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Business

Celsius Execs Cashed Out $40 Million Before Halting Withdrawals

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Celsius founder and recently resigned CEO Alex Mashinsky as he appeared in a promotional video for Celsius uploaded to YouTube. The video was deleted after the company imploded.
Screenshot: YouTube

Three executives at crypto trading platform Celsius cashed out at least $40 million in cryptocurrency shortly before the company halted withdrawals for all users earlier this year, according to a financial disclosure form filed in New York bankruptcy court late Wednesday.

The withdrawals by Celsius executives, first reported by CoinDesk, don’t look good from an optics perspective, given how many users were stopped from being able to pull their money out during the liquidity crisis just a few months ago. Celsius halted all withdrawals indefinitely in June and filed for bankruptcy the following month, leaving users with nothing. Celsius owes roughly $4.7 billion to users but doesn’t have the money to pay them.

The three execs who pulled out the combined $40 million in crypto were former CEO Alex Mashinsky, former Chief Strategy Officer Daniel Leon, and current CTO Nuke Goldstein. Mashinsky resigned as CEO in September, but is still at the center of the investigation over whether Celsius was little more than a Ponzi Scheme—something that over 40 states are currently looking into. Leon resigned just yesterday.

The Financial Times previously reported that Mashinsky withdrew roughly $10 million from Celsius before the collapse of the company, citing unnamed sources, but we now know Leon and Goldstein were also pulling their money out before the public knew there were any problems with liquidity at Celsius. Leon withdrew at least $11 million, and Goldstein withdrew at least $20.8 million, including millions in the Celsius token.

Gizmodo has uploaded the latest Celsius court filing, which totals over 14,000 pages, to the Internet Archive for anyone who really wants to get into the nitty gritty of the bankruptcy case. It appears the filing is so large because it seems to have the names and recent transactions of every user on the platform.

Screenshot showing just some of the withdrawals made by the former Celsius CEO in May of 2022.
Screenshot: PACER

Curiously, Mashinsky’s wife Kristine appears to have withdrawn over $2 million in the Celsius token on May 31, according to the documents. Mashinsky did not immediately respond to an email early Thursday.

The Celsius token is currently trading at $1.28, down roughly 78% from a year ago. Bitcoin, the most popular crypto in the world, is currently trading at $20,175, down 63% from a year ago. Ethereum, the second most popular coin, is currently trading at $1,360, down 62% from a year ago.

Goldstein’s lawyers said in a statement:

Your report that Mr. Goldstein withdrew millions of dollars in advance of the “pause” is flatly mistaken. The reality is that Mr. Goldstein did not withdraw even one dollar in the four weeks prior to the pause—to the contrary, he deposited over $90,000 in CEL tokens in late May, just three weeks before the pause. Most of the supposed “withdrawals” from our client’s account were, in fact, regular-course transfers between his accounts and involved corresponding deposits. Indeed, in the year before the pause, Mr. Goldstein had net positive deposits into Celsius (including interest), not withdrawals. Your account unfortunately distorts Mr. Goldstein’s position, as he currently has millions locked up in Celsius, making him one of the Company’s largest unsecured creditors. Nuke is proud of his work to create a secure platform for Celsius users, and has been working tirelessly day in and day out to help restructure the Company to the benefit of all its creditors.

Update, Oct. 6, 11:29 am ET: Updated with a statement from Nuke Goldstein’s lawyers.

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Entertainment

Warner Bros. Discovery proposes “10 year plan” for DC

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WB Studio Tour
Photo: Matt Winkelmeyer (Getty Images)

Can DC ever chart a course to navigate out of Marvel’s shadow? That’s been the question for the last 10 years (since the conclusion of Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy). Newly crowned Warner Bros. Discovery chief David Zaslav thinks he has the answer, which is… the same thing the guys before him tried to do, basically.

“You look at Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman—these are brands that are known everywhere in the world,” Zaslav said on the infamous WB earnings call (per The Hollywood Reporter). “We have done a reset. We’ve restructured the business where we are going to focus, where there is going to be a team with a ten year plan focusing just on DC. We believe we can build a much more sustainable business.”

