Key Takeaways:
- According to reports, LedgerX, one of the last SBF crypto businesses still in the industry, is up for sale and drawing attention from prospective buyers.
- Rostin Behnam, the chairman of the CFTC, told lawmakers on Thursday that a possible sale was not really spoken about.
According to sources familiar with the situation, LedgerX, one of the few financially sound parts of Sam Bankman- Fried’s disintegrating FTX empire, is up for sale and marking involvement from interested clients such as cryptocurrency heavyweights Blockchain.com and Gemini.
John J. Ray II, the exchange’s new CEO, and the restructuring consultants have been searching through the company’s books for cash, cryptocurrency, and other assets that can be used to pay off its creditors.
LedgerX’s value is still being calculated, but a filing from November 17th indicated that it had an approximately $303 million in cash.
Reportedly there may be more than a dozen other interested buyers for the cryptocurrency derivatives exchange, and they added that some of the relevant parties have agreed to sign non-disclosure contracts.
Along with six other companies in the sector, LedgerX has also caught the attention of cryptocurrency exchange Bitpanda and commodities trading platform Kalshi.
A key component of Bankman-efforts Fried’s in Washington was this unit, which is enrolled as a derivatives exchange with the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission. It’s also regarded as one of FTX’s most valuable assets now that over 100 other companies have declared bankruptcy.
LedgerX requested approval for a contentious plan to clear cryptocurrency derivatives trades without middlemen after FTX US acquired it last year. As the corporate group of companies declared bankruptcy, the firm decided to withdraw its application to the CFTC. There was no mention of LedgerX in the insolvency proceedings.
LedgerX planned to release $175 million from a $250 million fund it set aside as part of that application on Wednesday to be used in FTX’s bankruptcy process.
The demise of FTX sent shivers down the spine of the entire sector. Recently, it came to light that former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried and U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) chairman Rostin Behnam had ten meetings to discuss the firm’s clearinghouse application.
Behnam claimed that over the course of the previous 14 months, he and his crew met with Bankman-Fried and his FTX team ten times concerning follow-up texts and calls.
