OKX

US Department of Justice documents identify Seychelles-incorporated Aux Cayes FinTech Co. Ltd. as the operator of the global platform under the OKEx and subsequently OKX names since at least 2017. It is distinct from US-licensed OKCoin USA; OKCoin’s earlier history should not be treated as the legal history of the global OKX platform.⁠[2]

Following changes in China’s digital-asset trading policies, OKEx introduced C2C trading on October 31, 2017. Verified merchants or other users supplied fiat buy-and-sell quotes, while the platform handled matching and workflow, providing fiat access alongside crypto-to-crypto and derivatives trading. This extended the customer journey as the business shifted from its early Chinese operations to overseas markets; it did not establish availability of fiat services in every country or period.⁠[3]

OK Blockchain Foundation announced the platform asset OKB in February 2018. In May, the platform introduced voting-based listings, investment-based listings and traffic-partnership listings, using community votes, project investment commitments and outside traffic as alternative routes to market access. These arrangements arose as exchanges competed for projects and users during a bear market. They subsequently changed and are not current listing rules.⁠[3]

OKEx launched BTC perpetual contracts on December 11, 2018, added trading-page data tools such as long/short account ratios and leading-trader trends in August 2019, and introduced BTC/USD options in January 2020. On February 10, 2020, it announced the destruction of 700 million unissued OKB and plans involving OKChain, decentralized trading and an OKT mapping. These milestones broadened its offering beyond crypto pairs and dated futures into perpetuals, options, market data and blockchain infrastructure; announced plans were not necessarily all delivered at the time.⁠[3]

Retrospective reporting described outages, slow responses and position or wallet-balance display problems during volatile markets in OKEx’s early years, with fewer such incidents by late 2019. Researchers including the Blockchain Transparency Institute meanwhile estimated, using their methodologies, that wash trading represented more than 75% to over 90% of volume. Then-CEO Jay Hao disputed the samples and methods as incomplete and the conclusions as seriously inaccurate; other reports based on order-book depth and trade distribution offered opposing evidence. These conflicting models are recorded as a dispute, rather than establishing any percentage as proven fact.⁠[3]

On October 16, 2020, OKEx suspended all digital-asset withdrawals after a private-key holder became unable to provide authorization. On November 19, it said the person had finished assisting an investigation and planned to resume withdrawals before November 27. The company acknowledged that its contingency design had not covered a key holder becoming temporarily unreachable for unforeseen reasons. Public primary materials did not identify that person.⁠[4]

OKEx officially became OKX on January 18, 2022. The company said removing “Ex” reflected its expansion from an exchange into a cross-platform service provider. Its products already included spot, margin and derivatives trading, yield products, an NFT marketplace and a self-custody wallet. Later migrated pages carried differing publication dates; the contemporary press release confirms January 18.⁠[1]

In an interview, the OKX DEX team said its cross-chain trading aggregator launched in January 2022 and completed a first-stage quotation algorithm that December. X-routing discovered and connected liquidity pools while incorporating gas costs into quotes. The product combined a swap aggregator with cross-chain bridges. Its roadmap included competition among market makers, sophisticated trading participants and MEV participants, plus packaging wallet and DEX capabilities as WaaS SDKs and APIs. These are attributed team descriptions and plans, without adopting promotional claims of uniqueness or optimality.⁠[5]

OKX says it first published proof of reserves in November 2022 and subsequently reported monthly, introducing Merkle trees and zk-STARKs so users could verify inclusion of account liabilities and control of disclosed addresses. Proof of reserves is a cryptographic snapshot for specified assets at a particular time; it is not a full financial-statement audit, deposit insurance or a guarantee of continuing future solvency.⁠[6]

A retrospective account described the team learning about Ordinals and BRC-20 through user feedback and industry discussion, then progressing through internal briefings, product evaluation and leadership approval. Confirming the direction and obtaining support reportedly took approximately one to two weeks. It also traced wallet experiments to around 2018–2019, initially emphasizing underlying technology, with a clearer multichain-wallet direction after DeFi Summer. These dates come from team and media retrospectives and do not imply that all BRC functionality was already available.⁠[7]

