Billionaire Gemini co-founder Cameron Winklevoss is no longer a director at Gemini Europe, according to a Companies House filing made on October 12.
Gemini Europe is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the New York-based Gemini cryptocurrency exchange, who currently provides services in 29 European countries.
Cameron Winklevoss co-founded Gemini in 2014, alongside his twin brother Tyler, which has since grown to become the 10th-largest crypto exchange in the world according to CoinGecko.
The twins became fairly well known in the mainstream media for their role in the early history of Facebook, which led to a series of highly-publicized lawsuits where the brothers sought multi-million dollar remuneration for their alleged contributions to the success of the social networking giant.
The brothers have also attracted attention for their generally bullish attitudes to the future of Bitcoin, which they regularly communicate at industry events.
Gemini has yet to provide any reasons as to why the change took place, though Decrypt has contacted the firm for additional information.
Winklevoss isn’t the only top executive to leave Gemini Europe’s board of directors in the past month, the firm’s executive leadership is currently undergoing some serious changes.
Blair Halliday, who had served as managing director of Gemini for two years, jumped ship to become managing director, UK, of crypto exchange Kraken earlier this month.
Gemini’s Board of Directors has also seen several new appointments in the past month.
Gillian Lynch was appointed director on October 7, 2022, just a week before the firm launched in Ireland, after becoming the first crypto exchange to acquire an Electronic Money License (EMI) license in the country in October 2020, pipping companies like Coinbase, Stripe, Square, and Meta (formerly Facebook) to the post.
Lynch joined the firm in April 2021, with the experienced Irish exec bringing around two decades of financial services expertise to the table, including an 11-year stint at the Bank of Ireland and well over three years at Irish core banking vendor LEVERIS.
It’s unclear whether Winklevoss’s disappearance from the board of directors has any connection to the Irish expansion, though the company did say that “going live in Ireland is the latest step in” its European growth strategy.”
Gemini undergoes restructuring
But it’s not just Gemini’s top executive leadership that is moving on to pastures new.
In June 2022 the firm announced plans to lay off around 10% of its staff, with a memo attributing the decision to “current, turbulent market conditions that are likely to persist for some time”.
The move by Gemini was not dissimilar to the actions taken by Coinbase at around the same time, who also cited issues surrounding the “crypto winter” when trimming off a large percentage of its staff.
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