Justin Sun disputes reports of layoff discussions at Huobi

Amid a persistent business downturn and as he continues to increase his presence on Chinese social media sites following repeated bans, advisor Justin Sun has dismissed reports of significant layoffs at Huobi, one of the biggest crypto exchanges in the world.

Justin Sun: rumors of layoffs at Huobi not true

According to an internal statement by Justin Sun, who joined Huobi as an adviser in October of last year and has since served as the exchange’s public face, allegations of layoffs at Huobi were untrue, according to Jiemian, a Chinese business news outlet.

Following the sale of Leon Li’s shares to a buyout business controlled by About Capital Management HK Co., news organization Justin Sun was responsible for obtaining a controlling stake in Huobi in October. Sun has denied this, claiming he only works as Huobi’s advisor.

Congratulations to our community on this milestone! The total value of #BUSD    on TRON has just surpassed $100 million. This is indicative of the growing demand for stablecoins and the strength of the Tron protocol. 

Justin Sun, Huobi adviser.

Huobi has cancelled its year-end bonuses and will be laying off around 40% of its workforce, according to a report last week from cryptocurrency-focused news outlet Wu Blockchain, which cited unnamed sources.

Crypto billionaires reassure investors

The collapse of FTX and its founder Sam Bankman-abrupt Fried’s fall from grace continues to send shockwaves through the global cryptocurrency sector; therefore, industry titans have stepped up their attempts to reassure investors about the viability of their platforms.

Following trader withdrawals of US$6 billion in three days, Binance CEO Zhao Changpeng stated last month that “things have stabilized” and that the exchange had passed a “stress test” as a result.

While this is happening, Sun claimed on Twitter last week that Huobi is experiencing “impressive growth” and began to advertise his Chinese social media accounts on Monday despite having previously been repeatedly barred.

Sun announced his return to Weibo in a post there on Monday and shared a screenshot of his brand-new Weibo account on Twitter.

Sun’s account has been disabled by Weibo numerous times, notably in August 2021 and December 2019. This is due to Beijing’s ongoing crackdowns on crypto activity in the nation. Social media sites routinely delete accounts related to the subject.

However, the founder of the crypto project Tron and a well-known crypto figure from China looks set to make a comeback. On Monday, he also announced on Twitter that he has a Douyin account, the Chinese equivalent of the popular TikTok short-video app and that his goal is to gain one million followers in 2023.

Following its acquisition by About Capital in October, Huobi, which started operating in mainland China in 2013 but left the country due to Beijing’s crackdown on cryptocurrencies, announced a rebranding in November that changed the Chinese character for “coin” in its name to the surface for “must.” This was done as part of its expansion plans. According to Leon Li, he would lose all authority over the company after the acquisition.