What happened to Bitmain yesterday, part 5 (Mystery of the Mainland Ark)

What happened to Bitmain yesterday?

After Zhan Ketuan launched a fierce attack by detaining customer machines and demanding employees return to work, Wu Jihan launched a counterattack.

The key point and the only new idea in the statement released on Hong Kong Bit's Weibo on the 13th is that Wu Jihan accused Zhan Ketuan of signing a "Sales Agency Agreement" with Hainan Mainland Ark Data Technology Co., Ltd., in which he holds shares, in an attempt to embezzle Beijing Bit's assets and enrich himself, and said that he would pursue the matter to the end.

Tianyancha data shows that the company was registered on November 22, 2018, and Zhan Ketuan personally holds 25% of the shares. Zhan Ketuan became its individual shareholder on August 2, 2019, when Wu Jihan had not yet returned, and Zhan Ketuan was still the chairman and legal person of Bitmain Cayman and Beijing.

According to a report by Planet Daily in March 2019, the origin of the company is that Bitmain is carrying out a "joint mining" business, that is, the cooperative company provides electricity and mining farms, and Bitmain provides mining machines. Some miners said that "Boss Zhan has come out to run a mining farm in Sichuan, with a load of 160,000 and 100,000 machines"; the mining farm in charge of the above-mentioned Zhan Ketuan will run Antminer S11 and 15 models (S15 and T15).

In the early days, the company's shareholder was not Jihan Wu, but Fujian Maker Technology Co., Ltd., which is wholly owned by Beijing Bitmain. However, on August 2, 2019, Fujian Maker was replaced by Jihan Wu.

What is certain is that Zhan Ketuan has already controlled the supply chain and the factory, and can sell the mining machine inventory for cash, which may be the reason for signing the "Sales Agency Agreement". But it is also possible that this agreement was signed a long time ago, and it is unknown whether Wu Jihan's move is to prevent the other party from selling mining machines privately, or to investigate previous issues.

On the 14th, Zhan Ketuan also issued a statement: the cooperation between Bitmain and Hainan Continental Ark was a normal business transaction and a win-win strategic cooperation. However, it did not explain why the shareholder was not Bitmain but Zhan Ketuan himself. Legal experts pointed out that if Bitmain did have "business dealings" with Continental Ark, of which Zhan, then the legal representative of Bitmain, was an individual shareholder, there would not only be greater legal risks, but also the listing would be questioned as a related-party transaction.

In addition, several employees in the office area said that there has been no significant change in the number of people returning to work at Bitmain.

On the 14th, Zhan Ketuan issued the following statement:

The full text of Wu Jihan’s statement on the 13th is as follows, from Bitmain Hong Kong Weibo:

Truth and objectivity are the only reporting standards of Wu Shuo. As the war of public opinion between the two sides has started in various fronts, supporters have made radical and offensive remarks. Wu Shuo Blockchain will work harder to identify objective facts and information, verify through different channels, exclude emotional colors, and finally present relatively objective information to everyone. Except for the official platforms such as Wu Shuo Blockchain WeChat and Weibo, all information falsely claiming to be released by Wu Shuo is false, please do not believe it. If there are any errors, please feel free to point them out, and they will be clarified and modified in time. Thank you.