Jan 2 (Reuters) – Cameron Winklevoss, who founded crypto exchange Gemini Trust Co with his twin brother, on Monday accused Digital Currency Group (DCG) CEO Barry Silbert of “unscrupulous crash tactics” and asked him to commit to the resolution of $900 million in disputed client assets by Jan. 8.
Gemini has a crypto lending product called Earn in partnership with DCG’s crypto firm Genesis. Genesis suspended customer withdrawals in November following the collapse of major crypto exchange FTX.
Winklevoss said Genesis owes more than $900 million to about 340,000 Earn investors and that he has been trying to reach a “consensual resolution” with Silbert for the past six weeks.
“However, it is now clear that you used unscrupulous delaying tactics,” Winklevoss wrote in an open letter to Silbert posted on Twitter.
“We ask you to publicly commit to working together to resolve this issue by January 8, 2023,” he added. The letter did not say what would happen if no agreement was reached by January 8.
Winklevoss wrote that DCG owes Genesis $1.675 billion, which is money that Genesis in turn owes Earn users and other creditors, adding that “this mess is entirely your own doing.”
Silbert responded in a tweet that DCG did not borrow $1.675 billion from Genesis.
“DCG has never missed an interest payment to Genesis and is current on all outstanding loans,” Silbert said, adding that DCG submitted a proposal to counsel for Genesis and Winklevoss on Dec. 29 and has not received a response.
Genesis wrote in a letter to clients on Dec. 7 that it was working to preserve client assets and strengthen liquidity, adding that it would take “weeks, not days” to put together a plan.
Reporting by Mrinmay Dey in Bengaluru Editing by Tiffany Wu and Matthew Lewis
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