The point
Six is how many proof-of-reserves attestations CoinSwitch has published since January 2023, the latest showing a ₹613 crore surplus over customer holdings as of 31 March 2026. Zero is how many ZebPay or Giottus have published, despite both promising one in November 2022. An attestation proves one narrow thing: that on a stated date, a named accountant found enough crypto and cash sitting where it should be. Here is how to check that yourself, and what even the good ones leave out.
What does a proof-of-reserves attestation check?
A proof-of-reserves attestation is a chartered accountant's factual finding, narrower in scope than a full financial audit. In India, the standard usually named is SRS 4400, a format the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India sets for "agreed-upon procedures": the accountant checks specific facts the platform asked them to check, and says whether the numbers match, without forming an opinion on the business as a whole.
The check itself is simple to describe. The accountant totals what the platform holds in crypto and in rupees, totals what customers are owed, and states the ratio between the two. A ratio of 1:1 or higher means the platform is holding at least as much as it owes, on that date.
That last phrase carries the whole limitation. A PoR is a photograph, not a video. It says what was true on the stated date. It says nothing about the day before or the day after, and nothing about whether the coins sat there because that is where they belong or because they were moved there for the count and moved out again afterward. ZebPay's own explainer on the method is honest about this: a Merkle-tree reserve check "cannot ascertain if funds have been borrowed by an exchange to pass an audit," and it cannot confirm exclusive ownership of the private keys behind a wallet either.
The five checks to run on any platform's attestation
Run these five in order. Most attestations fail at least one, and knowing which one tells you what the document is worth.
1. Is there a dated document at all?
Start here, because plenty of platforms talk about proof of reserves without ever publishing one. If the platform's own page says "committed to transparency" but the records section under it is empty, you have your answer before you read another word.
2. Who signed it?
A real attestation names a firm. CoinSwitch's published editions describe the reviewer only as "a qualified chartered accountancy firm," without naming the firm itself, across at least its fifth and sixth editions. That gap matters, though the standard applied (SRS 4400) stays named and checkable even when the firm is not.
3. What exactly was compared?
Look for two numbers next to each other: total platform holdings, and total customer holdings, broken out by crypto and by rupees. A document that only asserts a ratio without showing the two totals it came from is not something you can verify, only something you can believe.
4. Which legal entity does the number cover?
A platform is rarely one company. CoinSwitch's fifth edition named the two entities under review, Bitcipher Labs LLP and Nextgendev Solutions Private Limited, and said in the same breath that assets held by PeepalCo, the parent brand, were "not included in this POR assessment." That is a useful sentence to find, because it tells you the boundary of what got checked.
5. What does it say nothing about?
Liabilities, for one: a reserve figure and a liabilities figure answer different questions, and a PoR is built to answer only the first. Custody structure is another: whether the crypto sits in a hot wallet the platform can move in minutes or cold storage it takes hours to access is a separate fact a PoR does not carry. A platform's own statement that it does not lend out user funds, however sincerely meant, is a claim sitting next to the audit rather than inside it.
What CoinSwitch's six attestations show
CoinSwitch is the only one of the three platforms with something to point at, so it carries the worked example. Its fifth edition, published 7 May 2025 and covering the position as of 31 March 2025, reported total holdings of ₹2,764.20 crore against customer holdings of ₹2,138.64 crore, a surplus of ₹625.56 crore. More than 95 percent of the crypto sat in CoinSwitch's own custodial wallets and exchange, the report said, with the rest on partner exchanges.
The sixth edition, covering 31 March 2026 and reported in the press on 25 May 2026, showed total holdings of ₹2,360.33 crore against customer holdings of ₹1,747.25 crore, a surplus of ₹613.08 crore. Split by asset type: crypto reserves of ₹2,140.58 crore against ₹1,673.41 crore owed to customers, and INR reserves of ₹219.75 crore against ₹73.83 crore owed. Bitcoin made up 40.62 percent of the crypto held, Ethereum 10.38 percent.
