Since Mantra’s OM token crashed by over 99% in April, the project team and crypto exchange OKX have been embroiled in an ongoing blame game at the expense of investors.
In a recent statement, the exchange claimed that the team borrowed ‘significant amounts of USDT’ and used OM as collateral to ‘inflate’ the price of the token.
Following the price manipulation, the exchange’s risk team was forced to freeze the accounts and liquidate a portion of Mantra [OM] after the price fell slightly, triggering an aggressive sell-off across other platforms.
OKX added,
“There has been no explanation of where those unusually large quantities of OM originated, nor why these groups of individuals held and controlled such a substantial portion of the token supply.”
The exchange called the Mantra team’s accusations a ‘misleading narrative.’
Mixed reactions to OM’s price crash
However, other users, like Park Yong, questioned OKX’s interest and posed,
“If OKX genuinely viewed $OM as a scam, the response would be simple: delist it, allow withdrawals, and move on.”
He added,
“Is this really about user protection, or is there internal exposure related to $OM that became uncomfortable once migration timelines came into play?”
For the unfamiliar, Mantra is a tokenization-focused protocol that will be migrating into a fully fledged Layer 1 (L2) from Ethereum.
As a result, it will change its ERC-20 governance token, OM, to MANTRA., The migration will be finalized by the 15th of January 2026.
With the migration schedule, OKX reached out to the team to help facilitate the conversion of its OM holdings.
Although the exchange said that there were legal actions underway, Mantra CEO JP Mullin denied such actions, affirming,
“Neither MANTRA or myself have any ongoing litigation or legal actions ongoing with OKX. This is between them and other larger traders/investors of OM.”
Mantra reverses 600% gain
During the late 2024 rally, which extended into February 2025, OM posted a 600% gain.
Although it erased part of the gains amid early 2025 tariff headwinds, it dumped over 80% after OKX froze the team accounts amid manipulation claims.
As of press time, OM traded at $0.07 and had been experiencing overwhelmingly bearish sentiment in the Futures market, according to CoinGlass.
But beyond the price chart, the chain has been positioning itself with new products, including a stablecoin, MantraUSD.
There are still over 36K holders of OM ahead of the migration. It remains to be seen whether the migration will help the chain move past the OKX and project team scandal.
Final Thoughts
- The Mantra team and OKX have denied crashing the OM price by over 90% in 2025.
- Large OM investors were reportedly suing OKX for losses, according to the Mantra chain CEO.
