Frustrated Nigerians have taken on April 15 to social media to express their anger after being locked out of their accounts on the digital investment platform CBEX, with many fearing that their hard-earned savings have been lost.
The platform, which attracted users with promises of high returns, has left countless customers unable to access their investments. Videos of distraught investors, some in tears, have circulated online, highlighting the growing panic as many are unable to withdraw their funds.
In Ibadan, a city in the south-west, a group of customers even ransacked a CBEX office, taking furniture and equipment in their outrage.
CBEX had assured investors that their money would double every month, an offer that appealed to many Nigerians in the face of a challenging economic environment. However, after the platform froze access to accounts over the weekend, frustration quickly turned to anger. One investor, Ola, told BBC Pidgin that he had been ready to withdraw 450,000 naira ($280; £210) just days before the freeze, only to be advised to wait. “Now it has crashed,” he said, echoing the sentiments of many who have shared stories of substantial losses, with one person reporting a loss of $16,000.
The company has yet to publicly address the issue, though some investors who reached out on the messaging service Telegram were told that a hacking incident was to blame and that the problem would be resolved soon. This situation has raised alarms about the safety of unregulated digital platforms, with Nigeria’s Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) having previously warned about the risks of such investments, which some experts fear may be Ponzi schemes. The current crisis has drawn comparisons to the 2016 collapse of MMM, another investment platform that left millions of Nigerians devastated when it froze its transactions.