Both editions are worth reading past the headline surplus, because CryptoTimes' coverage of the sixth edition carried a caveat worth keeping: this kind of publication, even when independently reviewed, "does not constitute a full financial audit" and does not assess asset liquidity or operational controls under stress. The same limit applies to every platform publishing an SRS 4400 attestation, and CoinSwitch's is simply the one this piece can show in full.
Why ZebPay and Giottus don't have one to check
What follows sits on their own pages, read on 25 August 2026, stated here as fact rather than judgment.
ZebPay's only public content on the subject is a blog post from 11 November 2022 explaining what proof of reserves is in general, complete with a quote from Binance's then-CEO calling on exchanges to adopt it. The post is an explainer of the industry method, Merkle trees and all. It contains no ZebPay-specific figures, no auditor name, and no date for a ZebPay report, because there has not been one. A direct request to zebpay.com/proof-of-reserves returns a 404. CoinGecko's own exchange data lists ZebPay's reserves as unavailable.
Giottus went one step further and built the page. giottus.com/proof-of-reserves is headlined "Committed to transparency," and states that the company "is forerunner in publicly acknowledging the need for publishing proof of reserves." CEO Vikram Subburaj told CoinDesk in November 2022 that Giottus was "ready to go ahead and publicise" its numbers. Nearly four years on, the records section of that same page reads, in full: "No records available."
Both companies did the easy part in 2022. Neither has done the part that costs something: publishing the attestation itself, with real numbers, that a customer could check against the five items above.
What this means before your next deposit
The checklist above works on any platform, including Qatobit, which publishes its own reserve position on the same "check it yourself" logic rather than asking anyone to take a founder's word for it. A page that says "committed to transparency" is a promise. A dated document naming a standard, a reviewer, two totals, and a named entity is the thing the promise was supposed to produce. Ask which one you are looking at before you decide what it tells you.
What happens to your holdings if a platform stops operating altogether, reserves or not, is a separate checklist worth running, and whether the crypto in your basket is legally yours in the first place is another. Reading a fee schedule closely rewards the same instinct: the costs most platforms never put on one line stay invisible until someone goes looking. The July 2025 case of customer funds surviving an operational-wallet breach is the clearest real example of why the custody-versus-operations boundary matters more than the surplus number does. Qatobit published its own methodology before launch, not after, for the same reason this checklist exists: a number is easiest to trust when you were shown how to check it yourself.
Frequently asked questions
Is a proof-of-reserves attestation the same as a financial audit?
No. CryptoTimes' coverage of CoinSwitch's own sixth edition made this explicit: an SRS 4400 attestation confirms specific agreed facts, like a reserve ratio, and "does not constitute a full financial audit" of the business.
Which Indian crypto platforms have published a proof-of-reserves attestation?
As of 25 August 2026, CoinSwitch has published six editions since January 2023, most recently reporting a ₹613.08 crore surplus as of 31 March 2026. ZebPay and Giottus have each explained the concept publicly since November 2022 but have not published their own dated attestation.
Does a reserve surplus mean a platform is completely safe?
No. A surplus shown in an attestation is a snapshot of one date and says nothing about liabilities, encumbrances, or whether the same coins were held there the day before or after. It is one useful fact, and on its own it stops well short of a safety guarantee.
Why do some proof-of-reserves reports not name the auditing firm?
CoinSwitch's published editions describe the reviewer only as "a qualified chartered accountancy firm" rather than naming it, across at least two consecutive editions. The standard applied, SRS 4400, is still named and checkable even when the firm is not.
What is the difference between a platform's crypto holdings and its liabilities?
Holdings are what a platform has on hand right now. Liabilities are what it owes customers. A proof-of-reserves attestation compares the two at a point in time; it does not track ongoing obligations the way a liabilities statement would.
Crypto investments are subject to market risk. Not financial advice.
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