By
Tolu Ajiboye
February 23rd, 2024
The bear market coupled with the turbulent US regulatory environment has prompted many digital asset businesses to lay off a part of their staff.
Hardware crypto wallet manufacturer Ledger is laying off 12% of its staff, citing microeconomic headwinds. In an October 5 blog post, the company’s CEO Pascal Gauthier wrote that the decision was made “for the longevity of the business,” which, like many crypto businesses has been impacted by the bear market caused by the collapse of major crypto firms like Voyager Digital and FTX.
“Macroeconomic headwinds are limiting our ability to generate revenue, and in response to the current market conditions and business realities, we must reduce roles across the global business,” said the CEO. “Sadly, this means we are making the difficult decision to reduce 12% of the roles at Ledger.”
Data from the company’s LinkedIn suggests that Ledger had about 734 employees when the post was published. This means that roughly 88 people may have been laid off.
The news of layoffs comes about seven months after the company completed a funding round, raising more than $109 million at a $1.4 billion valuation. In August, Ledger announced that as a part of a partnership with PayPal, it was integrating its Live software with the payments giant, enabling verified users in the United States to buy cryptocurrency using their Paypal app.
The bear market coupled with the turbulent US regulatory environment has prompted many digital asset businesses to lay off a portion of their staff. So far this year, Nansen, Coinbase, Huobi, Crypto.com, and Chainalysis have announced layoffs.
Meanwhile, Ledger has been experiencing success in its retail business. According to the post, the wallet manufacturer has seen increased “usage, revenue, and transactional volume within Ledger Live.” The CEO also hinted at new products and services to come including Ledger Recover and Ledger Stax.
“We will soon launch our subscription service Ledger Recover, which will enable millions to securely back up their Secret Recovery Phrase. This is a necessary service for the next wave of new users to join self-custody and Ledger,” he stated, adding: “We have a proven record of delivering quality products, and are excited to get Ledger Stax to market. It’s taking longer than we expected, yet I’m proud we endeavored on a project this innovative.”