Binance Says It Will Remove WazirX Off-Chain Transfers Hours After Indian Firm's Founder Says They Were Restarted

Binance said it will remove off-chain transfers between its platform and WazirX just hours after the Indian cryptocurrency exchange's founder, Nischal Shetty, said the service had been reinstated.

In a blog post, Binance said it will halt the transfers as of 03:00 UTC on Thursday.

Binance, the world's largest crypto exchange by volume, and its founder and CEO Changpeng Zhao have been involved in a surprising back and forth with WazirX and its founders. The disagreements started last week after Shetty and Zhao posted opposing views on social media regarding the ownership of the platform.

Last week, Indian authorities raided the properties of a WazirX director in connection to an alleged fraud involving crypto. Following the report, Zhao took to Twitter to claim that Binance did not own WazirX, prompting Shetty to fire back and say that it did.

Binance reportedly stopped off-chain transfers between the exchanges on Sunday. Shetty in an interview with CoinDesk earlier Monday said that the off-chain service had been restarted. "I'm guessing because a lot of users complained about it to them," he said.

Zhao also advised WazirX users to move their funds to Binance and that the exchange could shut down WazirX, "but we can't because it hurts users."

WazirX users flooded the exchange's Telegram channel with concerns about whether their funds were safe and whether the platform's native coin WRX would be delisted by Binance.

When asked for comment WazirX only said that "users can continue to use the on-chain deposits and withdrawals on WazirX.”

Binance also said it will support Indian regulators in the ongoing matters concerning WazirX.

UPDATE (Aug. 8, 14:40 UTC): Updates headline and story with new information and background.