LBank Review 2026: Is It Safe? Proof of Reserves, Licences, the Japan Warning, Fee Comparison and Sign-up

I have no experience using LBank. This article is what I put together on 31 October 2026 after checking LBank’s official pages, its official public API, regulators’ registers and notices, CoinGecko and media reports. It is not a review based on use; where I could not find something, I say so.

This review starts with LBank’s background and security record, then sets out its licences, regulatory warnings and restricted regions. After that come sign-up, fees (with a worked comparison against MEXC, BingX and WEEX), USDT deposits and withdrawals, and earn, and it ends with the pros and cons and who it suits.

What kind of exchange LBank is

The user numbers and listing speed are claims from LBank’s About Us page, and LBank’s own figures do not agree: the FAQ on the same page says “3000 million”, and a June 2026 press release says 25 million. The operating entity and governing law come from the user service agreement updated on 22 July 2026: disputes go first to negotiation, and if that fails, to arbitration in Dubai at the Dubai International Arbitration Centre (DIAC). The app developer name comes from the Apple App Store; CoinMarketCap’s profile, on the other hand, says the operator is LBK Blockchain Co., Limited. The official documents do not make clear which company you would deal with if something went wrong.

The founder stepping back comes from LBank’s 30 August 2024 press release, which does not say who took over.

This article covers only safety, fees, deposits and withdrawals, and earn; it does not discuss futures, leverage or copy trading.

Is LBank safe?

Proof of reserves: promised in 2022, not found today

A proof of reserves is an exchange publishing how much it holds in its wallets and comparing that with the total of all user balances. A ratio of 100% or more means that at the time of the snapshot the exchange held enough coins to cover every user’s balance.

After FTX collapsed, LBank announced in November 2022 that it would publish an auditable Merkle tree proof of reserves; an August 2024 press release also mentioned Merkle tree verification and on-chain asset verification. But this is what I found on 31 October 2026:

• There is no proof of reserves page on LBank’s website or help center, and no tool for users to verify their own balance; the usual addresses (such as /proof-of-reserves) return 404.
• LBank’s page on CoinMarketCap has no reserve data and no reserve audit record, only a “submit reserve data” button.

In other words, LBank has no public proof of reserves at the moment, and readers have no way to confirm whether it holds enough assets to cover user balances. This is the biggest difference between LBank and MEXC, BingX and WEEX, which are compared below: all three have Merkle tree proofs of reserves that users can verify themselves. For what a proof of reserves can and cannot prove, see the proof of reserves guide.

The US$100 million futures risk protection fund: futures price spikes only

On 12 March 2025 LBank announced a US$100 million “futures risk protection fund” (official announcement). It applies only to sudden price spikes (“wicks”): on futures pairs for the top 100 coins by market cap, if the candlestick price moves more than 2% away from the fair price within 1 minute and then quickly comes back, users who were liquidated or stopped out because of it can receive 120% of the loss.

This fund is not insurance that protects user assets if the exchange is hacked or goes under. The announcement gives no wallet address, and I found nothing that would let a third party check that the fund exists. The VIP page also mentions a “US$100 million User Protection Fund” of the same size, but I could not find its rules, and LBank has not said whether the two are the same money.

Hack record: none found; LBank claims ten years without a security incident

I found no reports of LBank’s exchange wallets being hacked or of withdrawals being suspended. LBank says “ten years with zero security incidents” repeatedly on its website and in press releases, and its Q1 2026 report also says it blocked more than US$10 million in potential losses (press release). These are LBank’s own claims, independent coverage is scarce, and not finding something does not mean it never happened.

The dispute I could find is about account freezes. In March 2020 a user said publicly that LBank had frozen his account and asked for his address, utility bills and online shopping records before unfreezing it; LBank said the account had received assets from another account that had been stolen, which triggered its risk controls (Sina Finance, 5 March 2020). LBank’s current help article also states that incomplete identity information, unverified sources of funds, legal requests or unusual trading can lead to some or all account functions being restricted.

Account security settings

According to LBank’s help center:

• Passkeys and 2FA: you can turn on passkeys and Google Authenticator.
• Withdrawal address allowlist: once on, you can only withdraw to addresses in your address book, and you can add a lock that blocks withdrawals to a new address for 24 hours (guide).
• Anti-phishing code: once set, official emails from LBank show your code (guide, 30 September 2026).
• Withdrawal lock after changes: after you reset your password, change Google Authenticator, reset SMS verification or change your email, withdrawals are paused for 24 hours (guide).
• Security certification and bug bounty: LBank’s press releases say it passed an audit by Prescient Security in Q1 2026 and obtained ISO/IEC 27001:2022 information security management certification, and in August 2026 said it would join CertiK’s bug bounty program. For both, I saw only LBank’s own press releases and found no public bug report page or reward rules.

