According to a filing lodged with Companies House on October 12, billionaire Cameron Winklevoss, who was a co-founder of Gemini and helped form the company, is no longer a director at Gemini Europe. (1)
Gemini Europe is an entirely subsidiary of the Gemini crypto exchange, which is situated in New York and presently operates in 29 countries across Europe. Gemini Europe provides services in these countries.
Gemini, which was initially established in 2014 by Cameron Winklevoss and his twin brother Tyler, has since grown to become the tenth-largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world, according to CoinGecko. Cameron Winklevoss is the current CEO of Gemini.
The role that the twins played in the early history of Facebook led to a series of highly publicized lawsuits in which the bros sought compensation in the multi-million dollar range for their purported contributions to the success of the social networking giant. The twins had become fairly well known in the mass press for their role in the early history of Facebook.
A further factor that has brought attention to the brothers is the generally optimistic outlooks they have for the future of Bitcoin, which they frequently share at events held by the sector.
Gemini has not yet provided any explanations as to why the modification was implemented; nevertheless, Decrypt has reached out to the company in an effort to obtain further information.
Not Just Cameron Winklevoss
It is not just Winklevoss who has resigned from his position as a top executive at Gemini Europe’s board of directors in the last month; the company’s executive leadership is currently going through some significant shifts as a result of these changes.
At the beginning of this month, Blair Halliday, who had been the Managing Director of Gemini for the previous two years, made the decision to leave the company and take the position of Managing Director, UK, for the cryptocurrency exchange Kraken.
A number of new members have been appointed to Gemini’s Board of Directors during the course of the past month. (2)
After becoming the first cryptocurrency exchange in Ireland to acquire an Electronic Money License (EMI) license in October 2020, beating out competitors such as Coinbase, Stripe, Square, and Meta (formerly Facebook), Gillian Lynch was appointed as a director on October 7, 2022, just one week before the company launched in Ireland. This was just one week before the company launched in Ireland.
The experienced Irish executive Lynch joined the company in April 2021, bringing with him close to twenty years of experience in the field of financial services. Prior to joining the company, Lynch spent eleven years working for the Bank of Ireland and well over three years working for the Irish core banking vendor LEVERIS.
It is not apparent whether Winklevoss’s departure from the management board has any connection to the business’s expansion into Ireland; nonetheless, the company has stated that
“going live in Ireland is the latest stage in” its goal for expanding into other European countries.” (3)
Gemini Undergoes Restructuring
But Gemini’s senior executive leadership isn’t the only one leaving the company for greener pastures elsewhere.
The company sent out a memo in June 2022 explaining its intention to lay off approximately ten percent of its workforce, citing “present, tumultuous market dynamics that are likely to endure for some time” as the reason for its decision. (4)
The action taken by Gemini was not comparable to the steps taken by Coinbase around the same time. Coinbase likewise cited concerns around the “crypto winter” as a reason for pruning off a big percentage of its workforce. Gemini’s move was not dissimilar to Coinbase’s action.