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Orthogonal Trading is insolvent, defaults on $36 million in loans

The unsecured lending platform Maple Finance published a blog post announcing that they were severing ties with Orthogonal Trading, who had "misrepresented its financial position" for a month. "It is now clear that they have been operating while effectively insolvent, and it will not be possible for them to continue operating a trading business without outside investment," wrote Maple.

On December 3, Orthogonal Trading admitted to Maple that they were unable to meet loan repayments. The group was unable to repay a $10 million loan due the following day. The group has $36 million in liabilities across various loans on Maple's USDC and wETH pools.

Orthogonal Credit, a sister group to Orthogonal Trading, published a blog post distancing themselves, writing that they were "shocked and dismayed" by Trading's misrepresentation. "We are speechless by the extent of the exposure and liquidity position of Orthogonal Trading’s book of business," they wrote. They attributed the insolvency to FTX exposure.

Theme tags: Collapse, Contagion

Genesis owes $900 million to customers of Gemini Earn

After a domino effect in which Gemini suspended withdrawals from its "Earn" lending product due to Genesis suspending withdrawals due to FTX's collapse, it's been revealed by the FT that Genesis holds around $900 million in Gemini customer assets.

Gemini has formed a creditor committee to try to recoup funds from Genesis, as well as Genesis parent company DCG.

Theme tags: Collapse, Contagion

Auros misses loan payment due to FTX exposure

Crypto trading firm Auros missed a payment on its 2,400 wETH (~$3 million) loan from the Maple defi lending project. According to M11 Credit, the operator of the credit pool from which Auros has taken the loan, this was due to "a short-term liquidity issue as a result of the FTX insolvency".

In total, Auros has 8,400 wETH (~$10.7 million) and $7.5 million in USDC in loans from M11 credit pools, plus another $2.4 million in loans from the Clearpool defi lending project, for a total of more than $20 million in unsecured loans.

Theme tags: Contagion
Blockchain tags: Blockchain: Ethereum
Tech tags: DeFi

BlockFi files for bankruptcy

Crypto lending firm BlockFi has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the wake of the FTX collapse. The company was in dire straits in the spring after Terra and Three Arrows Capital blow-ups, but was bailed out in June by a $250 million loan from FTX, followed by a deal giving BlockFi a $400 million credit facility and giving FTX the "option to acquire" BlockFi.

Because of this dependency, it was no surprise when BlockFi announced they were once again in crisis following the FTX explosion. On November 15, the Wall Street Journal reported they were preparing for possible bankruptcy and considering layoffs.

On November 28, BlockFi filed for bankruptcy. Their filing estimates they have more than 100,000 creditors (the maximum option on the form), between $1–10 billion in assets, and between $1–10 billion in liabilities.

Theme tags: Collapse, Contagion

150 companies seek Binance's bailout for organizations "facing significant, short term, financial difficulties"

On November 14, CZ of Binance announced an "industry recovery fund", which he said would devote money to ending "further cascading negative effects of FTX [and] help projects who are otherwise strong, but in a liquidity crisis".

In a blog post outlining the $1 billion initiative, Binance also divulged that "we have already received around 150 applications from companies seeking support under the [Industry Recovery Initiative]" — only a week and a half after it was announced.

Theme tags: Contagion, Hmm

Genesis warns of bankruptcy if it can't raise $1 billion

Genesis Global Trading has reportedly been telling investors that Genesis may need to file for bankruptcy if its attempts to raise at least $1 billion in new capital don't succeed. The firm revealed its exposure to FTX last week, halting withdrawals from its lending service and acknowledging that its derivatives arm has $175 million in funds locked in the bankrupt exchange.

The Wall Street Journal then reported that Genesis had been seeking a $1 billion emergency loan due to a "liquidity crunch due to certain illiquid assets on its balance sheet".

The halting of withdrawals from Genesis' lending business has already had major downstream impacts, as it is a major partner of other crypto lending services. Gemini and Coinhouse both followed Genesis in suspending withdrawals, as did other firms including Donut and GOPAX.

A Genesis bankruptcy would be a monumental event in crypto, with enormous downstream exposure.

Theme tags: Contagion

Coinhouse suspends "savings accounts" due to Genesis suspension due to FTX collapse

The French crypto broker Coinhouse announced that they would be suspending withdrawals from their crypto "savings account" product. Coinhouse partners with Genesis to offer the service, and Genesis recently suspended their service due to the FTX collapse. As a result, services that relied on Genesis, including Gemini and now Coinhouse, are halting their own services as the dominoes continue to fall.
Theme tags: Contagion

Nigerian startup Nestcoin has nearly all funds locked in FTX, announces layoffs

Nestcoin, a Nigerian startup that both builds and invests products they hope will "democratis[e] access to economic opportunity for everyday people in frontier markets", has announced that they will lay off more than 50% of their nearly 100 employees. Remaining employees will see their pay slashed by 40%, and the company CEO plans to take no compensation at all.

Nestcoin had nearly all of the funds remaining from their $6.45 million funding round locked in FTX — approximately $4 million.

Theme tags: Contagion

Gemini halts withdrawals from their lending service

The Gemini cryptocurrency platform announced that they would be pausing withdrawals on their lending platform. This is because they partner closely with Genesis' lending products, which halted withdrawals shortly before.

The company said in a blog post that they were "working with the Genesis team" to restore withdrawals. Like Genesis, they tried to urge that the issue would not affect other Gemini products. However, a service outage that same day did little to strengthen trust in the company.

Theme tags: Contagion

Genesis crypto lending service halts withdrawals

The crypto lending portion of Genesis Global Trading announced they would be halting withdrawals in the wake of the "extreme market dislocation and loss of industry confidence caused by the FTX implosion". On Twitter, they wrote that "FTX has created unprecedented market turmoil, resulting in abnormal withdrawal requests which have exceeded our current liquidity."

They urged in their announcement that the decision would not impact their trading or custody businesses — though if I was a user of their other services I might not be feeling so reassured given crypto companies' poor track record of segregating operations.

Genesis has about $2.8 billion in total active loans as of the end of September 2022.

This is not the first crisis for Genesis this year. The firm lost hundreds of millions due to exposure to the Three Arrows Capital collapse, and in August announced layoffs of 20% of their employees.

Theme tags: Contagion

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