The setbacks of the giant FTX are beginning to affect French players.
The bankruptcy of the American crypto giant FTX is starting to do damage in France. Coinhouse, the first cryptocurrency exchange platform in France, announced on Thursday that it was suspending ” until further notice “, withdrawals and investments on its crypto passbooks. This savings product, invested in cryptocurrencies (USDT, Bitcoin and Ethereum, etc.), launched in October 2021, offered a return of 6% on the unsecured capital.
Liquidity shortage
These booklets, whose funds are placed with other players in the crypto ecosystem, did not resist the setbacks of FTX. One of these counterparties, Genesis Global Capital, announced Wednesday to face a lack of liquidity. Withdrawals have been blocked. “We have no choice but to note the default of these counterparties and their inability to return the active cryptos entrusted to them”, Coinhouse said on Thursday.
Last week, the company had already announced that a fraction of the holdings – around 5% for Bitcoin and USDT passbooks, but 20% for Ethereum – placed on FTX would be exceptionally covered by Coinhouse.
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This time the amounts involved are of a different order. According to specialist news site The Big Whale, Genesis manages nearly 40% of Coinhouse’s cryptobook holdings. “In the event that Genesis is unable to return the funds, customers will be required to bear the loss”indicates on Twitter Grégory Raymond, co-founder of The Big Whale.
Coinhouse indicated that less than 10,000 customers (the platform claims nearly 100,000, editor’s note) had a passbook. “This suspension only affects the crypto passbooks of our customers due to the situation of their counterparties, and not the use of the platform which is operational.she argues. The information in our possession leads us to believe that it will take some time for things to return to normal and for market tensions to ease. »
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