Brother (@machibigbrother) June 16, 2022
Though numerous, the main spearhead of the allegations was directed toward Huang’s alleged involvement in the whereabouts of 22,000 Ether (ETH) raised during the initial coin offering for tokens of Formosa Financial (FMF), a Taiwanese treasury management platform built for blockchain companies, in 2018.
After the ICO, FMF tokens quickly plunged in price, partly due to the severe cryptocurrency bear market at the time. Jeff Huang had served as an advisor for the company before eventually relinquishing his role. In 2019, Taiwanese news outlet Block Tempo reported that Formosa Financial merged with the Philippines-based crypto exchange CEZEX and ICO crowdfund syndicate Katalyse.io.
As told by ZachXBT, on June 22, 2018, just three weeks after the FMF ICO, two withdraws of 11,000 ETH were made out of Formosa Financial’s treasury wallet. At the same time, multiple executives at Formosa Financial allegedly authorized a share buyback of the company.
There is significant uncertainty regarding the outflows of the said 22,000 ETH. ZachXBT alleged that the funds went first to George Hsieh, Formosa Financial’s former CEO, and Jeff Huang, and then to wallet addresses allegedly linked to their associates. However, the DeFi detective did not back up their claims with evidence as to how they came to associate the said addresses with Jeff and George.
On-chain data can only confirm that…
