Annnnnd Another One Bites the Dust! Hodlnaut Halts All Withdrawals, Deposits, Swaps, Limits to Earning in Kind, Ceases Borrowing and Lending

By Brother Numsee | Brother Numsee's Crypto Craze | 8 Aug 2022

Annnnnd Another One Bites the Dust! : Hodlnaut Edition

2022 is starting to look like the year of the death of CeFi. Just weeks after Celsius similarly halted withdrawals and entered into Chapter 11 Bankruptcy and in the wake of crises at BlockFi, Voyager, and Ledn, Hodlnaut has today announced the immediate halting of withdrawals, allegedly due to "recent market conditions" and in an effort "to focus on stabilising our liquidity and preserving assets, while we work to find the best way to protect our users’ long-term interests," hammering another nail into CeFi's coffin.

They have also withdrawn their MAS license application (they are based in Singapore) and stopped other services such as swaps, earning in other assets, and borrowing and lending. The fact that they've stopped taking deposits is curious; one might think if there was a good chance of turning the business around, any further deposits would help. This could be a step to mitigate damages / limit liability in a potential fraud case if they know there is little chance of becoming viable again.

As far as their path back to viability, they "are consulting with Damodara Ong LLC on the feasibility and timelines of our intended execution plan and are strategising our recovery plan with our users’ best interests in mind. "

Hodlnaut had been known for their customer service and communication. They seemed to communicate earnestly with users in the beginning of the crisis, seemingly honestly alerting them to the massive withdrawals they were facing. Then they seemed to go quiet for a few weeks before this announcement... They have now made their social media communication channels, including even the Hodlnaut subreddit, private, so people cannot even see comments without being approved.

Luckily, after getting massacred in the Celsius debacle like Santino Corleone, I withdrew the vast majority of my assets from Hodlnaut a couple weeks ago and mostly dodged this bullet. Maybe their recovery plan will work or perhaps they're small enough to be "bailed out" (swallowed up) by Sam Bankman Fried's FTX / Alameda Capital or Nexo, but this seems like the end of Hodlnaut and another chapter in the Death of CeFi.

They say Bitcoin Maxis are created in bull market conditions like this. At the very least, this has really hammered home the adage we love to pay lip service to, "Not Your Keys, Not Your Coins."

I'll try to write more about my experiences thus far with CeFi and its apparent impending death, but this has spurred me to leave CeFi and start investigating DeFi and left me weary of centralization. I'll be writing about my journey into DeFi and several Dapps and strategies soon.

They say Bitcoin Maxis are created in bull market conditions like this. At the very least, this has really hammered home the adage we love to pay lip service to, "Not Your Keys, Not Your Coins."

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