The way I saw it was that the potential profits of sitting on an exchange generating constant revenue through transaction fees would make the ICO look like pocket change. That's why I thought nobody would actually be stupid enough to let a pump group on that side of the deal. If they were going to play with the price then they'd have to do it at the buyer side and not at the seller side.
Thats why I don't believe Bter was actively involved in this. They are the largest volume provider for NXT and 2nd largest for Bitshares, ranked 3 and 4 on coinmarketcap. Stunts like these can ruin them and they would know it.
I withdrew everything I had from there. I thought they were just the arbiter in all of this exactly because they their whole fucking exchange to lose. The fact that they're willing to play with schemes like this suggests to me that they're have started to take stock before the whole thing comes down.