Huobi Global Is Forcing Americans to Use Its Local Partner HBUS

The Huobi news show that the exchange Huobi Global is expected to remove all of the United States based customers off of its platform later this month. The cryptocurrency exchange announced that all of the US accounts will be frozen on November 13, framing a move as a compliance step made to conform to US laws and regulations.

Huobi is also recommending that the customers transfer their assets to the local partner HBUS – a US firm affiliated with the global brand Huobi.

“Our User Agreement expressly prohibits users in the United States from using our platform,” Huobi noted of its main platform.

This move also finalizes the Huobi plans for shuttering outside of United States and the accounts there – as the company continues to push users to HBUS, a firm based in San Francisco.

“Please return your borrowed fund in margin trading and withdraw all your assets balance. Kindly approach customer support for assistance to convert all residual assets below the minimum withdrawal amount and unused Point Cards, to BTC/USDT (conversion base token) before withdrawing. Thank you for your understanding and cooperation,” the announcement continued.

HBUS is a local Huobi Global partner which is led by Frank Fu, a former lead at the Chinese photo editing app Meity, HBUS has been operating within the United States partner since early last year.

The exchange said that all of the outstanding balances must be withdrawn by the November 13 deadline. It also offered assistance for all users holding amounts below the withdrawal minimum through their customer support line.

As Huobi Global also said, customers can receive their funds in Bitcoin (BTC) or Tether (USDT), according to the announcement. The firm pledged to refund the points card purchases at a 1:1 ratio in USDT.

The account freeze from Huobi Global is not the first one in the industry. So far, we have seen Binance cracking on its American users and opening its United States subsidiary, pushing them to it as its FinCEN-registered partner.

Owned and operated by HBUS Holdco Inc., Huobi global advertises itself as “the safest platform that makes it easy to buy and sell Bitcoin, Ethereum and Litecoin” as one of the main cryptocurrencies supported on their website.