According to a Financial Times report citing two unnamed sources, Crypto lending firm Celsius Network owes $439 million to Indianapolis-based private lending platform EquitiesFirst.
EquitiesFirst, founded in 2002, began offering crypto-backed loans in 2016.
“EquitiesFirst is in ongoing discussions with our client and both parties have agreed to extend our commitment,” FT said.
Celsius started borrowing from EquitiesFirst in 2019. Two years later, EquitiesFirst asked Celsius to repay the loan to return the backed cryptocurrency, only to be told it could not be delivered “on time.” Report.
EquitiesFirst currently pays out $5 million per month; the debt consists of $361 million in cash and 3,765 bitcoin (BTC), which is almost $79 million at the time of writing.
Details of the debt first surfaced in Celsius’s bankruptcy filing Thursday, which revealed it has $5.5 billion in liabilities and $4.3 billion in assets.
The deficit could widen as $600 million of Celsius assets are locked into the now depleted CEL token, which is trading at $0.80 despite hitting an all-time high of $8.04 last June.
Celsius froze withdrawals in June due to liquidity issues amid “extreme market conditions.”