Does LBank have a licence? Regulatory record and restricted regions

Licences: only US and Canadian MSB registrations, both in the registers

LBank’s Global Regulatory Compliance page now lists only two items, and on 31 October 2026 I found both in the regulators’ registers:

An MSB is only an anti-money-laundering registration with the local authority. It is not an operating licence for an exchange, and it does not mean local supervision. FinCEN notes on its register that it does not verify the information businesses file, and that being listed is not an endorsement. On top of that, the US and Canada are both on LBank’s own list of restricted regions, so the regions these two registrations cover are exactly the places LBank does not serve.

Other claims that often appear online, and what I found:

Regulators’ warnings and enforcement actions

Most of these records concern “serving local users without local registration or a licence”; none accuses LBank of misusing assets. The company names differ: Japan in 2024 named LBank Exchange; Japan in 2025, Spain and India named LBK Blockchain Co., Limited; Dubai named LBK BLOCKCHAIN FZCO; and Australia named LBK.Info Pty Ltd. Apart from Canada, none of the countries in the table are on LBank’s list of restricted regions. The Philippine SEC’s notice page blocked my direct access, so that entry comes from BitPinas’s report. I found no criminal judgment or sanctions record naming LBank.

Watch out for sites impersonating LBank: the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (28 March 2024, press release), New Zealand’s Financial Markets Authority (8 September 2025) and Thailand’s SEC (12 December 2025) have all warned the public about websites posing as LBank, such as lbbwg.com, online-lbanks.com and lbank-t666.com. These warnings are about the fake sites, not LBank itself. Check the address before logging in; turning on the anti-phishing code mentioned above also makes it easier to tell real official emails apart.

Lists I checked where LBank was not found (31 October 2026): a search of the UK FCA website, the Hong Kong SFC list of suspicious virtual asset trading platforms, the Monetary Authority of Singapore investor alert list, the US CFTC RED List of foreign entities, the French AMF blacklists, the Polish Financial Supervision Authority (KNF) warning list and the Australian ASIC warning list. Not being on a list does not mean holding a local licence.

Restricted regions

According to the user service agreement updated on 22 July 2026, LBank does not accept sign-ups from individuals in these countries or regions:

Afghanistan, Antigua and Barbuda, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Central African Republic, Crimea, Cuba, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Donetsk, Egypt, Guinea-Bissau, Hong Kong, Iran, Iraq, Kyrgyzstan, Lebanon, Lesotho, Libya, Luhansk, Macau, mainland China, Mali, Mauritania, North Korea, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan (including Darfur), Syria, the United States, Uruguay, Yemen and Canada.

The agreement also says companies in the US and mainland China cannot open corporate accounts. Singapore, the UK, Japan, Malaysia, Spain, the Philippines, India and the UAE are not on the list, but not being on the list does not mean local law allows you to use it; authorities in Japan, Malaysia, Spain, the Philippines, India and Dubai have all issued the warnings or taken the actions described above.

How to sign up for LBank

Create an account with an email address or phone number, enter the invitation code in the invitation code field, then complete identity verification (KYC). Among international exchanges, LBank is one with less public information: it has no proof of reserves, and its terms do not give the operating company’s full name. Before signing up, read the safety and regulatory sections above in full and make sure you are not in a restricted region. For what other LBank codes found online actually give and how to check one before signing up, see LBank referral code.

LBank trading fees: 0.1% spot, 0.02% maker and 0.06% taker on futures

These are the rates shown on LBank’s official fee page and VIP page on 31 October 2026. Reaching the threshold for any one of 30-day spot volume, 30-day futures volume or 30-day average assets moves you up a tier:

• For VIP 4 to VIP 6, see the official VIP page. According to the official guide, VIP tiers are recalculated daily at 10:00 (UTC+8), the three criteria cannot be combined, and tiers reached on assets alone have no downgrade protection.
• The official fee page notes that some coins may not follow this fee schedule during certain periods, and actual trade records prevail; check the rate for a spot pair on the order screen.
• I found no rule on the official pages for paying fees with a platform token.
• A maker order waits on the order book for someone else to fill it; a taker order fills against an existing order. At VIP 0 the spot maker and taker rates are the same, so placing a limit order is no cheaper.

In money terms: a regular user buying 1,000 USDT of BTC on spot pays 0.1% whether as maker or taker, a fee of 1 USDT.

