• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Republica Press

Your Business & Political News Source

REPUBLICA PRESS
Your Business & Political News Source

  • Home
  • BUSINESS
  • MONEY
  • POLITICS
  • REAL ESTATE
  • SCIENCE/TECH
  • US
  • WORLD

EXCLUSIVE Texas securities regulator is probing Celsius account freeze – official

by

>>> Don’t Miss Today’s BEST Amazon Deals!<<<<

WASHINGTON, June 16 (Reuters) – State securities regulators in Alabama, Kentucky, New Jersey, Texas and Washington are investigating crypto lender Celsius Network’s decision this week to suspend customer redemptions, Joseph Rotunda, enforcement director at the Texas State Securities Board told Reuters on Thursday.

Officials met and began investigating the matter first thing Monday morning, Rotunda said, adding he considered the probe to be a “priority.”

Celsius said that due to extreme market conditions, it was pausing withdrawals, swaps and transfers between accounts. The company said that doing so would put it “in a better position to honor, over time, its withdrawal obligations.” read more

Register now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com

“I am very concerned that clients – including many retail investors – may need to immediately access their assets yet are unable to withdraw from their accounts. The inability to access their investment may result in significant financial consequences,” he said.

Alabama Securities Commission Director Joseph Borg also told Reuters that Alabama, Texas, New Jersey and Kentucky securities regulators were probing the matter. Celsius has been responsive to questions from the regulators, but that the investigation is in the initial stages, he said.

Borg added that U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has also been in communication with Celsius.

The SEC declined to comment. The New Jersey and Washington state securities regulators did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A spokesperson for the Kentucky Department of Financial Institutions said it was their policy to not comment on ongoing enforcement actions and investigations.

Celsius and CEO Alex Mashinsky did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Rotunda said he and his team learned of the move by New Jersey-based Celsius to freeze user withdrawals from the company’s blog post and announcement on Twitter on Sunday night, which said the company needed to take action to “stabilize liquidity.”

In September, regulators in Kentucky, New Jersey and Texas hit Celsius with a cease and desist order, arguing its interest-bearing products should be registered as a security. In February, the SEC and those same state regulators fined BlockFi $100 million for failing to register its crypto lending product.

Similar to a bank, Celsius gathers crypto deposits from retail customers and invests them in the equivalent of the wholesale crypto market, including “decentralized finance,” or DeFi, sites that use blockchain technology to offer services from loans to insurance outside the traditional financial sector. read more

Celsius promises retail customers huge returns, sometimes as much as 18.6% annually. The lure of big profits has led individual investors to pour assets into Celsius and platforms like it.

Mashinsky said in October Celsius had $25 billion in assets. That figure had fallen to around $11.8 billion as of last month, the Celsius website showed.

Celsius appears to have stumbled on some of its wholesale crypto investments, according to public blockchain information and analysts who track such data. As those investments soured, the company was unable to meet redemptions from customers fleeing amid the broader crypto market slump, analysts said. read more

Cryptocurrencies have lost more than $400 billion since TerraUSD, a major stablecoin pegged to the U.S. dollar, collapsed in May. Bitcoin sank to an 18-month low on Wednesday to $20,079.72. It has slumped about 70% from its record high of $69,000 in November. read more

Register now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com

Reporting by Hannah Lang; Editing by Richard Chang, Nick Zieminski, Michelle Price and Diane Craft

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

View Source

>>> Don’t Miss Today’s BEST Amazon Deals! <<<<

Filed Under: BUSINESS Tagged With: Alabama, Bitcoin, Blockchain, Dollar, Financial sector, Information, Insurance, Investments, Kentucky, New Jersey, Policy, Regulators, Reuters, Securities and Exchange Commission, State, technology, Texas, Twitter, Washington, Washington state

Primary Sidebar

More to See

The Madison Club’s Latest $27M Mansion: Luxury in La Quinta, CA

The poshest place in California's Coachella Valley is The Madison Club. This exclusive gated community in La Quinta is where A-listers and tycoons … [Read More...] about The Madison Club’s Latest $27M Mansion: Luxury in La Quinta, CA

Quality Wines From The Romagna Region Of Italy

Piazza del Popolo in the evening, Ravenna, Emilia-Romagna, Italy getty Italy has 20 different geographical regions, and Emiglia-Romagna—in the … [Read More...] about Quality Wines From The Romagna Region Of Italy

Investigators of War Crimes in Ukraine Face Formidable Challenges

KOROPY, Ukraine — Four men tugged at long strips of fabric to lift a coffin out of the gaping hole in the backyard of a small house. They flung the … [Read More...] about Investigators of War Crimes in Ukraine Face Formidable Challenges

Copyright © 2022 · Republica Press · Log in · As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.

Terms and Conditions - Privacy Policy