Embattled crypto lender Hodlnaut held $13 million on FTX before withdrawal freeze

Quick Take

  • Singapore-based crypto lender Hodlnaut held assets worth $13.1 million (18.4 million Singapore Dollar) on FTX.
  • According to court documents, the embattled lender under judicial protection held the assets as of October 25.

Troubled Singapore-based crypto lender Hodlnaut held assets worth $13.1 million (S$18.4 million) as of October 25 on the collapsed cryptocurrency exchange FTX. It is unclear whether Hodlnaut’s managers moved funds away from FTX before operations were halted.

The lender under judicial protection also held assets on other centralized exchanges such as Deribit, Binance, OKX and Tokenize for a total of $18.3 million (S$25.7 million), according to court documents dated October 25. Its share on FTX was more than 70% of its holding on centralized exchanges. 

We have reached out to Hodlnaut and will update this article should we hear back.

From one liquidity crisis to another

In August, Hodlnaut halted withdrawals amid a liquidity crisis. It later emerged that it had a nearly $200 million financial shortfall in a court affidavit filed. 

In particular, the document shows that Hodlnaut parked some $317 million in UST, the failed stablecoin, in the Anchor Protocol on Terra as a way to pass high yields through to its customers. In May, Terra’s stablecoin UST sharply de-pegged from the dollar, inflicting losses of $189.7 million on Hodlnaut, per the affidavit. 

On Tuesday, FTX halted withdrawals amid a liquidity crisis. That day, FTX said that it had agreed to an acquisition by rival Binance. Yesterday, that acquisition fell through after Binance reviewed FTX's financials.


Disclaimer: The former CEO and majority shareholder of The Block has disclosed a series of loans from former FTX and Alameda founder Sam Bankman-Fried.

© 2024 The Block. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

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About Authors

Tom is a deals reporter at The Block covering venture capital, fundraises, fintech and M&A. Before joining, he was an editorial intern at the FT-backed platform Sifted where he reported on neobanks, payment firms and blockchain startups. You can reach him by email at [email protected] or Telegram @tommatsuda.
Yogita Khatri is a senior reporter at The Block and the author of The Funding newsletter. As our longest-serving editorial member, Yogita has been instrumental in breaking numerous stories, exclusives and scoops. With over 3,000 articles to her name, Yogita is The Block's most-published and most-read author of all time. Before joining The Block, Yogita wrote for CoinDesk and The Economic Times. You can reach her at [email protected] or follow her latest updates on X at @Yogita_Khatri5.

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