It is no longer news that thousands of Nigerians lost their money in what so many people believed to be a scam project, but the truth is did Nigerians actually lose their funds?
Let’s begin by addressing the names at the center of this controversy: CBEX, short for Crypto Bridge Exchange, not to be confused with the widely known Chinese Beijing Exchange that some people mistakenly refer to.
We are here to conduct an objective investigation into what many are calling a tragedy. The goal is not to take sides or assign blame, but to assess whether we are truly dealing with a scam—or something far more complex.
Could CBEX be as much a victim as the users? Was this collapse the result of a targeted cyberattack? Or are we looking at a meticulously planned scam?
The average investor isn’t evaluating this event with objectivity. Many who got involved with ST did so because of the buzz from peers, and now, most of the reactions—fueled by social media and bloggers—are highly emotional.
Few people truly took time to research the facts. And it’s only those few that are capable of analyzing this incident rationally and drawing a balanced conclusion.
At this point, no one can say for sure what really happened, what caused the collapse, or who the actual victims are. It’s easy to assume the users are the victims—but what if CBEX is a victim too?
What Did CBEX Claim to Offer?
CBEX presented itself as a crypto trading platform where users could trade a variety of digital assets—BTC, ETH, TRX, XRP, DOT, ADA, and more.
But the real question is this: Was CBEX actually trading in the live crypto markets?
Many platforms today, including well-known forex platforms with millions of users, don’t actually execute trades in live markets. And yet, they are widely considered legitimate.
If these platforms are not trading in real markets, how do they pay out the users who win big?
Could they be operating under a model where losses from other users cover these payouts—something we’ll call the “PonziPro” model?
This doesn’t necessarily mean they are illegal ponzi schemes. It simply means they’re using a risk-sharing structure where user losses fund user gains.
So, does CBEX fall into this category? We can’t definitively say they do—or that they don’t.
Most platforms won’t show you verifiable trading data unless they’re industry giants like Binance, Bybit, Bitget, or Crypto.com and CBEX won’t show you theirs either.
Let’s assume, for analysis purposes, that CBEX operated on a simulated or non-live market model, just like many other platforms.
If that’s the case, could CBEX still run a viable business using this structure? Absolutely. Many others do.
Their collapse doesn’t automatically mean they were fraudulent—but it also doesn’t prove they weren’t, right?
Stay with us, because your long-awaited answers may lie within this balanced breakdown. Objectivity is crucial for every investor, especially when the full picture isn’t available.
How Did CBEX Acquire Its Users?
A legitimate question every investigative writer should ask is: How did CBEX manage to acquire such a large user base—especially without billboards, TV ads, or traditional marketing in Nigeria?
Oddly, most blog posts and media coverage failed to mention ST at all, or only briefly brought it up after the collapse gained attention. Why?
Possibly because CBEX made a bigger media splash/attention. But in our opinion, ST Technologies should be the primary focus because when you understand where ST Technologies stands so many things might just make sense to you.
ST claims to be a UK-based company, expanding across multiple continents, like many other ambitious tech firms.
For their African market entry, Nigeria was the logical launchpad—thanks to its large population and significant tech adoption.
ST officially registered with Nigeria’s Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC), initiated the process with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), and even engaged with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
Backed by this level of transparency and confidence, the organization began promoting its innovative product—attracting a significant number of Nigerian users to its platform.
Simply put, the average Nigerian user of CBEX is also a user of ST Technologies. This is why labeling the platform as a scam doesn’t quite add up. In our view, the organization has fulfilled its expected responsibilities.
The question is: Why would a fraudulent entity go through all this? It doesn’t align with typical scam behavior.
ST never hid its affiliation with CBEX—now widely labeled a scam.
Could these actually be legitimate tech organizations doing business? Or are we looking at scammers who were just extremely well-prepared?
The answer isn’t clear yet.
The ST-CBEX Relationship: What Was the Operational Model?
ST publicly announced its partnership with CBEX, stating that it was working on an AI project and one of the capability of the technology is predictability of market movements.
CBEX, a trading platform, allowed integration of such AI tools. So, the partnership made strategic sense.
ST provides AI-generated trading signals, CBEX executes trades based on those predictions.
This is not unusual in today’s rapidly evolving tech space. It’s a common, symbiotic model—one organization offers predictive intelligence, the other executes the strategy.
But could this model really work? Yes—AI-based trading systems are not new.
While 100% prediction accuracy might be unrealistic, AI can reach significant accuracy when combined with market volume, order strength, and other technical indicators or factors.
Was this the model ST adopted? Possibly. Could it be why their signals appeared successful? Also possible. We are not 100% sure but remember this is simply an objective analysis of what we are dealing with here.
Could it be an entirely different model? Perhaps.
It’s important to note, however, that ST Technologies never promised a 100% accurate trading signal. What they did offer was a loss recovery guarantee—and based on our findings, there has been at least one instance of a failed trade where users’ funds were promptly refunded.
What we’re dealing with is innovation—and innovation often challenges the status quo.
If this was a scam, then the level of innovation was surprisingly advanced.
But so far, we can’t conclusively say it was a scam. From the facts so far, this is far from being a scam
Many reputable companies in the space have suffered worse collapses and continued operations without the backlash CBEX faces. Why? Could it be possible that there is more to the attack than just the loss of money and making it look like a scam
Did People Actually Benefit Before the Collapse?
