Celsius Network, one of the biggest crypto lenders, has informed customers early Monday that it would halt withdrawals, swap, and transfers between accounts due to "extreme market conditions."
In blog post, the company declared that the decision was taken in the "best interest" of the crypto community. Further adding that, while abiding by their its management framework, Celsius has "activated" a clause in the Terms of Use that will assist in the smooth processing of the situation.
"Celsius has valuable assets and we are working with a singular focus: to protect and preserve assets to meet our obligations to customers," the post read.
The crypto lender explained that it is currently focusing on "stabilizing liquidity and restoring withdrawals, swap, and transfers" as soon as possible. Warning about a delay, the post also mentions that various options will be considered by crypto experts to find a solution of the problem, which might take some time. There was no mention of a timeline for the resuming of the withdrawals.
The announcement which resulted in a 60% fall in the price of the firm's token CEL, comes after the cryptocurrency market suffered a liquidation worth hundreds of millions of dollars, TechCrunch reported.
Bitcoin recorded an 18-month low, falling more than 6% since the news broke of Celsius suspending withdrawals and transfers. Similarly, the world's second-largest cryptocurrency, Ether dropped to its lowest from March 2021,at more than 8%.
As per NBC, the crypto lender had raised $750 million in funding late in November from investors and was valued at $3.25 billion. According to its website, Celsius Network had $11.8 billion in assets, as of 17 May and had processed a total of $8.2 billion worth of loans.
Last year, CEO Alex Mashinsky stated that the company had more than $25 billion in assets.
Some important investors of Celsius include Tether International of Hong Kong that issues stablecoins and Caisse de Dépôt et Placement du Québec, Canada's second largest pension fund.
