The founders of Three Arrows Capital (3AC), Su Zhu and Kyle Davies, have denied attempting to abscond funds out of the company before it collapsed. Zhu, in an interview with Bloomberg, said he would maybe accept being called stupid, but people saying he absconded funds, is not true.
He highlighted that the firm’s executives suffered significant personal losses while trying to keep the embattled cryptocurrency hedge fund afloat. The 3AC co-founder said people may call them stupid or delusional. And he accepts it. Zhu revealed that he actually put more of his personal money into the company.
Following the collapse of the crypto hedge fund, reports flashed that Zhu and Davies had gone into hiding and allegedly not being cooperative. Zhu admitted that in fact, they had been forced into hiding because they were getting “death threats”. He said it doesn’t mean that they haven’t been communicating with the relevant authorities. The co-founders have been communicating with the authorities.
Zhu and Davies also brushed off rumors of living extravagant lifestyles. Zhu said they were never seen in any clubs spending lots of money. They never even drove around in Ferraris or Lamborghinis. The co-founders called out the smear campaign against them, which Zhu described as a classic playbook. These kinds of headlines come up when companies collapse and people turn to talks.
Acknowledging that a lot of people lost their funds, Davies said the entire ordeal was unfortunate. He shared that the whole situation is regrettable. The co-founders shared that prior to the collapse they were bullish and had put a number of trades on leverage. They expected a market turnaround. Zhu told Bloomberg that 3AC positioned itself for a kind of market that didn’t end up happening. Before the collapse, he told people that they don’t want to overestimate their ability to do things.
The executive explained that crypto traders don’t want to blow out during a supercycle. Davies pointed out that 3AC did very well when the crypto cycle was good. They believed in everything to the fullest. He shared that they had almost all of their assets in the company. Davies highlighted that 3AC did the best in the goods and lost everything in the bad times.