On April 24, 2023, the OKX Wallet browser extension enabled viewing and transferring Bitcoin NFTs and paying network fees from another address. It introduced related NFT activities on May 11 and announced work with UniSat on BRC-20 standards on May 12, including planned cross-checking of index data and exploration of order-flow sharing. A BRC-20 explorer followed on May 14, Bitcoin Ecosystem Week on May 24 and the BRC-30 staking proposal on June 1, later renamed BRC20-S. The Ordinals marketplace was fully integrated into the wallet in late May. This release cadence did not confer exclusive authority over protocol standards.⁠[7]

Reporting described August–October 2023 as a period of fewer feature releases and more infrastructure and performance optimization. Ordinals version changes raised concerns about duplicate-payment risks, prompting adaptations. A separate community-reported wallet issue was reportedly fixed overnight through a temporary group of about six people. These cases illustrate community feedback and rapid iteration, but the report did not provide independent technical postmortems for every incident and does not establish fault-free operation or absolute security.⁠[7]

Dubai’s VARA register lists OKX Middle East FinTech FZE as holding an effective VASP license from September 17, 2024, covering approved exchange, broker-dealer, lending and management services for retail, qualified and institutional investors. The license applies to the Dubai entity and the specified activities.⁠[8]

The Monetary Authority of Singapore’s directory lists OKX SG Pte. Ltd. as a Major Payment Institution authorized for Digital Payment Token Service. The authorization belongs to the Singapore entity and approved services; it does not automatically cover global OKX or products in other regions.⁠[9]

OKX announced MiCA authorization in Malta in January 2025 and passporting across the European Economic Area. Historical and current materials use names including OKCoin Europe Limited, OKX Europe Limited and derivatives provider OKX Europe Markets Limited. These reflect different periods or service scopes; a single license should not be generalized to all OKX products worldwide.⁠[10]

On February 24, 2025, Aux Cayes FinTech pleaded guilty in the United States to operating an unlicensed money-transmitting business. It agreed to approximately $420.3 million in forfeiture and $84.4 million in fines, exceeding $504 million in total, and to retain a compliance consultant through February 2027. The plea and penalties concerned Aux Cayes, not a personal guilty plea by Star Xu. The DOJ specifically distinguished OKCoin USA.⁠[2]

OKX announced the US launch of its exchange and wallet in April 2025, a regional headquarters in San Jose and migration of former OKCoin customers. That month, Star Xu introduced the first version of OKX Pay, designed around self-custody and split key material. Product announcements establish launch timing and design intentions, but not availability in every state, eligibility for all users or a particular level of adoption.⁠[11]

In an interview, global chief commercial officer Lennix said the team numbered about 20 when he joined in 2017 and subsequently grew to roughly 300–500. A wallet was not the original plan: early work focused on blockchain analysis, shifting toward a fuller wallet business about three years before the interview. He described two product priorities: lowering self-custody barriers and enabling interaction across chains. The company reported 122% growth in wallet downloads in 2024, roughly ninefold growth in users and twentyfold growth in daily DEX trading volume. These interview figures were company-reported, not audited metrics or enduring market shares.⁠[12]

The same interview said OKX had paused parts of its DEX aggregator while assessing MiCA requirements and separated centralized trading and the wallet into different applications to explain self-custody versus exchange custody to regulators. The team also discussed an onchain KYC standard, address-risk labeling and AI-based subsecond detection of suspicious behavior, alongside bank connections and fiat services. These were compliance designs and plans as of April 2025, not evidence of regulatory endorsement or universal implementation.⁠[12]

In November 2025, OKX introduced DEX trading within its exchange application, initially connecting SolanaSolanaSolana is a proof-of-stake (PoS) public blockchain designed for high throughput and low latency, with SOL as its native token; it was developed by Solana Labs and launched Mainnet Beta in March 2020. It is known for design choices such as its Proof of History clock and parallel execution, suffered several network-wide outages in its early years, and became one of the crypto industry’s focal points in events including the FTX collapse, U.S. SEC lawsuits, and the listing of Solana ETFs.Open the full entry, Base and X Layer. Users could initiate onchain trades using centralized account balances, with acquired assets delivered to a self-custody wallet created for them. USDT or USDC simplified gas payments, with some initial gas subsidies from the platform. This combined centralized account access with self-custodial delivery; it did not mean DEX assets remained in exchange custody or that every region and chain was supported.⁠[13]

