According to Trade Algo, troubled Hong-Kong-based cryptocurrency lender Babel Finance is considering launching a decentralised stablecoin to pay off its creditors. The new stablecoin is expected to be released as part of the company's restructuring strategy, which is being overseen by co-founder Yang Zhou, who is currently the only director of Babel.
Strategy for Restructuring Babel Financial
As it seeks their agreement on its restructuring plan, Babel Finance on Monday filed a moratorium of protection with the high court of Singapore, requesting that creditors refrain from taking any legal action against the business for up to six months.
As a result of "exceptional liquidity pressure," Babel banned customer transfers and repayments in June 2022. Following the failure of the Terra ecosystem and Celsius Network, Babel decided to halt withdrawals.
Now Yang Zhou wants to create Hope, a platform for decentralized finance (DeFi) that will feature a stablecoin bearing his name. Initial collateral for the dollar-pegged Hope stablecoin will consist of Bitcoin (BTC-USD) and Ether (ETH-USD), with additional coins being added later. The DeFi project's revenue will be used to pay creditors as part of the company's restructuring strategy.
Wang Li, a co-founder of Babel who was removed from his position as CEO in December 2022, was named as the person responsible for the company's $766 million loss, according to the restructuring filing Babel made, which stated that "the risky trading activities seem so to have been directed solely by Wang."
Babel calculates that Wang's trading practices caused the company and its clients to lose $524 million in Bitcoin, Ether, and other tokens. In addition, the company lost $224 million when its counterparties destroyed collateral after it was unable to satisfy a significant number of margin calls.
The risks associated with the cryptocurrency market are nevertheless a cause for concern. Silvergate Capital (NYSE:SI) most recently ceased operations of its cryptocurrency platform Silvergate Exchange Network after issuing a warning that it might not be able to continue as a going concern. While the news caused the stocks of several cryptocurrency companies to decline, Bitcoin, the biggest cryptocurrency by market price, moved in a constrained range on Monday. Compared to a drop of about 41% during the previous year, the price of bitcoin has increased by over 35% since the year 2023 began.
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