Celsius Network has been making moves following a U.S. bankruptcy court’s decision to allow the crypto lender to sell its altcoin holdings for Bitcoin and Ether starting this month. Blockchain data from Arkham Intelligence shows that the firm transferred at least $64 million of cryptocurrencies to a wallet labeled as “Celsius Network: OTC” from the company’s “Fireblocks Custody” wallet in multiple transactions Thursday afternoon. The largest transactions included $19.3 million in Chainlink’s LINK token, $14.7 million in Polygon’s MATIC, $7.5 million in AAVE and $6.1 million in SNX.
The court’s decision means that Celsius could potentially sell $170 million of smaller cryptocurrencies, based on court documents. Crypto analytics firm Kaiko commented on the potential market impact, saying, “The market impact could be significant, especially considering liquidity for these tokens has dropped over the past year.”
Celsius filed for bankruptcy protection in July 2022 after halting withdrawals due to a shortage of customer funds. Alex Mashinsky, ex-CEO of the company, was arrested Thursday on seven counts, including securities fraud, commodities fraud, and wire fraud by the Department of Justice (DOJ).