San Francisco payments firm Ripple is reportedly interested in buying assets from bankrupt crypto lending platform Celsius.
According to a report from Reuters, a spokesperson for Ripple said that the company was looking to see if there was any synergy between it and Celsius’ assets.
The spokesperson declined to say whether Ripple wanted to acquire Celsius outright.
“We are interested in learning about Celsius and its assets, and whether any could be relevant to our business… Ripple has continued to grow exponentially [through recent crypto market turmoil and] is actively looking for M&A opportunities to strategically scale the company.”
Last month, Celsius filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy after it halted all withdrawals from its platform. In New York-based bankruptcy court, the company revealed a $1,190,000,000 deficit on its balance sheet between assets and liabilities.
Celsius recently offered its users the option to either receive cash at an unspecified discount or “remain long” on their crypto assets.
Months after Celsius’ collapse, a committee representing the platform’s users launched an investigation into the situation, including a special focus on CEO Alex Mashinsky, who the committee says made false claims about the company’s business model.
“Those claims were echoed by Mashinsky, who repeatedly promised customers in his public videos and messages that their funds were safe, that Celsius had adequate capital reserves and robust risk management protocols, and that users could withdraw their coins at any time.
Celsius’ assurances turned out to be empty and false promises. On June 12, 2022 – less than a week after promising to ‘damn the torpedoes’ – Celsius initiated a ‘Pause’ and halted all account holder withdrawals due to ‘extreme market conditions.’ Celsius, which had previously championed its transparency, then largely went silent…
The Committee has already started this investigation and will work to ensure causes of action against Mashinsky and others are preserved and prosecuted for the benefit of the Debtors’ estate and the Committee’s constituents.”
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