FTX restructuring team member believes that FTX's customer base is "extraordinarily valuable."
The potential release of the FTX customer list, containing around nine million users, might cause a substantial drop in the crypto exchange's sale value, argued a key player on the FTX restructuring team.
Kevin Cofsky, a partner at the investment bank Parella Weinberg currently retained by FTX, expressed this concern during a June 8th court hearing.
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The man stressed that FTX's value could be significantly undermined if its rivals had access to its clientele data, harming the ongoing restructuring efforts.
Cofsky is a pivotal figure within the restructuring team, working to extract as much value as possible from FTX. Elucidating on the importance of customer data, Cofsky said:
We believe that the existing customer base is extraordinarily valuable and our understanding is based on our research and having looked at the costs incurred by other crypto companies specifically to solicit customers.
Currently, the full list of FTX customers is unknown. However, a challenge to this decision was presented by numerous well-known media outlets, such as Bloomberg, The New York Times, and the Financial Times. These organizations claimed that the public and the press should rightfully have access to bankruptcy filings.
According to Cofsky, client data is viewed as "extremely valuable and valued" by those interested in the business.
I think that releasing that information would impair the debtor's ability to maximize the value that it currently possesses.
FTX has kick-started a process of drawing interest from prospective buyers or investors. On top of that, the company is reportedly considering relaunching the crypto exchange. Cofsky labeled the new version of the crypto exchange a “first-class” and “regulatorily compliant” entity.
Even if the company is not sold or fails to attract investors, a reboot of the crypto exchange could allow creditors to recover some of their dues from trading fees.