Ionic restarted Celsius’ crypto miners and is already facing a lawsuit
Celsius, the fraudulent company that advertised ultra-high interest rates on crypto deposits, sold its mining assets to a new company.
Now operated by Ionic Digital, the relaunch is going even worse than anyone could have imagined.
Although founder Alex Mashinsky is out of the company and awaiting his prison sentence, the new company’s directors are facing accusations in a new lawsuit that they allocated themselves compensation packages worth $420,000 annually.
Contesting this claim, an Ionic Digital spokesperson denies that any such compensation was paid, telling Protos that “the Ionic board of directors voted to dissolve its Emergence Committee in January 2025.”
Ionic Digital shares frozen
According to a new lawsuit, certain Celsius victims thought that their partial compensation in shares of Ionic would be worth $20. However, because they are illiquid and frozen by battles over Ionic’s Board, those shares have not yet been sellable for anything.
Three of the 86,000 creditors who accepted shares in Ionic are suing the company to compel public disclosure of its stockholder list as part of an attempt to install new directors.
They also want to stop the “millions of dollars that have funneled out of Ionic, revictimizing stockholders already hurt by Celsius’s pre-bankruptcy fraud.”
Of course, all courts hear two sides of every story. The complaint by these shareholders is merely one side of the Ionic story and the lawsuit was new as of February 10, 2025. Ionic and its counsel have the opportunity to respond in court.
Read more: Celsius planned to IPO as Ionic Digital but it’s not going well
In December 2024, Celsius founder Mashinsky pleaded guilty to two counts of financial fraud. He’s not part of Ionic today and is facing a maximum sentence of 30 years for his crimes. A judge has scheduled his sentencing window for April-May of this year.
Protos received a reply from Ionic Digital in which it stresses that the company is not affiliated with Celsius Network and that it acquired Celsius’ mining assets following a competitive bankruptcy court auction process.
It also states that Celsius creditors overwhelmingly approved the creation of Ionic Digital, and that the company holds approximately 2,551.31 bitcoin on its balance sheet with no debt as of January 31.
Finally, it clarifies that its board of directors voted to dissolve its Emergence Committee in January without compensating directors $420,000 annually. The company also intends to complete an audit by the end of the second quarter.
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Edit 18:46 UTC, Feb 12: Replaced an inaccurate headline and excerpt, correcting claims about Celsius emerging from bankruptcy and replacing them with notations of Ionic’s independent operations. Noted Ionic’s contention about director compensation and deleted references to Celsius 2.0. Added corporate statement.