By Diane Lourdes Dick and Christopher K. Odinet (University of Iowa)
Note: This post is the third post in a series of posts on bankruptcies of cryptocurrency companies and the emerging issues they pose. Previous posts in the series include:
1. The FTX Bankruptcy: First Week Motions, Jurisdictional Squabbling, and Other Unusual Developments, by Megan McDermott
2. Quantifying Cryptocurrency Claims in Bankruptcy: Does the Dollar Still Reign Supreme?, by Ingrid Bagby, Michele Maman, Anthony Greene, and Marc Veilleux
This series is being managed by the Bankruptcy Roundtable and Xiao Ma, SJD at Harvard Law School, xma [at] sjd [dot] law [dot] harvard [dot] edu.
Check the HLS Bankruptcy Roundtable periodically for additional contributing posts by academics and practitioners from institutions across the country.
***
Bankruptcy has a public and a private side. The reorganization of a private company in chapter 11 has implications for the public, and, in some reorganizations, the public interest is quite substantial. The recent bankruptcy of the third largest crypto exchange in the world, FTX, represents just the kind of corporate restructuring where the public interest is front and center. Yet the public priority embedded in these proceedings has the potential to be overlooked. In this work, we aim to change that by shining light on the stakes, the costs, and the allocative decisions to be made in what will no doubt be described as one of the most consequential legal proceedings to happen in the world of crypto. Specifically, the outcome of these proceedings will help clear up what it means to hold crypto as a form of property, as well as the custodial v. proprietary nature of the relationship between crypto exchange companies and their customers as to rights in crypto assets. The answers to these questions will not only help resolve this bankruptcy but they will also guide lawmakers and regulators as they seek a way to regulate and police the crypto market in the future. As such, we question whether the private value capturing model that is chapter 11 is the right framework—particularly when it comes to the allocation of who bears the costs—for these largely public-oriented matters.
Click here to read the full article.