Blockchain.com Will Start Reducing Its Workforce With 25% Cut

Blockchain.com will start reducing its workforce with the 25% cut announced today, making it the latest platform to announce mass layoffs so let’s have a closer look at our latest cryptocurrency news.

The restructuring at the company will shutter operations in Argentina and will also halt expansion too. Blockchain.com is the latest company to announce mass layoffs and the exchange said that it will reduce the workforce by 25% or 150 people. Blockchain.com will start reducing the workforce as a result of the prolonged crypto winter and they will also shut down plans for expansion into other territories.

Up to 44% of the cuts impact employees in Argentina while a quarter of the affected workforce is coming from the USA and 16% from the UK. The exchange is enhancing the purse strings after taking a $270 million hit from being exposed in the form of crypto loans and US dollars to the Singapore-based hedge fund Three Arrows Capital. 3AC owes $3.5 billion to its creditors and $2.36 billion comes from one loan towards Genesis Global Trading.

The crypto industry is filled with stories of insolvency after the historic collapse of the stablecoin platform terra back in May. In the past few weeks, a few high-profile lenders like Celsius and Voyager also filed for bankruptcy but in Voyager’s case, help came in the form of bailouts from FTX. Broadly speaking, there’s a liquditiy crisis or a crypto winter which saw big crypto companies make cuts to their workforce as well.

Gemini, another giant exchange owed by billionaires Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss, was among the first to announce it will be firing employees. Accoridng to the blog post, the company will cut down 10% of the workers because of marekt conditions that will likely persist for some time. Coinbase was next and it announced 1100 layoffs or 18% of its workforce with Brian Armstrong writing:

“It is now clear to me that we over-hired.”

The NFT market OpenSea announced it was getting rid of 20% of the team due to an unprecedented combination of the crypto winter and macroeconomic instability.

As recently reported, Blockchain.com lost $270 million to Three Arrows Capital as per the letter sent to the shareholders two weeks ago. The company however remains liquid and solvent with the CEO assuring customers that they will not be impacted by the loss. Blockchain.com numbers among the entities wanting to hold 3AC fully accountable for defrauding the industry. Three Arrows Capital owes $270 million to the lending platform Blockchain.com but the CEO insisted in a letter to the shareholders that the company is still liquid and customers won’t be impacted.