It’s not often that a borrower bails out their lender, especially when it’s hundreds of millions of dollars.
Alameda Research, the company founded by crypto billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried that last month extended a $500 million line of credit to crypto broker Voyager Digital, itself owes the company $377 million, according to the Voyager’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing.
It’s an unexpected revelation revealed by a bankruptcy that seemed like a foregone conclusion since Voyager revealed that hedge fund Three Arrows Capital owes him over $600 million.
A table on page 13 of the bankruptcy filing, which was filed today in a New York District Court, shows that Alameda Research owes Voyager $377 million at an interest rate of 1% to 5%. The outstanding balance includes a $75 million unsecured loan, according to a list of Voyager’s largest unsecured claims on page 119 of the filing.
Alameda Research did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Decrypt.
Alameda’s debt makes it Voyager’s second largest borrower after the insolvent Three Arrows Capital, which is also going through 3AC.
When the extent of 3AC’s problems became apparent, largely due to $200 million he lost in the Collapse of Terra in May, its lenders began to realize that huge 3AC loans on their books were on the verge of default.
Once 3AC was no longer able to make payments, Voyager issued a notice of default last Monday. Then, on Wednesday last week, a court in the British Virgin Islands ordered 3AC to be liquidated. This means that 3AC must cease all operations and allow the court to oversee the sale of its assets to compensate for what it owes to its creditors, including Voyager Digital.
It’s worth pointing out that Sam Bankman-Fried, founder and CEO of cryptocurrency exchange FTX, has a vested interest in seeing Voyager as a whole. At one point, Alameda and its venture capital arm, Alameda Ventures, were Voyager’s largest shareholders with 11.6% of all shares outstanding, according to a June 17 press release.
At the time, Voyager (VYGVF) stock was trading at just over $1.
A week later, on June 23, Alameda announced in a press release that it had sold, or returned without money, 4.5 million of its shares. Those shares were worth $2.6 million at the time, and VYGVF was trading at $0.56 per share.
The sale of Alameda shares increased its stake in the company to 9.49%, just below the 10% threshold that would have made him an “insider” in the eyes of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission. This is the same SEC rule that required Tesla CEO Elon Musk will reveal his Twitter stake in April, before making an acquisition offer.
Wednesday afternoon, after the Toronto Stock Exchange suspension of trading in shares of Voyager Digitalit ended the trading day at $0.27.
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