Voyager Digital Temporarily Suspends All Trading, Withdrawals and Deposits
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Crypto broker Voyager Digital (VYGVF) is temporarily suspending all trading, deposits, withdrawals and loyalty rewards, the company announced Friday. Even the Voyager-issued debit card will stop working for owners. The changes were effective as of 2 p.m. ET.
"This was a tremendously difficult decision, but we believe it is the right one given current market conditions," said Stephen Ehrlich, CEO of Voyager, in a statement. "This decision gives us additional time to continue exploring strategic alternatives with various interested parties while preserving the value of the Voyager platform we have built together. We will provide additional information at the appropriate time."
Voyager recently disclosed it had significant exposure to Three Arrows Capital (3AC) and had issued a notice of default to the beleaguered hedge fund. Voyager claims 3AC has failed to make require payments on its loan of 15,250 BTC ($294 million) and $350 million USDC. Voyager said it is actively pursuing all available remedies for recovery from 3AC, including through a court-ordered liquidation process in the British Virgin Islands.
Shares of Voyager plunged more than 26% to $0.33 in Friday’s U.S. trading (shares of the firm’s main listing in Canada were not trading on Friday because of the country's Canada Day holiday). Shares are down more than 97% year to date.
Voyager had earlier received a cash/USDC loan of $200 million and a revolving credit facility for 15,000 bitcoin ($294 million) from quantitative trading firm Alameda Research, which is owned by FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried, to safeguard Voyager's customer assets.
Ehrlich did not immediately respond to a request for additional information.
UPDATE (July 1, 19:41 UTC): Updated with information about Three Arrows Capital in second bullet point.
CORRECTION (July 1, 19:57 UTC): Corrected information about Voyager's stock price movement in deck and third bullet point.
UPDATE (July 1, 20:32 UTC): Updated with information about the Alameda Research loan.
