Bittrex Inc. and several related companies filed for bankruptcy on Monday after ceasing their US operations switch off Late April in response to an official crackdown.
The bankruptcy, which the company said would not affect its operations outside the US, came less than a month after the US Securities and Exchange Commission accused the crypto platform of violating securities rules for years.
Bittrex Global will continue its operations for customers outside the US as usual, the company said in a statement. For users who did not withdraw their funds prior to the shutdown, Bittrex intends to “ask the court to activate these accounts as soon as possible so that customers who meet the necessary regulatory requirements can withdraw them.”
Bittrex listed assets and liabilities of up to $1 billion each in its Chapter 11 petition. The affiliated companies Desolation Holdings LLC, Bittrex Malta Holdings Ltd. and Bittrex Malta Ltd. also went bankrupt, according to court documents.
The SEC sued Bittrex in federal court last month, alleging it violated regulator rules from 2017 to 2022, raking in at least $1.3 billion in revenue in the process. The SEC said that Bittrex acted at times as a broker, exchange, and clearing house, but did not register with the SEC.
Bittrex denied the allegations in a statement at the time.
That was just the latest regulatory hurdle for Bittrex. The company listed the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control as its largest unsecured creditor, to whom it owes $24 million from a previous settlement for failing to prevent customers in Iran, Cuba and other sanctioned countries from selling its to use the platform.
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