The cryptocurrency lender Genesis World Holdco filed for chapter late on Thursday, the most recent crypto firm to take action after the collapse of FTX, the change based by Sam Bankman-Fried.
A 12 months in the past, Genesis and a bunch of different giant lending corporations drew thousands and thousands of consumers with the promise that they might deposit their crypto holdings and earn sky-high returns. However Genesis’s chapter submitting makes it the fourth main crypto lender to fail since final spring, when a downturn within the digital asset market despatched costs plunging. Different main lenders which have gone out of enterprise embody Celsius Community and Voyager Digital, whose prospects misplaced billions of {dollars} in deposits.
Genesis survived for longer, however suffered within the fallout from FTX’s implosion. In November, the corporate mentioned it was freezing withdrawals, citing “market turmoil” brought on by the chapter of Mr. Bankman-Fried’s enterprise.
The agency’s submitting in chapter court docket within the Southern District of New York coated three entities — Genesis World Holdco and two of its subsidiaries, Genesis World Capital and Genesis Asia Pacific.
Genesis is a subsidiary of the Digital Foreign money Group, the crypto conglomerate based by Barry Silbert in 2015. Mr. Silbert’s administration and the troubles at Genesis have not too long ago introduced him into battle with two different distinguished crypto executives, Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, who run the change Gemini.
Final week, the Securities and Trade Fee charged Genesis with providing unregistered securities in a partnership with Gemini. Gary Gensler, the S.E.C. chair, mentioned on the time that Genesis and Gemini had bypassed “disclosure necessities designed to guard traders.”
The Winklevosses have publicly accused Genesis’s parent company, DCG, of stalling to maintain funds that belong to its prospects. They’ve additionally claimed that DCG and Genesis misrepresented monetary info and mischaracterized the worth of firm belongings to present the impression that Genesis was in higher well being than it was.
The S.E.C.’s costs in opposition to Genesis and Gemini had been a part of a broader crackdown on crypto lenders. Final February, the S.E.C. introduced $100 million in penalties on BlockFi, a crypto lender. BlockFi filed for chapter in November, making it one of many first large victims of FTX’s collapse.
Earlier on Thursday, the S.E.C. introduced a $45 million settlement with one other crypto lending agency, Nexo, for violating securities legislation.