WEX was an obvious scam right from the very beginning, anyone who didn't see it or do any research on them before handing over their coins only has themselves to blame.
i have mixed feelings about that. i don't think wex launched with any ill intentions. btc-e got all their $$ nabbed by its payment processors and the feds (along with domain, servers, etc). the first thing they did was refund 55-60% of all account value to users. they issued tokens for the debt, some of which they repaid over time. they seemed to have every intention of making good.
obviously something happened in june/july 2018. i'm not sure if it was a botched transfer of ownership, some sort of robbery or compromise, or something else. there are some suspicions the admins robbed the exchange at that point (and shut down withdrawals) to fund vinnik's fight against extradition to the USA. to me,
that's when it became a scam. i don't see why they would pay back 60% of the money, run an exchange for a year,
and then scam if it was a scam from the very beginning.
I've yet to see any solid proof that this was the work of hackers either - has their been any or are we to believe that it's true "because binance says so"? My first thoughts were that it's another inside job like most centralized exchange hacks are.
why though? they're not haircutting user funds (and stealing them). they're compensating users for everything.