- Recently, a crypto exchange in the Bahamas collapsed, sending its owner’s fortune tumbling
- Crypto billionaires are now fast disappearing due to a massive selloff which has hit the industry
- From crypto exchange founders who controlled empires worth billions of dollars to others who founded the cryptos, everyone is now looking down
Sam Bankman-Fried – FTX
November 8, 2022, is the day Sam Bankman-Fried, the CEO of FTX, will never forget.
On that day, the 30-year-old former billionaire’s crypto empire crumbled before his eyes.
Credit: Michael Ciaglo / Stringer
Source: Getty Images
Bankman-Fried was the go-to person in the crypto industry, like a godfather.
The ex-billionaire who is now facing criminal charges lost everything in one day. A whopping $15.6 billion was wiped off, reducing him to a poor man.
On November 8, he announced on Twitter that his empire would be bought by his rival, Changpeng Zhao and his firm, Binance, a Fortune report said.
Bankman-Fried’s brutal fall will reverberate in the crypto industry for a long time.
Brian Armstrong – Coinbase
Although not poor compared to Bankman-Fries, the Coinbase founder, Brian Armstrong, had a net worth of $13.7 billion as of November last year. By May this year, he was worth about $8 billion.
As of today, Armstrong is worth just $2.2 billion, the Bloomberg Billionaire Index said.
Coinbase was the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the US. The company’s shares have fallen 84 per cent since April’s first day of their trading last year.
Michael Novogratz – Galaxy Digital
Before the beginning of the crypto crash in November last year, Michael Novogratz, the CEO of Galaxy Digital, had seen his net worth fall to $2.5 billion from $8.5 billion in early November 2021.
Novogratz was the champion of TerraUSD, the stablecoin that collapsed this year alongside its Luna.
In the last two years, Novogratz’s wealth has ballooned, and now they are fast disappearing after a selloff that began the current winter season in the crypto world.
Changpeng Zhao -Binance
On paper, Changpeng Zhao has lost even a bigger fortune than most other crypto billionaires.
He made his debut on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index in January with a fortune of $96 billion, the crypto industry’s richest man.
His wealth plummeted to $11.6 billion in May and has risen slightly to $17.4 billion.
His net worth is calculated based on multiples of Coinbase and Voyager Digital values.
Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss -Gemini
The co-founders of Gemini have lost a combined net worth of $2.2 billion as of May this year, about 40 per cent of their wealth.
Vitalik Buterin – Ethereum
Vitalik Buterin announced that he is no longer a billionaire due to the sharp fall in the price of his crypto, Ethereum.
Forbes estimates that about 400 people, seven of which were crypto billionaires, have lost a combined wealth of about $55.1 billion to $27.3 billion.
Crypto holdings have been hit with a massive price decline starting with the Terra blockchain collapse in May.
Bitcoin has lost 70 per cent of its value from a high of almost $70,000 in November 2021.
Crypto Crash: 11-year-old Bitcoin worth $60 million found amid crypto market meltdown
Recall that TopLatestNews reported that as the world woke up to the crash of FTX, a crypto exchange platform based in the Bahamas, about 3,500 dormant bitcoins from a wallet created on October 7, 2011, moved for the first in over 11 years.
A huge string of dormant bitcoins moved on Friday, November 11, 2022, after being idle for over a decade.
The more than 3,000 bitcoins are estimated at over $60 million and came from seven different BTC addresses formed on October 7, 2011.
Source: TopLatestNews