Compared with MEXC, BingX and WEEX: regular users and after fee rebates

The table below uses the regular-user taker rates in this site’s exchange data table, plus the official fee rebate percentages synced to each exchange’s invitation code box on 31 October 2026, to work out the fee on a 1,000 USDT trade (futures at a notional value of 1,000 USDT):

How it is calculated: fee = trade amount × taker rate × (1 − rebate percentage). For LBank spot, 1,000 × 0.1% × (1 − 30%) = 0.70 USDT.

• Spot: for regular users, LBank charges 0.1% like BingX and WEEX, twice MEXC’s 0.05%. With fee rebates, LBank’s 0.70 USDT is the most expensive of the four: 0.15 USDT more than BingX and 0.30 USDT more than MEXC.
• Futures: for regular users, LBank’s 0.06% sits between BingX (0.05%) and WEEX (0.08%). With rebates, LBank’s 0.30 USDT is less than WEEX’s 0.32 USDT and more than BingX’s 0.275 USDT, and MEXC’s 0.08 USDT is still the lowest.
• This is the fee on a single taker trade; it does not include spreads, slippage or withdrawal fees. Rates and rebate percentages can change. This site’s figures for each exchange are those in the fact card above and in the international exchange fee comparison; for how fee rebates are calculated, see the exchange fee rebate guide.

Depositing and withdrawing USDT on-chain

On LBank’s deposit page, choose USDT and a network, copy the address, and withdraw from the sending side. Both sides must use the same network, or the funds may not be recoverable. Deposits are free; withdrawals cost a fixed network fee regardless of the amount.

On 31 October 2026 LBank’s official public API also listed Plasma (withdrawal fee 0.2 USDT, minimum withdrawal 1 USDT), NEAR and Kaia (API name klay; both 1 USDT, minimum withdrawal 5 USDT); Avalanche C-Chain was open for deposits only that day, with withdrawals suspended.

• BEP20 and Plasma, at 0.2 USDT, are LBank’s cheapest networks, and TRC20, at 1.5 USDT, is the most expensive. Compared with the official data for MEXC, BingX and WEEX in this site’s data table (22 and 23 October 2026), LBank’s withdrawal fees on BEP20 (0.2 USDT), Polygon (1 USDT) and TON (1 USDT) are the highest of the four; on BEP20, MEXC charges 0.01 USDT and WEEX 0.05 USDT.
• TON has two entries: the API lists the TON network for USDT twice with the same contract address. One is for deposits only and needs a memo; the other allows withdrawals and needs no memo. When depositing, follow the network and memo shown on the deposit page; a deposit without the memo may not arrive.
• Withdrawal fees are adjusted from time to time; the withdrawal page shows the current fee.

If a transfer is confirmed on-chain but the exchange has not credited it, see what to check in USDT deposit delayed: what to do.

LBank earn: Spot Earn

LBank’s earn products come in two main kinds: flexible “Spot Earn” and fixed-term locked earn. According to LBank’s official LBank Earn guide and Spot Earn page (31 October 2026):

• How interest works: once it is on, your assets stay in the spot account and can still be traded and withdrawn; interest is calculated daily and paid to the earn account the next day. Any later deposit or transfer of the same coin into the spot account joins automatically, with no need to subscribe again.
• USDT rate: the page shows 2.9% to 15% APR for USDT, with the top 15% marked for new users. The official tiers are 12% APR on up to 200 USDT and 2.9% on the part above 200 USDT. Rates float and may change at any time.
• Redemption: there is no lock-up, so you can redeem at any time, except between 00:00 and 00:30 each day, when earnings are settled. Some coins may have redemption delays or limits.
• Where the yield comes from: LBank says earnings come mainly from the platform’s use of the assets (liquidity support, lending matching), changes in market rates, and LBank’s marketing rewards.
• Fees and guarantees: LBank says subscribing and redeeming are free, but does not say how much of the earnings it keeps; it also states that neither principal nor earnings are guaranteed.
• Fixed-term products usually cannot be redeemed early; there is also “Futures Earn” for VIP users who have completed KYC, which this article does not cover because it involves futures.

Putting USDT in an exchange earn product means taking on several layers of risk: USDT itself, the exchange and the borrowers. With no proof of reserves at LBank, the exchange layer is even harder to see. USDT flexible earn rates at several exchanges are updated daily in the USDT earn rate comparison. For the extra risk idle USDT carries in exchange earn products compared with short-term Treasury ETFs and Aave lending, see Where to park idle USD and USDT.

Pros and cons: who LBank suits

Under this site’s exchange rating methodology, LBank currently scores 0 on “security and reserves” because it has no proof of reserves, and its total ranks near the bottom of the exchanges this site covers; the score for each item and its sources are in the fact card above. If you are still comparing exchanges, start with how to choose a crypto exchange, then compare with exchanges that do have a proof of reserves: the MEXC review, BingX review and WEEX review. More exchange guides are on the crypto topic page.