Defunct crypto lender Celsius Network is back in the limelight after it was spotted depositing millions of dollars in Ethereum staking contracts to a crypto wallet owned by Figment.
As per data shared by Arkham Intelligence, Celsius has sent 30.8K ETH to be deposited, worth $56.98 million via Figment, an institutional-grade staking service, over the past week.
The movement represents one of the largest movements of funds for the crypto lender since it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in July.
Previously, Celsius took out 6,521 staked Ethereum worth over $13 million — since the network-enabled withdrawals through the Shapella upgrade.
According to Lookonchain’s dashboard, on-chain investigator, Celsius withdrew 4,991 ETH as of April 13.
Market experts believe that recent regulatory efforts in the US may be pressuring crypto firms in the nation to withdraw their staked ETH.
As for the bankrupt crypto lender, it owed more than $4 billion in consumer debt and in January a court allowed to distribute 94% of each user’s eligible assets.
Celsius highlighted the names of the qualified clients in a 1,400-page document submitted to the bankruptcy court in New York. Kirkland & Ellis LLP presented this document on behalf of the insolvent business.
The infamous crypto market carnage of 2022 topped with the Terra Luna incident spurred a massive sell-offs that hit lending crypto firms including Celsius, Voyager, and Three Arrows Capital hard.
Since its collapse, the firm has been slapped with several lawsuits over the past few months.
As per the latest update, the next court hearing is scheduled on 17th May.
That said, Ethereum’s high transaction costs are once again making headlines.
While it has left many investors anxious, validators have benefited greatly as staking payouts have surpassed a new record of 8.6% after the merger.
Ethereum Validators’ Profit Soar To $46M
According to recent data, Ethereum validators took home a total of 24,997 Ether or $46 million in the first week of May, thanks to the memecoins rage.
In particularly the meme token called Pepe which experts believed has acted as a catalyst for the dramatic increase in the profitability of validators.
This indicated an increase of 40% compared to the previous week’s earnings of $33 million when 18,339 ETH were distributed among them.