The plaintiff collapsed FTX exchange, filed a lawsuit against Grayscale Investments, accusing the firm of mismanaging funds and breaching the trust agreement.
The defendants also include the company’s CEO Michael Sonnenshein and the founder of the parent entity — Digital Currency Group — Barry Silbert.
The complaint, on behalf of the subsidiary Alameda Research, alleges that over the past two years Grayscale improperly collected more than $1.3 billion in ‘excessive management fees’.
The plaintiff contends that the ‘fabricated justifications’ for prohibiting redemption of the trusts’ shares led to a 50% discount relative to NAV.
The plaintiffs sought a court injunction against Grayscale to unlock $9 billion of value in the Bitcoin and Ethereum trust shares.
«If Grayscale lowers its fees and stops improperly blocking redemptions, the creditors’ shares of FTX will be worth no less than $550 million, which is about 90% more than their current value», the statement said.
FTX’s current CEO John J. Ray III noted that the team would ‘use any available tools’ to maximise recovery for the exchange’s customers.
«The suit filed by hedge fund Alameda Research’s Sam Bankman-Fried is misleading. Grayscale is transparent in its efforts to approval for the transformation of GBTC into ETF — a result that, undoubtedly, represents the best long-term prospect for the product», said a representative of the defendant, The Block.
According to Grayscale’s site, the value of assets in the company’s flagship GBTC trust exceeds $14 billion.
In January, Sonnenshein criticised the SEC’s approach to regulating the cryptocurrency industry.