On March 5, 2026, NYSE parent Intercontinental ExchangeICEICE (Intercontinental Exchange) is a US financial-market infrastructure company founded in 2000. It operates exchanges and clearing services, fixed-income and data businesses, and mortgage technology. Its businesses include the New York Stock Exchange; founder Jeffrey Sprecher is chair and CEO.Open the full entry announced a minority investment in OKX at a $25 billion valuation, without disclosing the amount, and obtained an OKX board seat. Proposed cooperation covered regulated futures, price licensing and tokenized securities. Features requiring development or regulatory approval should not be described as fully launched.⁠[14]

Star Xu outlined Exchange OS as infrastructure providing spot, perpetual-contract and prediction or outcome-market capabilities to developers and institutions, with X Layer as the onchain foundation. The article described gradually introduced uses including World Cup outcome markets. It establishes the company’s strategy and public architecture, rather than completion of every interface, market and institutional partnership.⁠[15]

OKX made its options markets available on Talos, with order books, strikes, expiries, implied volatility and Greeks. Eligible institutions could trade through Talos’s order and execution management system. The integration supported order-book execution only, excluding OTC options and RFQ, with execution unavailable in the US, EEA and other restricted markets.⁠[16]

OKX announced access for eligible Texas residents and institutions to its US platform, including spot trading, TradingView connectivity and selected institutional settlement arrangements. The announcement identified OKX INC. as provider, with Texas money-transmission license 3574 and NMLS number 1767779. Products and institutional credit remained subject to eligibility, collateral and applicable terms.⁠[17]

Investing.com reported that OKXICE LLC was seeking regulatory permission for tokenized shares of 63 US-listed companies, including Nvidia and Apple. This described a proposal, rather than approval or a launched service.⁠[18]

OKX announced Circle, QRTQube Research & TechnologiesQube Research & Technologies (QRT) is a London-based global multi-strategy investment manager combining data research, technology and trading execution across asset classes and regions. Its business originated at Credit Suisse and became independent in 2018.Open the full entry, Ripple and SC VenturesSC VenturesSC Ventures is Standard Chartered’s innovation, fintech-investment and venture-building unit, established in 2018 and led by Alex Manson. It builds independent businesses and makes strategic minority investments, focusing on digital banking, trade and supply chains, and digital assets.Open the full entry in an extension of its March financing at a $25 billion pre-money valuation, without disclosing the new amount. Citing Bloomberg, Investing.com put ICE’s March investment at approximately $200 million and attributed a long-term market-infrastructure focus to Haider Rafique.⁠[19][18]

OKX launched the standalone OKX Money application for holding and transferring dollar stablecoins and spending through virtual or physical cards. It announced funding in more than 50 currencies, converting into USDG, USDC or USDT, with phased availability in participating markets. Balance rewards, cashback and features depend on region and eligibility.⁠[20]

The global OKX exchange, historical OKCoin spot platform, self-custody OKX Wallet, OKC and X Layer blockchains, and locally licensed entities are not interchangeable. Assets in custodial trading accounts and self-custody wallets also have different control models. Descriptions of licenses, penalties and services should preserve the relevant entity, jurisdiction and date.⁠[2]

Website: https://www.okx.com (opens in a new window). X: https://x.com/okx (opens in a new window). LinkedInLinkedInLinkedIn is a social networking platform for professionals. It was founded in 2002 by Reid Hoffman and others, launched in 2003, and listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 2011; after Microsoft acquired it for approximately $26.2 billion in 2016, it became a wholly owned Microsoft subsidiary. Its revenue comes from membership subscriptions, advertising, and recruitment solutions.Open the full entry: https://www.linkedin.com/company/okxofficial/ (opens in a new window). YouTubeYouTubeYouTube is Google’s video-sharing and creator platform, founded in 2005 by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim and acquired by Google in 2006. Built around video uploading, viewing, and creator earnings, the platform has developed Shorts, YouTube Music, Premium, YouTube TV, and products for children, and is headquartered in San Bruno, California, United States.Open the full entry: https://www.youtube.com/@TheOKXGlobal (opens in a new window).⁠[21][22][23]