On March 30, 2025, the cryptocurrency community was abuzz with controversy surrounding Movement Labs. Earlier, on March 24, reports surfaced that Movement Labs had transferred over 24 million MOVE tokens (equivalent to more than $11 million USD) to Coinbase within just two days. This move sparked suspicions that the project might be quietly "dumping" tokens, despite previous claims of a "buyback" initiative to stabilize the market.
Specifically, in a post on X on March 30, the account @Ice_Frog666666 sharply criticized Movement Labs’ actions, labeling them as a "staged act" designed to deceive the community. The user argued that transferring tokens to Coinbase shortly after announcing a $38 million MOVE token buyback plan indicated the project had no real intention of supporting the market, instead engaging in "profit-taking" and "dumping" to cash out.
Facing mounting pressure from the community, Rushi Manche, co-founder of Movement Labs, responded on X on the same day. He clarified that the MOVE tokens transferred to Coinbase were not for dumping but were part of a transaction with a financial institution to prepare for an upcoming institutional product, potentially related to an ETP (exchange-traded product) or ETF (exchange-traded fund). Rushi emphasized that these tokens were used in a loan tied to the product and were neither sold nor transferred as alleged.
This is not the first time Movement Labs has faced controversial allegations. Previously, on January 28, 2025, according to tapchibitcoin.io, Rushi Manche had to publicly refute claims of insider trading linked to World Liberty Financial—a project backed by the Trump family. Suspicious transactions reportedly occurred just two hours before Movement Labs announced its mainnet for developers, raising questions about the project’s transparency. Rushi denied any coordination in those transactions, but the incident further fueled doubts about the project’s operations and internal information management.
However, Rushi Manche’s response failed to gain the community’s trust. Many users, including @Ice_Frog666666, expressed their loss of confidence and demanded concrete evidence to prove the transparency of the transactions. Others, such as @lengyu2021, suggested that Movement Labs hold an AMA (Ask Me Anything) session to address the community’s concerns openly. Meanwhile, negative comments continued to pour in, with several users labeling the project a "scam" and demanding specific timelines for the promised airdrops.
Movement Labs is a blockchain project focused on building a modular ecosystem of blockchains using the Move programming language, aiming to enhance security, performance, and user experience in decentralized networks. Founded by a team of experienced developers, Movement supports various environments such as Aptos, Ethereum-compatible chains (via Move-EVM), and Sui, while also providing tools like the Movement SDK to integrate MoveVM with Solidity, enabling developers to easily build smart contracts and decentralized applications (dApps).
The controversy has continued to heat up crypto forums, with Movement Labs facing significant pressure to regain the community’s trust. Can the project prove its transparency, or will the allegations of "dumping" further drag Movement Labs into a spiral of criticism? The answer remains uncertain, but this situation once again underscores the critical importance of transparency and effective communication in the volatile cryptocurrency industry.
