- By Andrei Poliakov
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I've been planning to do this for a while. Every few weeks, I'm going to sit down and write about what's going on at APX, what's happening in the market, and what I think about the direction of the industry. This is the first issue.

State of the Industry

On March 15, BlockFills filed for Chapter 11. Chicago-based institutional crypto lender, backed by Susquehanna and CME Group's venture arm. 2,000 clients across 95 countries. Gone.

At the first day hearing, BlockFills' own counsel confirmed what borrowers feared most: customer funds had always been commingled with company funds. Bankruptcy proceedings would dictate that all of it was property of the estate. Borrowers who thought their collateral was safely held would now stand in line alongside every other unsecured creditor.

We've been here before. Celsius. FTX. BlockFi. I've watched this movie enough times to know how it ends. Unregulated or offshore platform, funds commingled, collateral gone, and borrowers finding out too late that what they signed never actually protected them.

I wrote a full piece on BlockFills two weeks ago. It goes in depth into the legal details that actually determine whether you get your Bitcoin back when a lender blows up. Link in the comments if you haven't read it.

The pattern isn't stopping and the next one is already out there. The only real question is whether borrowers start paying attention to what to look out for before it happens to them. It would be interesting to see what borrowers do after BlockFills. I expect a lot of borrowers will finally start working solely with regulated platforms. Whether that actually happens will tell us a lot about where this industry is.

Inside APX

A few things worth sharing from our side.

In March, the CSA expanded our exemptive relief enabling us to offer U.S. dollar loans advanced and repaid in USD Coin (USDC) nationwide. We got our original authorization in April 2025, when we became the first (and still the only) crypto-backed lender in the country to get it. The USDC expansion means we can help more borrowers, and it's a reminder that the rigorous regulatory path we chose was the right one.

Zero borrower losses since day one. That's not luck but rather our commitment to compliance and regulation!

The Future

Our white-label vertical is picking up steam. For those of you that weren’t aware - we offer our technology to many other lenders, fintechs and crypto exchanges, both in Canada and around the world. We are very excited to bring on more white-label clients, and it’s a testament to how robust our entire platform is.

If you found this useful, please share it. My inbox is always open for comments and feedback.

See you in two weeks.

Andrei Poliakov
‍Founder and CEO, APX Lending

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