Ifinex Inc., the parent company of cryptocurrency exchange Bitfinex and troubled stablecoin Tether, has raised $1 billion as part of a so-called “initial exchange offering.”

The news came via Bitfinex Chief Technology Officer Paolo Ardonio, who said on Twitter Monday that iFinex had raised the $1 billion in 10 days with an unspecified number of investors from “giants in our industry” contributing more than $100 million each with others inside and outside the industry investing more than $1 million each.

“Why? Because they know we are trustworthy, they recognize what we have been doing (without needing us bragging about it publicly) and they want us keep fighting for the industry whole,” Ardonio wrote in another tweet. “Their own words.”

To add confusion, Ardonio later wrote that “most was raised by investor who contacted directly iFinex and subscribed directly with iFinex.”

The company announced May 4 that it was raising money through the issue of a “LEO” token. The token was pitched as an new “utility” token that will become the main transaction cryptocurrency on the Bitfinex exchange, replacing Tether. Tether is iFinex’s stablecoin and the root of the IEO. The company raised money to cover reserve funds it took from Tether to cover losses at Bitfinex.

The drama started with the New York Attorney General’s office filing a lawsuit against the company April 25 alleging that it engaged in “undisclosed, conflicted transactions to cover Bitfinex’s losses by transferring money out of Tether reserve funds.”

Bitfinex later admitted that it had raided Tether’s reserves April 30 to cover a loss of $850 million stolen by payments provider Crypto Capital Corp. The company argued that it had done nothing wrong and there was no legal obligation for it to hold $1 for every Tether USDT issued, despite this being the expected norm for a stablecoin.

The sale of $1 billion LEO tokens was well-received by markets, which had remained concerned about Bitfinex and Tether going forward.

Bitcoin, possibly thanks to the iFinex IEO news, continued its rise, breaking through $8,000, its highest level since July last year and coming after bitcoin broke through $7,000 and $7,500 over the weekend. Bitcoin was trading at $7,917.51 as of 11:25 p.m. EDT, down slightly from its daily high but still up 12% over the last 24 hours.

Image: 30478819@N08/Flickr