Renowned crypto lending platform Celsius reportedly transferred a staggering $59 million worth of altcoins to an exchange. This important decision has sparked a lot of speculation and intrigue, with many wondering if it could be a prelude to a massive conversion to Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH).
Celsius continues its sales activity
Celsius Network, a bankrupt crypto lending platform, has taken a big step into the crypto market. Early Monday, the company transferred a total of $59.4 million in various cryptocurrencies to FalconX, a well-known institutional crypto exchange. The action, which received the green light from a US bankruptcy court late last month, is believed to be a strategic move to trade these altcoins for Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH).
Blockchain analytics firm Arkham Intelligence has provided data showing that a Celsius-controlled wallet was responsible for sending $13.6 million into Polygon’s MATIC, $10.7 million into Chainlink’s LINK and $7.3 million in AAVE to a FalconX deposit address.
According to a report by Kaiko, a leading crypto analytics firm, this large-scale transfer could potentially put significant selling pressure on the prices of the affected tokens. The reason behind this is a phenomenon known as liquidity deterioration, which occurs when a large volume of a particular asset is sold, reducing its availability and potentially lowering its price due to oversupply on the market.
Volatility in the Altcoin market is increasing
Celsius has received court approval to turn its altcoin assets into more liquid forms of Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH), as part of its takeover strategy. Reports indicate that the company transferred some of its holdings to Wintermute, a market maker, and Paxos, a stablecoin issuer.
Since Celsius filed for bankruptcy about a year ago, the majority of its altcoin holdings have been steadily declining. Despite a surge in Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Litecoin (LTC) in June, triggered by the launch of the institutional exchange EDX, the rest of Celsius’ portfolio saw declines ranging from 80% to 5% during the past year.
Earlier on Monday, Celsius made another round of trades, moving an additional $8.5 million into Chainlink’s LINK, $7.8 million into Synthetix’s SNX, and $3 million into Binance’s BNB token. The company also moved over $1 million into ZRX, 1INCH, and XAUT.Celsius, Tether’s gold-pegged stablecoin, to convert its collection of smaller tokens, worth around $170 million. dollars, in Bitcoin and Ethereum, the two largest cryptocurrencies by market capitalization.
Adding to the company’s challenges, its former CEO, Alex Mashinsky, found himself in legal hot water. On Thursday, he was formally indicted for fraud by the Department of Justice (DOJ).
