Huobi Group founder Leon Li is engaged in talks with a group of investors as the Chinese entrepreneur looks to sell his majority stake in the crypto exchange at a value of between $2 billion and $3 billion, according to a Bloomberg report.
People close to the matter said FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried and Tron founder Justin Sun are among the investors who have held preliminary talks with the Huobi boss.
Li is reportedly seeking to sell around 60% of the firm. A potential deal could net the Huobi founder more than $1 billion, making it one of the largest in the crypto industry to date.
Huobi’s existing investors, including ZhenFund and Sequoia China, were reportedly informed of Li’s intentions during a shareholder meeting in July, with one person saying a deal could be completed before the end of the month.
“He [Li] hope that the new shareholders will become more powerful and resourceful, and that they will value the Huobi brand and invest more capital and energy to drive the growth of Huobi, a Huobi Global told Bloombergdeclines to disclose further details.
HT, the native symbol of the Huobi exchange, has also jumped to $5.56 from $4.45 after Bloomberg report, before returning to $5.31 by press time.
This still represents a massive increase of more than 19% in value in the last day, per CoinMarketCap.
Huobi Global, FTX and Tron did not immediately respond Decryptits request for comment.
The bear market is taking its toll on Huobi
Founded in 2013, Huobi was forced out of China during a crackdown on the crypto industry last year and is currently registered in the Seychelles.
With a trading volume of over $1 billion in the last 24 hours, it is now one of the world’s largest crypto exchanges.
Reports of the Huobi founder looking to sell his stake in the firm first surfaced in early July when China-based crypto journalist Colin Wu broke the news on Twitter.
“With a profit of more than $1 billion in 2021, Huobi may be the most profitable exchange in the world after Binance in 2021, and it has many matching licenses. But when the market is down, it may be difficult to sell higher value,” wrote Wu back then.
Before that, Wu reported that due to the sharp drop in revenue after all Chinese users were removed, Huobi was preparing a cut in the workforce, which may exceed 30% of the firm’s employees.
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