S.Korea court to settle MIR4 maker Wemade, WEMIX legal battle

Following a court hearing on Friday, the Seoul Central District Court is expected to soon finalize its decision on an injunction that South Korean blockchain game developer Wemade Co., Ltd. filed against four major cryptocurrency exchanges after the trading platforms announced the delisting of Wemade’s native token, WEMIX, local media outlets reported.

See related article: S. Korea’s Wemade files injunction against country’s top 4 crypto exchanges

Fast facts

• The court is expected to determine whether to approve Wemade’s injunction filings on Dec. 7, ahead of the planned delisting of Wemade’s WEMIX token on local crypto trading platforms Upbit, Bithumb, Coinone and Korbit, according to local media reports.
• With the injunction, Wemade looks to invalidate the planned delisting of WEMIX on the four fully licensed cryptocurrency exchanges that collectively fill over 95% of the South Korean crypto market volume.
• On Nov. 24, the four exchanges, which are part of joint local crypto market monitoring organization DAXA, announced they will be delisting Wemade’s WEMIX cryptocurrency, citing inaccurately reporting circulation numbers.
• Following the delisting announcement, the WEMIX token price plunged about 75% from being traded around US$1.6 falling to US$0.4, and the shares of Wemade and subsidiaries dropped nearly 30% as the stock market opened on the day after the announcement. Nevertheless, today’s court decision led WEMIX to surge 50% briefly before settling at US$0.56, according to CoinMarketCap data.
• The WEMIX issuer provided an estimate to Upbit in January that some 245 million tokens were in circulation. But actual WEMIX tokens circulated until Oct. 25 exceeded the estimate by about 72 million.
• In an hastily planned online press conference on Nov. 25, Wemade chief executive officer Henry Chang called out Upbit for abusing its power in deciding to delist WEMIX, and is also reportedly filing a complaint against the exchanges with the Fair Trade Commission (KFTC).
• Wemade, established in 2000, found success in adopting blockchain technology to its line of video games such as play-to-earn MMORPG game MIR4 Global, which has gained over 1.4 million concurrent users last year. Last month, the company launched its latest blockchain mainnet WEMIX 3.0 and accompanying stablecoin and decentralized finance service.