Oh, gee, a 10 year plan? Why didn’t anyone think of that before? It’s a strange bit of corporate gaslighting to pretend we weren’t all around for the attempted Zack Snyder-verse. Further, it’s not much of a “reset” when only one film (Batgirl) was canceled and the rest–which are all still tangled up in the Snyderverse to some degree–are going forward (even the dreaded Flash film).

“It’s very similar to the structure Alan Horn, [former Disney CEO] Bob Iger and Kevin Feige put together very effectively at Disney,” said Zaslav, as if copy-pasting from the MCU handbook worked for any of his predecessors. He may want to consider that Feige is someone that directors actually want to work for; the Marvel boss’ compassionate response to Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah after Batgirl was canned only makes Zaslav and DC look even worse in comparison.

But Zaslav is determined to “focus on quality” and not “release any film before it’s ready,” which sounds more like the baseline for the film industry than an innovative new strategy. “The objective is to grow the DC brand. To grow the DC characters,” he said. “But also, our job is to protect the DC brand, and that’s what we’re going to do.” DC fans will surely sleep better knowing this is the guy protecting their beloved heroes.

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Entertainment

The Dream is finally real

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The Sandman
Image: Netflix

After literal decades of development, the fervent prayers of millions of fans, and the exhausted efforts of poor, used-up Joseph Gordon Levitt, it’s finally here: Actual goddamn footage of an actual goddamn TV version of Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman, in the form of the trailer for Netflix’s upcoming adaptation of the beloved comics series, released today at Comic-Con.

The Sandman | Official Trailer | Netflix

And, hey: Are we being rubes here, or does this look…Actually pretty good? We can’t say we’re completely sold on Tom Sturridge as the show’s central figure, Dream; there’s a very specific blend of self-involved arrogance and self-involved moping baked into that character, and almost any actor would struggle to nail it out of the box. Kirby Howell-Baptiste seems to be on more even footing as Gaiman’s deeply empathetic version of Death, though, and Boyd Holbrook is pretty convincing as the show’s version of literal walking nightmare The Corinthian—who appears to be getting an enhanced role from the relatively small (but deeply memorable) one he plays in Gaiman’s comics.

More importantly, though, Gaiman, David S. Goyer, and Allan Heinberg seem to have nailed the sweeping, surreal scope and tone of Sandman, with shots of Hell, the realm of Dream’s sibling Desire, and one very unlucky diner all exuding the proper sense of mystery and dread. (We also get a quick bit of David Thewlis as the resident of said diner, and, yeah: This is probably going to be a creepy one.)

A few other tidbits from the panel today: Mark Hamill will appear in the series, voicing Dream’s pumpkin-headed janitor, Mervyn Pumpkinhead. And, somewhat amazingly, legendary Sandman covers artist Dave McKean is also involved in the project; at Gaiman’s personal request, he provided unique end credits art for each episode of the show.

Sandman has lingered in the popular consciousness for more than 30 years now because it’s more than just a supernatural adventure: Obsessed, like its author, with stories, it’s often meandering, digressive, and, yeah, a little bit pretentious. (While also being very human and funny; there’s a reason they’ve got Patton Oswalt in this thing as a talking raven.) That’s a tall order for any TV show to live up to, but from this brief look, we don’t see any real red flags indicating why it can’t finally dream itself into life when Netflix unleashes the show in full in a couple of weeks.

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Technology

GOG Is Now Providing Menstrual Leave To Employees

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Image: GOG

The digital storefront GOG, formerly known as Good Old Games, recently announced that it will offer its employees menstrual leave, allowing anyone suffering from excessive period pain or other complications extra time off. It makes the studio one of the first companies in the games industry to offer such a benefit to its staff. Its parent company, CD Projekt Red, is also looking into providing similar leave options.

As first spotted by Axios, the Poland-based company announced on LinkedIn April 1 that it was going to start offering extra paid time off for all affected employees. A GOG spokesperson told Axios they estimate this will amount to an extra day per quarter for employees who take advantage of the time off. But also told the outlet that staff members are free to take more time off “whenever period pains occur.” Employees can also choose to just take a few hours’ leave rather than full days.

“Menstrual Leave fosters inclusiveness by accepting that there are biological differences in the workplace,” GOG wrote in the LinkedIn post announcing the new plan. “By giving additional days off for those experiencing menstrual period pain, we acknowledge these symptoms are real.”

