The U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York has cleared the way for the bankrupt Voyager Digital to begin reimbursing its creditors.
As reported by Reuters, Judge Michael Wiles approved the firm’s liquidation plan, allowing Voyager to return approximately $1.33 billion in crypto to customers.
“At today’s hearing, the Court approved the liquidation procedures. We are working with Voyager to go effective under the plan as soon as possible (as early as this Friday),” Voyager’s Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors said.
The committee added that it will be dissolved after the liquidation plan takes effect, targeting June 1 as the latest date for finalizing the initial distribution of funds.
3/ We are still working towards making initial distributions available no later than June 1. We will provide additional updates as they are available.
— Voyager Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors (@VoyagerUCC) May 17, 2023
The bankruptcy plan, the third for the firm, was tabled on May 5 following Binance.US's decision to pull out of the previously reached agreement.
According to the information provided on Voyager's website, the estate is in possession of $1.334 billion in assets which equates to 75.68% of the aggregate value of customer claims against Voyager’s estate.
However, “due to certain holdbacks,” customers should only anticipate an initial payment of 35.72% of their claims. Any further distribution depends on the result of future litigations that revolve around the “FTX/Alameda preference claim dispute, the success of any additional claims brought by the Voyager Plan Administrator against third parties, as well as any recovery by the Voyager estate as a creditor in the Three Arrows Capital liquidation.”
Citing Judge Michael Wiles’ order, Voyager said the initial payments will be made either in crypto through the Voyager app or in cash after a waiting period of 30 days.
Regarding deposits held in unsupported cryptocurrencies that cannot be withdrawn from Voyager's platform and Voyager's proprietary VGX token, the firm said that customers will be repaid with USDC stablecoin.
The crypto broker filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in July 2022 year after revealing it had massive exposure to failed crypto hedge fund Three Arrows Capital (3AC) and has since been working out how to return assets to investors.
At one point, crypto exchange FTX was eyeing the buyout of the firm’s distressed assets, but the deal was called off when FTX itself went bankrupt in a sudden collapse that rocked the crypto industry last November.
Last month, Voyager reached an agreement with the U.S. federal government, allowing it to sell its assets to the American arm of the crypto exchange Binance. This was axed too after Binance.US walked away from the deal on April 25.