Bankrupt Crypto Lenders Aren't a Blockchain Problem

Crypto has been really quiet this week (sarcasm!), so let’s get the headlines on paper first:

• Voyager Digital, a New York-based crypto lending company, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Wednesday. The company has $654 million in outstanding loans to Three Arrows Capital, the crypto hedge fund that a British Virgin Islands court ordered to liquidate last week. 
• Crypto exchange FTX extended an additional $400 million revolving credit facility to BlockFi in a deal that also includes the option to acquire the crypto lender for up to $240 million.
• Vauld, a Singapore-based crypto lending company, froze customer withdrawals on Monday and said it was in talks to be acquired by rival lender Nexo.

In aggregate, it’s really easy to look at those headlines and say to yourself “see, crypto ain’t all it’s cracked up to be!” But the truth is, just about every major crypto tragedy that’s come up in the past week isn’t at all a function of the decentralized blockchains the assets sit on. Rather, it’s a function of the web of lending and speculation that people build around them.