Implementing Menstrual Leave is yet another step towards making GOG an even more inclusive workplace, and we won’t stop in our continuous efforts to learn, reflect and improve on how we can do better for all of our team members.

GOG’s culture and communication manager Gabriela Siemienkowicz told Axios that the new policy is “experimental” and that the company would evaluate throughout 2022 how these additional days off “impact the well-being” of GOG employees. After that, the storefront may “expand the policy” next year, though there are no details as to what that may entail.

Kotaku has reached out to GOG for comment.

Siemienkowicz also told Axios that the policy was inspired by her own experiences and that during a “Women of GOG” meeting she brought the topic up and found other employees had similar stories and experiences.

“We shared the same view on this matter,” said Siemienkowicz. “And would appreciate the possibility to simply lay down and take most of the day off without sacrificing one of the regular paid absence days we have available throughout the year.”

GOG’s parent company, CD Projekt Red, told PC Gamer that it is also looking into adopting a similar policy in the future.

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Entertainment

Superman was almost the villain in The Suicide Squad

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Henry Cavill in Man Of Steel
Screenshot: Warner Bros.

The Suicide Squad introduced plenty of characters who hadn’t had their chance to shine onscreen, from Peacemaker to Polka-Dot Man. But perhaps the biggest surprise for DC fans was seeing Starro The Conqueror as the villain that the squad battles. James Gunn proved that a giant starfish can actually be pretty intimidating—and his inclusion inadvertently gave the very timely message that if you just cover your damn face, you won’t die (… from having Starro’s face-huggers sucking on your face to mind-control you). However, it turns out Gunn initially wanted a very different “villain” to face off against the squad: Superman.

While on the podcast Script Apart, The Suicide Squad’s writer and director talked about how, before choosing Starro as the villain, he thought the Suicide Squad should fight Superman. He believed that it would be “a very interesting story.” Ultimately, he scrapped the idea when he realized that Starro would make a far better villain to fight. “When I came up with Starro, he’s a character I love from the comics. I think he’s the perfect comic book character, because absolutely ludicrous but he’s also very scary in his own way,” he explained.

Gunn read the comics while growing up and he remembering thinking that Starro and his mind control powers were terrifying back then. “What he does is scary,” Gunn said. “He used to scare the crap out of me when I was a child, putting those face-huggers on Superman and Batman and stuff. So I thought he was one of the major, major DC villains that was probably never going to be put into another movie. And if they did, they would do it like, the black cloud version of Starro. Not a giant walking starfish, a kaiju that is bright pink and cerulean blue, just ridiculously big, bright bad guy.”

Having Superman be the villain wouldn’t be a bad fit; if anything, it’d feel reminiscent of the critically acclaimed Harley Quinn animated series. But Starro forces the squad to prove their abilities, with an intense and very entertaining face-off in the movie’s final moments.

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Entertainment

Sasha Calle is your new Supergirl in the Flash movie

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Photo: Rachel Luna (Getty Images)

We can now add young Kryptonian butt-kicker Supergirl to Warner Media’s ongoing efforts to duplicate (at least!) every single character in their DC Comics film and TV rosters, with Deadline reporting that Sasha Calle will play a new version of the character in Andy Muschietti’s upcoming Flash movie. Calle is best known for her role on The Young And The Restless, where she’s appeared for the last 283 or so episodes. (That’s “since 2018″ in non-soap-opera speak.)

Muschietti posted a video today on his Instagram, showing the moment in which he revealed to Calle that she’d been cast in the part, and it is, you know, exceedingly cute and sweet. Calle was one of reportedly more than 400 performers who auditioned for the part (without, apparently, even knowing what role they were going for for much of the process); among other things, she read with the film’s star, Ezra Miller, as part of the extensive vetting process. Calle is the first Latinx actor to play the character, who’s currently portrayed by Melissa Benoist over on The CW’s Arrowverse of shows.

Meanwhile, there’s still not much known about The Flash, which has been in development for years now without much in the way of forward movement. The biggest news, of course, was the addition of Michael Keaton’s Batman to the cast, making it clear that the film would likely be dipping heavily into the DC Comics multiverse. There’s also the big intended part that won’t be going forward; Ray Fisher’s Cyborg was originally slated to appear in the film, but his high-profile disagreements with DC Films over alleged abusive treatment on the set of Justice League has pretty thoroughly scorched that particular earth by now.

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