RockWallet absorbs Wyre’s user base

After the shutdown of digital currency payments firm Wyre in June 2023, self-managed digital currency wallet RockWallet has stepped in to acquire its user base.

The firm said it had reached out to Wyre’s user base and will offer them a way to reactivate their accounts without going through a new KYC process.

RockWallet co-founder Steve Bailey said they were “honored to have the opportunity to fill that gap and connect with Wyre’s former clients to earn their trust as we welcome them to continue their crypto journeys with RockWallet.”

As regular CoinGeek readers know, RockWallet has the stamp of approval from several high-profile CoinGeek contributors, including Kurt Wuckert Jr, who has said he has used it on his show, and Joshua Henslee, who fully reviewed it here.

What happened to Wyre?

At the beginning of 2023, CoinGeek raised questions about Wyre’s viability as it announced it was seeking new funding and would not pause customer withdrawals. Six months later, the firm announced it was shutting down, citing “market conditions” as the reason.

After nearly a decade, Wyre is winding down. Due to market conditions, we made this decision to protect the best interest of our key stakeholders and customers. This decision is not due to any regulatory agency direction. Wyre continues to secure customer assets.

— Wyre (@sendwyre) June 16, 2023

What did it mean by market conditions? For those who weren’t around, early 2023 was the tail end of a storm that rocked the digital currency industry, causing firms like Celsius Network to fold as LUNA/UST collapsed and a cacophony of chaos unfolded across the industry.

As CoinGeek had previously predicted on many occasions, this carnage was driven by a toxic combination of greed and fraud. Sam Bankman-Fried had robbed his customers
blind, causing FTX to collapse, and firms like Three Arrows Capital, which had recklessly borrowed on leverage, unwound quickly, causing token prices to drop sharply. In one particular case, LUNA went to zero as the algorithmic stablecoin UST imploded.

While some of the perpetrators of this madness got their just deserts, others have evaded justice, and some decent firms like Wyre got caught in the crosshairs, ending a 10-year hard-fought business run.

More about RockWallet

Thankfully, in RockWallet, Wyre customers have a new home, and a good one at that.

The self-custodial wallet offers various services, from sending and receiving digital currencies to storing and swapping them. It puts control in the hands of users who can always recover their wallets using a seed phrase. Extra security features include password protection and two-factor authentication.

You can learn more about RockWallet here.

Watch: Steve Bailey from RockWallet Joins Kurt on the CG Weekly Livestream