BlockFi CEO Denies Rumors of $25 Million Deal With FTX Previous reports said FTX was buying BlockFi in a fire sale, but BlockFi's CEO is denying the claim.
By Madeline Garfinkle •
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On Thursday, sources told CNBC that FTX was close to finalizing a deal to buy struggling crypto lender BlockFi for $25 million — a price tag far below BlockFi's last private valuation of $1 billion. However, later that day, BlockFi CEO and co-founder Zac Prince has pushed back against details of the deal, specifically the discounted price.
"Lots of market rumors out there — I can 100% confirm that we aren't being sold for $25 million," Prince tweeted Thursday. "I encourage everyone to trust only details that you hear directly from BlockFi."
News of the possible deal came just a week after FTX supplied BlockFi with a $250 million emergency line of credit. "We're injecting $250 million into BlockFi and partnering with them so they can navigate the market from a position of strength," FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried said upon news of the bailout.
Related: Top 4 Reasons the Cryptocurrency Market Is Crashing
The deal-no-deal chatter is the latest casualty amid a particularly bleak era for crypto, with BlockFi being just one of the dozens of crypto companies struggling to stay afloat.
Earlier this week, one of the most prominent crypto hedge funds, Three Arrows Capital, defaulted on a loan worth more than $670 million. Other platforms such as Celsius and CoinFlex have paused customer withdrawals, due to "extreme market conditions."
As for the BlockFi deal, we can expect to know more soon.
Although Prince denied the $25 million deal, he also wrote, "We will share more with you as soon as we can," in the same tweet.
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