Wallet trace — what the Professor maps:

• Deposit transaction hashes from the claimant wallet to the FT Markets platform receiving address.
• Forwarding wallets the platform consolidated through — typically two to four hops on the deposit chain (BTC / ETH / USDT-TRC20 / BSC / Polygon / Arbitrum / Optimism / Avalanche).
• Bridge crossings between chains, where the operator moves value into a chain with deeper liquidity ahead of the off-ramp.
• Mixer interactions — Tornado-Cash variants, Sinbad, and the smaller obfuscation services that operators rotate through under regulatory pressure.
• Final off-ramp wallet — the centralised exchange deposit address that received the consolidated funds.

Off-ramp reading — exchange counterparty for FT Markets:

• Endpoint counterparty in the FT Markets casefile is named — typically a major venue such as OKX or Bybit, sometimes Gate.io or KuCoin, occasionally Binance or Huobi when liquidity allows.
• FT Markets’s off-ramp wallet is then matched against compliance feeds the Professor maintains a standing read on.
• Leverage is applied to that named counterparty — the FT Markets packet is assembled to a standard the off-ramp’s compliance desk reads and acts on.
• If the FT Markets off-ramp is non-cooperative, the casefile escalates to IC3, the relevant state AG, and (where dollar value warrants) a civil-discovery overlay for KYC.

Recovery pathway — how this casefile moves toward filing:

1. Triage on FT Markets — submission read against a no-go checklist, written go/no-go returned to the claimant inside one business day.
2. Trace on FT Markets — deposit pathway mapped across chains, captured with chain-of-custody hashes.
3. Identify on FT Markets — off-ramp endpoint matched to a named exchange counterparty.
4. File the FT Markets packet — IC3, state AG (where loss meets state thresholds), off-ramp compliance desk, and civil-discovery overlay where dollar value supports it.
5. Follow-through on FT Markets — the Professor stays on the casefile until a documented next step exists.

What the casefile records — chains and counterparties:

• Deposit-side chains in FT Markets casefiles — typically the major chains (BTC, ETH) and the high-throughput stablecoin chains (Tron USDT, BSC USDT) — with bridge crossings noted.
• Off-ramps named in FT Markets packets — centralised exchanges that accept regulator-grade compliance filings.
• Filing options on FT Markets — IC3 (US), state AG, off-ramp compliance desk, civil-discovery KYC where the dollar value warrants it.

Lines we never cross — by published policy:

• Hard line on FT Markets — no seed-phrase requests, period.
• Hard line on FT Markets — no remote logins requested.
• Hard line on FT Markets — no upfront cash retainer.
• Hard line on FT Markets — no guarantee language.
• Hard line on FT Markets — no unsolicited phone outreach.