Add the Winklevoss twins to the growing list of crypto evangelists feeling the heat following the multi-billion dollar collapse of the FTX cryptocurrency exchange.
Cameron Winklevoss said Monday that Gemini, the crypto exchange he co-founded with his brother Tyler in 2014, has hired lawyers and formed a creditors committee to recoup funds following a report that $900 million of its customers’ money was frozen after crypto broker Genesis halted withdrawals last month due to liquidity issues.
“Returning your funds is our highest priority and we are operating with the utmost urgency,” Cameron Winklevoss wrote in a post on Twitter.
Genesis announced on Nov. 16 that it was freezing withdrawals from a key platform as result of “unprecedented market turmoil” in the wake of the implosion of Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX crypto empire, which filed for bankruptcy on Nov. 11.
Genesis was the main partner of Gemini’s “earn” program, in which its retail investors received payments for allowing their crypto assets to be loaned out to others. Some $900 million of Gemini customer deposits had gotten hung up as a result, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Genesis and its parent company, Digital Currency Group, have said they are seeking outside investment to help bolster its books and pay its customers back.
A spokesman for Genesis had no comment and a message sent to a representative of Gemini wasn’t immediately returned.
The Winklevoss brothers were early champions of cryptocurrencies, using money they won in a legal settlement with Facebook
META,
and its founder Mark Zuckerberg over their role in the social media giant’s creation, to launch Gemini.