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FTX's downfall and Binance's consolidation: the fragility of centralised digital finance

Author

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  • Vidal-Tomás, David
  • Briola, Antonio
  • Aste, Tomaso

Abstract

This paper investigates the causes and the consequences of the FTX digital currency exchange's failure in November 2022. Analysing on-chain data, we report that FTX heavily relied on leveraging and misusing its native token, FTT, and we show how this behaviour exacerbated the company's fragile financial situation. To gain further insights into the downfall, we employ state-of-the-art network science instruments to model the evolutionary dependency structures of 199 cryptocurrencies on an hourly basis, and we investigate tick-by-tick public trades at the time of the events. We identify the collapse of the Terra-Luna ecosystem as the pivotal event that triggered a significant decrease in the exchange's liquidity. Results suggest that the crash was actively accelerated by Binance tweets causing a systemic reaction in the cryptocurrency market. Finally, identifying the actors who mostly benefited from the FTX's collapse and highlighting a generalised trend toward centralisation in the crypto space, we emphasise the importance of genuinely decentralised finance for a transparent, future digital economy.

Suggested Citation

  • Vidal-Tomás, David & Briola, Antonio & Aste, Tomaso, 2023. "FTX's downfall and Binance's consolidation: the fragility of centralised digital finance," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 119902, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:119902
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    File URL: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/119902/
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Saengchote, Kanis & Samphantharak, Krislert, 2024. "Digital money creation and algorithmic stablecoin run," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    2. Kotiloglu, Serhan & Ometto, M. Paola, 2024. "An exploratory look at the role of ownership in initial coin offerings (ICO): Different audiences and ICO success," Journal of Business Venturing Insights, Elsevier, vol. 21(C).
    3. Marcin Wk{a}torek & Marcin Kr'olczyk & Jaros{l}aw Kwapie'n & Tomasz Stanisz & Stanis{l}aw Dro.zd.z, 2024. "Approaching multifractal complexity in decentralized cryptocurrency trading," Papers 2411.05951, arXiv.org.
    4. Riccardo De Blasis & Luca Galati & Rosanna Grassi & Giorgio Rizzini, 2024. "Information Flow in the FTX Bankruptcy: A Network Approach," Papers 2407.12683, arXiv.org.
    5. Cascavilla, Alessandro, 2024. "Between money and speculative asset: The role of financial literacy on the perception towards Bitcoin in Italy," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    binance; cryptocurrency; FTX; network science; Terra-Luna; ES/K002309/1; EP/P031730/1; Horizon 2020; H2020-ICT-2018-2 825215;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G10 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)
    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions

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