Celsius Distributes $2 Billion

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Good Morning.

The crypto markets continue to go up. Sam Altman’s Worldcoin did a 3x in one week after OpenAI released its new text-to-video product, Sora, and Altman’s effort to raise $7T for AI chips. We’re so so so back.

In Today's Email:

• What Matters: Celsius distributed $2B 💸 

• Products: Utopia Labs offramp 💵 

• Charts: USDe supply, WLD price 📈 

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WHAT MATTERS

Celsius Distributed $2B of Crypto to Creditors

State of play: Celsius has begun distributing most of the owed crypto to its creditors, according to a recent court filing. The process, which started in late January, aims to distribute $3B in crypto.

• Nearly 75% of the BTC/ETH planned for distribution by PayPal/Venmo and Coinbase has been collected.

• There were 336,841 claim distributions for 171,672 creditors, involving 20,255.66 BTC and 301,338.77 ETH, totaling $2B in crypto.

• Former Celsius users who withdrew more than $100K within 90 days before the bankruptcy must return 27.5% of the amount that they withdrew to receive their claims and avoid lawsuits.

In September 2023, the creditors approved a plan where custodial account holders receive 72.5% of their BTC and ETH, and interest account holders get a mix of crypto and new mining company shares.

• According to the latest filing, eligible holders for the distribution of MiningCo Common Stock will be contacted by Odyssey Transfer and Trust Company.

• Cash distributions are also ongoing, and creditors will be informed of any necessary steps to receive their funds.

• The cash distributions are done via US Dollar checks and wire transfers, but the estate is still exploring a variety of options to distribute the cash.

What’s next: If you are one of Celcius’s creditors, stay alert for phishing attempts. The Post-Effective Date Debtors nor their advisors will ever contact you to request account information or other personal information.

Our take: With this, we are one step closer to seeing the end of the Celsius saga. The faster we can move on from the 2022 bankruptcies, the better the space will be.

For builders and investors: We can predict that a lot of the liquidity from Celsius will be returning to the open markets.

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PRODUCTS OF THE WEEK

The Easiest Way to Offramp Your USDC

Earlier this month, Utopia Labs launched Offramps.eth, a platform to simply offramp USDC with just two clicks.

• Offramps.eth charges a 1.5% flat fee.

• Offramps.eth estimates that the fund will arrive in 1-3 days.

• Offramps.eth is available on Ethereum, Optimism, and Arbitrum. It recently announced that it is now available on Polygon.

Other cool products:

• ByBundle, a cost-effective NFTs marketplace.

• Swoop Exchange, a Meta-DEX and Bridge Aggregator.

• xAudits, a smart contract audit service for rust and solidity.

• Atlantis Tools, a P2P crypto exchange automation, connection & payments platform.

• Tokenlaunchpad, a web app to quickly issues custom tokens on various blockchains.

CHARTS OF THE WEEK

USDe Circulating Supply Almost Doubles

State of play: Ethena Labs publicly launched the Ethereum-based stablecoin USDe on February 16 and raised $14M in funding led by Dragonfly and Maelstrom, which brought the company valuation to $300M.

• USDe total circulating supply has continued to rise since its launch in December 2023, currently, it sits at 241.82M USDe.

• USDe total circulating supply almost doubled from ~125M in January 2024 to 241.82M in February 2024.

• According to DefiLlama, USDe is now in the 11th rank of stablecoins based on market caps just below PayPal’s PYUSD.

Our take: There will be more demand for capital-efficient stablecoin like USDe. We’re already seeing more projects trying to mimic the structure of USDe.

WLD Price Hits Record High

State of play: After OpenAI's Sora AI launch on Feb. 16, Worldcoin ($WLD) hit a new high, tripling in price from ~$2.2 in January to ~$6.6.

• The market cap of WLD is at ~$867M and ranked #84 in CMC.

• WLD has been reacting strongly to news related to OpenAI, for instance, WLD's price dipped in November 2023 following news of Sam Altman's temporary ousting from OpenAI.

• AI tokens surged 25% in the last week, with many experiencing triple-digit growth, according to CoinGecko AI sector.

Our take: There will be more beta play for AI coins as market participants speculate on the rise of AI trends. (Most people can’t buy actual shares in AI companies)

QUICK BITES

• FixedFloat exploited for $26.1M.

• Ether futures hit ATH on Deribit.

• Worldcoin hits ATH price on Sora.

• Yuga Labs acquires NFT startup Proof.

• Celsius distributed $2B of crypto to creditors.

• Ex-Ripple exec became CEO of Crystal Blockchain.

• Pudgy Penguins briefly flips Bored Ape in floor price.

• Japan moves close to allowing VC firms to hold crypto.

• FTX creditors file a class action against bankruptcy lawyers.

• South Korea mulls further crypto tax delay amid election campaign.

• JPM analyst criticizes Coinbase’s lack of insights into ETF business.

NOTEWORTHY READS & MEME

• Cody Poh’s read on I don’t like L2 anymore.

• Thor Hartvigsen’s read on USDe: Ethena labs stablecoin.

• Arkham Intelligence’s read on GCR: top crypto traders 2024.

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Disclaimer: All the information presented in this publication and its affiliates is strictly for educational purposes only. It should not be construed or taken as financial, legal, investment, or any other form of advice.