The U.S. arm of Binance has filed a fresh bid to participate in the auction for the assets bankrupt lender Voyager Digital. The report, citing informed sources, comes from CoinDesk.
CEO Changpeng Zhao said in a Bloomberg interview that the U.S. unit of the company will participate in the new auction to acquire Voyager Digital’s assets.
«Binance is not a Chinese company, we are not related to China at all.»
CEO Changpeng «CZ» Zhao (@cz_binance), who is considering a bid for assets of bankrupt crypto firm Voyager, said on @BloombergTV his company is mistakenly believed to be Chinese «because I look Chinese» pic.twitter.com/Wqos9XTeW5
— Bloomberg Crypto (@crypto) November 24, 2022
In October Voyager reached a preliminary agreement with FTX US. The deal contemplated returning to clients 72% of the value of their assets.
In September, Sam Bankman-Fried’s firm won the auction to sell Voyager’s assets, offering about $1.4 billion.
At the time, FTX US offered better terms than Binance US. Media reported that the latter’s participation was in question due to xenophobia and concerns about national security.
Following FTX Group insolvency filing on November 11, Voyager Digital said it would restart the auction and was ready to discuss terms with potential buyers. According to the press, Wave Financial and CrossTower have already shown interest.
Against these developments, Voyager’s own token VGX jumped 41% in the last 24 hours. Over the past seven days it rose 92.8%, according to CoinGecko.
Thomas Brazil, managing partner of 507 Capital, noted that the process could complicate Voyager’s plan to sue FTX US for breach of contract.
Earlier, on November 14, Binance announced the launch of a fund to mitigate the cascading negative effects of the FTX collapse on the industry.
CEO Changpeng Zhao compared the current state of the cryptocurrency market to the 2008 financial crisis. He believes that in the coming weeks even more firms may fail.
It was recently disclosed that the U.S. Congress is examining Binance’s role in the FTX collapse.
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