FTX announced that its Nickel futures contract has been liquidated. The announcement sent shockwaves through the market, with many investors losing money on their investment in the contract.
The Nickel Digital Asset Management Metaplex fund announced its closure on July 1 after seeing a 20% return during its first months of trading. This article will explore how this collapse affected different players in the market and why some of them ended up closing down their operations or locking down assets following the crash.
The announcement came after FTX had been accused of faking trades to boost volume at a rival exchange, NYSE Arca/Global Trading Systems (GTS), as part of an alleged scheme to manipulate the price of nickel.
Nickel Digital Impacted By FTX
The Nickel contract returned -5% on their investment, while Gold and Copper both ended up with the same returns.
The impact of FTX’s collapse on other assets like Bitcoin (BTC) was also significant. In fact, BTC temporarily fell by more than 30% during this period after a week-long runup in price earlier in the month that saw it climb to around $9000 per coin.
Nickel Digital Asset Management is based in New York and has been around since 2016. The company operates a few different funds and strategies, including Metaplex, a portfolio that invests in other cryptocurrencies.
The fund was up 20% before it was shut down. According to the company’s website: “The fund invests in crypto assets such as Bitcoin, Ethereum and Litecoin through US-domiciled exchange traded notes (ETNs).”
Nickel Digital Asset Management said on Twitter that trading would be halted for its Metaplex fund until further notice because of the liquidation of FTX’s futures contracts for nickel futures due on Friday March 15th.#FinTech #Blockchain
Metaplex was up 20% at the time of its closure, and launched in April. The fund was a multi-strategy investment vehicle that invested in other crypto assets, not just nickel.
