Crypto Firm Wyre Forces 90% Withdrawal Limit on Users

Just days after two ex-employees purportedly warned the likelihood of a closure, the provider of cryptocurrency infrastructure, Wyre, amended its withdrawal policy to restrict users from cashing out up to 90% of their assets.

Wyre put a withdrawal cap on its platform on January 7, 2023, citing “the best interest of our community.” Users of Wyre can now withdraw up to 90% of their cryptocurrency funds as the company looks into alternative strategic options to avoid the persistent bear market.

Additionally, Wyre’s chief risk officer and compliance officer, Yanni Giannaros, was named interim CEO by the organization. The tweets states: 

“Stephen Cheng is our interim Chief Executive Officer – his skillset as our Chief Risk Officer and Chief Compliance Officer makes him well-suited to lead our company.” 

Users of Wyre will be subject to adjustments to daily withdrawal caps as the platform implements new operational concepts.

The company further said that it is still conducting business, and will give updates about the situations to the community when new information becomes available.

“We sincerely appreciate the support and positive sentiments from our community as well as the crypto ecosystem at large as we pursue options that will enable Wyre to flourish. Our operations continue and we will share information with the community as it is available,” the platform asserted.

Wyre Ends Partnership with MetaMask

According to reports, Wyre’s partnership with the cryptocurrency wallet MetaMask was terminated as a result of its failure. 

The removal of Wyre from MetaMask’s mobile aggregator, which previously allowed users to purchase bitcoins directly from the digital wallet, was revealed on January 5.

Bolt Financial, a technology company based in San Francisco, announced back in September that it was abandoning its $1.5 billion plan to acquire Wyre Payments Inc..

There are speculations that Bolt’s reassessment of the deal may be due to the overpriced nature of it given the present market conditions, the collapse in the cryptocurrency market, and the financial technology industry.