The APEX Network crowdsale launched on January 29 at 2018, 5:00 pm Beijing/China Standard (GMT +8). Just over an hour later at 6:11 pm (GMT +8), APEX Network announced the crowd sale had successfully ended.

The NEO to USD price was pegged at 1 NEO : $130.50 USD on January 22, 2018. The hardcap for the crowd sale was set at $5.2 million (about 40,000 NEO tokens), and a total count of 10,000 whitelisted participants allowed to partake.

APEX Network warned token sale investors would need to participate within the first hour of the crowd sale to ensure their contributions, for investors to remain within their individual contribution caps, and to avoid purchasing a previously approved whitelisted account, as addresses provided in the KYC/AML process can not be altered.

The final NEO = CPX rate (for the private sale, public presale, and crowd sale) was set at 1 NEO = 1,000 CPX. The following individual caps for the crowd sale was divided into the following phases:

– 1st hour, 4 NEO individual maximum cap (which was guaranteed for whitelisted participants);
– 2nd hour, 10 NEO individual maximum cap; and,
– 3rd hour, 30 NEO individual maximum cap.

To prepare for the crowd sale, APEX Network provided extra security measures for their website, and prepared for a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack. Two backup plans were developed in case of issues at the time of the launch:

1. In case the website was down at the time of the crowd sale, a backup server/URL would be announced via the official Telegram channel; and,
2. In case the backup server was compromised, the public key would be emailed to whitelisted applicants.

The crowd sale, even with the hardcap limit reached promptly and extra security measures set in place, was met with issues for token sale participants.

APEX Network opted to run the crowd sale via ‘regular NEO transfer’ – from investor to a unique NEO address for APEX. Shortly after beginning the crowd sale, malicious individuals were able to hack the APEX Network website, and change the address for the crowd sale.

APEX responded by shutting down their website, and sharing the official public key with investors through their two main social media platforms, Twitter and Telegram. Additionally, Jimmy Hu, Founder and CEO of APEX Network, took a selfie with the new address timestamped to further verify the validity of the new address.

To remedy the investors who submitted NEO tokens to the hacked address, APEX has ensured they will reimburse participants who used the key on the hacked website. The reimbursement only applies to those who submitted to that particular fraudulent address on the website.

The team will be conducting a full investigation into the wrong-doings of the malicious actors who changed the donation address. Once the investigation has concluded, crowd sale participants will be able to check their contribution status.

Further updates by APEX Network can be viewed on their website, their Twitter account, or Telegram.

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