Binance to dump FTX Token holdings after report parses finances of Bankman-Fried's Alameda
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Changpeng Zhao, CEO of Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume, said recently that his company will sell the rest of its holdings in FTX Token (FTT-USD), the coin issued by Sam Bankman-Fried's FTX crypto exchange, after last week's CoinDesk story questioned the overlap between FTX and SBF's trading firm, Alameda Research.
"As part of Binance’s exit from FTX equity last year, Binance received roughly $2.1 billion USD equivalent in cash (BUSD and FTT). Due to recent revelations that have came to light, we have decided to liquidate any remaining FTT on our books," CZ wrote in a series of Twitter posts.
The "recent revelations" were said to have related with CoinDesk's assessment on Alameda's balance sheet that reportedly held billions of dollars worth of FTX Token (FTT-USD), underscoring the close ties between FTX and Alameda despite the fact that they're two separate entities.
As of June 30, Alameda owned $5.8B of FTX Token (FTT-USD), including coins that were pledged as collateral, CoinDesk reported. Its overall balance sheet was said to have included $14.6B in assets and $8B in liabilities. By comparison, there's roughly 200M FTT coins in circulation worth $4.56B, according to FTX's website.
In response to the news, though, Alameda CEO Caroline Ellison said "that specific balance sheet is for a subset of our corporate entities, we have > $10b of assets that aren’t reflected there. The balance sheet breaks out a few of our biggest long positions; we obviously have hedges that aren’t listed."
And to mitigate the potentially volatile market impact of Binance's FTT sales given its sizable position, Ellison said Alameda "will happily buy it (FTT-USD) from you today at $22."
The sale of Binance's FTX Token (FTT-USD) holdings, which account for a huge chunk of the coins in circulation, will take "a few months to complete," CZ added. And "regarding any speculation as to whether this is a move against a competitor, it is not."
Of note, Bankman-Fried shrugged off growing speculation about the solvency of FTX, saying its "assets are fine" and it "has enough to cover all client holdings," he wrote in a Twitter post earlier on Monday.
FTT dipped 2.8% to $22.45 per token at 12:46 p.m. ET, down around 14% in the past five sessions and -65% year-to-date.
Towards the end of August, Voyager Digital (OTCPK:VYGVQ) attracted takeover interest from Binance, FTX.