Today in Crypto: TerraUSD Investors Sue Binance.US Over Losses; BlockFi to Lay Off 20% of Staff

An investor in the doomed Terra blockchain ecosystem filed a federal lawsuit seeking class action status and naming, among defendants, Binance.US, Bloomberg reports.

The plaintiff is arguing that the defendants played various roles in misleading investors about how stable the stablecoin really was.

“Investors who purchased UST on Binance.US were wiped out, learning quickly that, contrary to Binance’s U.S. advertisements, UST was not ‘safe,’ ‘stable,’ or ‘fiat-backed,’” the lawsuit states. Bloomberg quoted a spokesman for Binance.US as having said the lawsuit had “no merit.”

The aggregate value of the cryptocurrency market dropped below $1 trillion for the first time since January 2021, Reuters reported, citing data from CoinMarketCap.

According to Reuters, the global cryptocurrency market reached its peak to date of $2.9 trillion in November 2021.

The decline in cryptocurrencies is hurting a wide swath of victims, thestreet.com reports.

The investing website states that victims include, beyond the holders of cryptocurrencies, companies that serve the industry and companies such as Tesla that hold bitcoin on their balance sheets.

See more: Musk’s Tesla Latest Public Company To Go All In On Crypto

Cryptocurrency firm BlockFi is cutting 20 percent of its staff across the firm, Reuters reported. According to the news service, BlockFi grew to more than 850 employees as of a recent count, up from 150 in late 2020.

According to Reuters, BlockFi also stated it was cutting its spend on marketing and compensation for executives.

Related: Crypto Nosedives Following Celsius Collapse

Meanwhile, DeFi lending platform Celsius, which claims to have 1.7 million customers, said “extreme market conditions” led it to stop all withdrawals on the platform. The company’s eponymous coin has lost more than 50% of its value in the past 24 hours.

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