Let’s assess the impact of this project while it was active, and by the way, the ST-CBEX is very much active now, like always
Did people gain?
How accurate are the media’s claims about losses?
What’s being defined as a “loss”?
Humans tend to forget the good and sensationalize the bad.
Countless marriages succeed daily, but divorces dominate the headlines. Why?
Many businesses thrive quietly, but a single failure becomes newsworthy. That’s human nature.
This project ran for over two years.
Based on our findings, most users who joined within the last four months doubled their investments.
Encouraged by early profits, many reinvested. That’s typical human behavior in any investment endeavor this doesn’t mean the platform they are using is scamming them, if not, your banking investment platform could as well be scamming you
But yes, lives were changed for the better—many experienced a real improvement in their quality of life because of this innovative platform.
This is where emotions often cloud judgment.
But we are analyzing based on facts and logic—because the market doesn’t care about emotions. And neither should your investment decisions.
If you lost money, you weren’t wrong for trying to improve your life. Even money kept in the bank carries risk.
More money has been lost in government-backed investments and failed banks that were never publicized, simply because the institutions involved were protected. Let that sink in!
So, Was CBEX a Scam or a PonziPro?
This brings us to the ultimate question: Was CBEX a traditional ponzi scheme or a PonziPro model, like many forex platforms—or even banks (yes, banks!)?
When you really analyze the operations of financial institutions you will see this perfectly legitimate PonziPro model at play every time
Which ponzi scheme in Nigeria has operated for years before crashing?
Another crucial thought is that CBEX might have paid out more money to users than it received inform of deposits—especially over the last years. As against the general believed allegations of carting away with users funds. An allegation that is fact baseless by the way.
How did they consistently fund withdrawals, run offices, and invest millions?
Could user deposits alone cover it?
Unlikely—unless they intended to run at a loss (which no scammer plans to do).
The media keeps talking about how much users put into the system.
But what about how much, users took out of the system?
Thousands of Nigerians withdrew real money.
Yes, some lost money due to greed or poor financial and investment decisions or management which is absolutely not the fault of either ST or CBEX.
But many gained significantly, and this fact should not be ignored at all. Users withdrew Alot of money from the system (We hope and promise to show a few statistics of withdrawals if we are able to comfirm this directly from the ST organization)
There were users who withdrew in hundreds of thousands of dollars, some in tens of thousands of dollars and several people in thousands of dollars and we mean several users!
So the question remains, where did those funds came from? From the same acclaimed ponzi scheme? Or this business model could as well just be 100% real!
Nigerians are resilient, driven, and quick to adopt new technologies. But perhaps that’s also why this incident feels so personal.
It wasn’t just about money—it was about hope.
“It’s easy to criticize something in hindsight. But perhaps three or four years from now, we’ll look back on this present moment—which will then be the past—and everything will finally make perfect sense.”
But the truth is, CBEX and ST Technologies might have represented something more than just a platform—they represented the possibility of economic freedom and it becoming more glaring and this could move alot of cheese.
So again, is this a scam? Or Was it another cyberattack experienced by another tech firm because even the big boys in this space have taken a share of this experience.
Or was it a startup, striving for innovation, brought down before it could scale?
We are giving you all these facts because we want you to decide—based on facts, not noise.
The Aftermath: A Twist That Many Ignored
Now, this is where everything gets even more interesting.
In our findings and research, we discovered that immediately after the incident occurred, ST Technologies stepped up and took responsibility. They began initiating a process to help users recover their funds.
Again, this is not what a typical scam platform would do.
Yet, the media and most bloggers focused entirely on CBEX, without even acknowledging that the organization that had been responsible for user fund protection from the beginning was ST Technologies.
This critical detail seems to have escaped the public eye. Which is one of the reason why we began to think that perhaps the truth has always been available but the media intentionally ignored it or they are just generally irresponsible and should never be listened to or because lies sell more than truth in this part of the world and the media just decide to sell what people always look forward to hear.
Now, we’ll admit—the procedure defined by ST Technologies for fund recovery may have sounded a bit harsh or demanding at first glance.
But when you look at it from a business standpoint, it was likely one of the few options they had in the face of such a massive crisis.
It might not be the perfect strategy, but it was a step toward responsibility, and they acted on it swiftly. Remember they did not register as a charity organization in the first place.
Many users reacted emotionally, which is entirely understandable—people were hurt and afraid. But let’s be honest: it takes a lot of courage to own up to a financial collapse and still stand by the user community.
Our respect for the organization grew after we realized this was not a case of them vanishing overnight.
In fact, around the same time, several other platforms quietly folded without any explanations, refunds, or recovery plans.
ST Technologies and CBEX, on the other hand, stood their ground and faced the backlash.
Objectively speaking, that kind of behavior is not consistent with traditional scam schemes or ponzi operations.
So our final thought, if you are an investor on ST-CBEX platform, we recommend that you drop all the noise on social media and so called trusted media houses and look at the facts yourself.
If you decide to continue with the organization, you might just be right and if you decide not to continue with them, you might as well be right but at the end of the day we want you to owned your decision, don’t be carried by the noise around you. If you cannot do this alone, we recommend you speak to a financial advisor as we are simply giving all these analysis for educational purposes
Remember every and any investment you get yourself into comes with its own risk and the financial investment world, you will not always have all the facts 100% lining up, risk is how people build wealth.
