Paxos investor and Carlyle Group co-founder David Rubenstein scrambled to put cryptocurrencies in a positive light. He started by saying many people bought Bitcoin at fifty cents or a dollar and those people are doing pretty well. Rubenstein completely avoided the failure of cryptocurrency Terra and crypto lender Celsius.
Bloomberg's recent article on Terra's implosion was titled "How $60 billion in Terra Coins Went Up in Algorithmic Smoke." Did Rubenstein's Paxos trade Terra? Paxos has a blog post on Terra's failure which refers to Terra as a stablecoin that was unstable.
Paxos offers a cryptocurrency brokerage service. Rubenstein has a conflict of interest when talking about cryptocurrencies and as usual it is undeclared. Ever the salesman Rubenstein will hawk his investment goods until the end. He hates seeing them implode nearly as much as he hates paying taxes..
Update 6-17-22: Crypto lender Babel Finance is the latest firm to suspend withdrawals and redemptions due to a liquidity crisis.
Rubenstein could sell Beats headphones to people in the projects but they ain't buying bitcoin and have no need for a Paxos cryptocurrency exchange. “People looking to make money, not lose it.”
Update 6-19-22: Three Arrows Capital, a leveraged long cryptocurrency hedge fund, is in financial trouble and its founders are missing in action.
...analytics firm Nansen estimated 3AC held $10 billion in blockchain assets as of March, and the company has investments all over the crypto ecosystem. As of December, that included a stake in the world’s biggest Bitcoin fund, the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust, that reportedly exceeded 5 percent.
How's Paxos holding up? Did any of Rubenstein's recent $77 million in Carlyle stock sales go to Paxos for capital calls?
Update 6-20-22: Celsius crypto implosion soured an "Unbank Yourself" fan and customer. "I tried to reach them for days. You can’t remove someone’s ability to resolve a situation and then punish them for not resolving it,” the 46-year-old carpenter told Yahoo Finance. “I trusted them with my savings and it’s unfair.” They sure can because you are here for them when push comes to shove. Would you like some private equity in your retirement account?
WallStreetonParade wrote "the latest blowup is Celsius Network, which can’t find the money to pay its customers and has halted all withdrawals, but can afford those hefty billable hours at Akin Gump.
Update 6-23-22: Two more cryptocurrency exchanges, CoinFlex and Voyager Digital are limiting withdrawals as the genie remains out of the bottle.
Update 6-25-22: Goldman Sachs is readying to feast on the carcass of Celsius. Feces needs a middleman. Who will Goldman brokers push it on, their customers or Uncle Sam?
Update 7-11-22: Crypto hedge fund Three Arrows Capital founders are AWOL. Creditors asked a court to "subpoena the founders and have them provide a list of company assets including wallets it controls, bank accounts, digital assets in its possessions, derivatives contracts, securities, accounts receivables, and all company records."
Update 7-16-22: Celsius joined 3 Arrows Capital and Voyager in bankruptcy.
Update 8-2-22: A number of FDIC insured banks ran with the crypto devils and may go under as a result. How this is remotely OK is a question one should ask David Rubenstein and his former employee Jerome Powell.
Update 10-1-22: Rubenstein remains a crypto promoter.
Update 11-10-22: Bloomberg reported FTX with an $8 billion hole is careening toward bankruptcy.
