Who are the Winklevoss brothers? Biography of Bitcoin billionaires Tyler Winklevoss – Cameron Winklevoss

Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss, who are identical twins, rose to fame for their lawsuit against Mark Zuckerberg for stealing the idea behind Facebook. Even though they did not win the lawsuit, the duo still emerged as prominent Bitcoin billionaires. In this article, we at CryptoViet aim to explore the identities of the Winklevoss twins.

Who are The Winklevoss brothers?

Tyler Winklevoss and Cameron Winklevoss are two American entrepreneurs and investors, famously known for accusing Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, of stealing their idea to create the social media platform. The legal dispute between the two parties was resolved through an out-of-court settlement in 2008. Subsequently, the Winklevoss brothers invested in Bitcoin and became prominent cryptocurrency investors. They are also the co-founders of the cryptocurrency exchange Gemini.

Biography of the Winklevoss Brothers

Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss are the most renowned identical twin brothers in the cryptocurrency market. They were born on August 21, 1981, in New York, USA. Their childhood was relatively more privileged than that of other children. Despite their parents not having high-level degrees, they worked hard to provide Tyler and Cameron with a luxurious life. Perhaps, this is the primary reason why both brothers possess a modest character and always respect others, regardless of their societal status.

During their high school years, both Winklevoss brothers were admitted to the prestigious National Greenwich School, which is renowned for having trained former US President George H.W. Bush. This achievement was also recognized as a significant stepping stone towards their eventual admission to Harvard University, where they met Mark Zuckerberg.

Dispute with Mark Zuckerberg

As it is commonly known, the original version of Facebook was developed by Mark Zuckerberg at Harvard University and was named Harvard Connection. This social networking platform was designed to connect Harvard students and alumni, and although Mark had coded the platform from scratch, credit for the idea of transforming a student-focused application into a platform with millions of users worldwide goes to the Winklevoss brothers. In fact, initially, Mark was only employed to develop the platform, not to conceive the idea. However, soon after, he left his job and decided to develop his own platform based on the original concept. This sentence conveys relevant information in an informative style and has a formal tone.

This is considered one of the costliest mistakes that Mark had to pay for, as after Facebook became large enough and Mark became wealthy enough, the Winklevoss brothers decided to punish the owner of Facebook. In fact, in 2008, amidst escalating tensions between the Facebook “founders,” Mark had to execute a civil settlement that provided the Winklevoss brothers and their associate Divya Narendra with $65 million in compensation fees and Facebook shares. Just the aforementioned shares alone could have enabled the Winklevoss family to “live it up” for the rest of their lives.

Fate came to Bitcoin

The occurrence of fate that led the two brothers towards Bitcoin was a fortuitous coincidence. During a beach party on the island of Ibiza, Tyler engaged in casual conversation with friends and heard about Bitcoin as an innovative means of storing wealth at that time. As Tyler recounts, “We were on vacation and happened to meet an acquaintance. He informed us about Bitcoin and advised us to embark on a fresh endeavor following our litigation with Facebook.”

Subsequently, exactly one year later, the Winklevoss brothers expended over 10 million USD to purchase BTC at a rate of 120 USD (equivalent to 100,000 Bitcoin). At the time of their acquisition, the media consistently analyzed both of their transactions. The first was the shares they were compensated, and the second was the amount of BTC that they had just procured. This is because the social media platform with millions of users had a market cap value of 151 billion USD; in contrast, BTC’s value was much less significant and did not even equate to one-tenth of Facebook’s market capitalization.

However, merely 3 years afterwards, when the BTC price skyrocketed to over 11,000 USD, two additional zeros were directly added to the Winklevoss twins’ account, resulting in their assets increasing to 1 billion USD. This granted them a spot on the world’s billionaire list and also made them the initial two billionaires in the crypto market.

Gemini Exchange

After their success with Bitcoin, the Winklevoss brothers went on to establish the Gemini exchange in October 2015, headquartered in their home state of New York in the United States. Throughout its operational history, Gemini has achieved notable success, particularly with its direct integration with Samsung Pay.

However, the decision to establish its headquarters in the United States has resulted in significant obstacles for the exchange during the period of 2022-2023. Specifically, government officials in the U.S. are consistently pushing alongside bipartisan lobbying efforts for regulatory measures governing the cryptocurrency market to be passed. Consequently, the exchange has had to seek refuge in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to some extent.

Furthermore, in the aftermath of the sudden collapse of FTX, both Gemini and Genesis were also linked to customer debt amounting to $900 million. Specifically, Genesis, the partner of the Gemini Earn program, was heavily impacted by the Domino effect following the FTX collapse, thereby losing the ability to fulfill its debt obligations to customers. Regrettably, this group of customers originated from the Gemini Earn program of the exchange with the same name.

According to a report from the Financial Times, Genesis will conduct fundraising rounds in the near future. However, they are required to lower their fundraising target to $500 million, less than half of their initial goal. In the meantime, the company’s affiliates are working together with Genesis to resolve the outstanding debt issue in order to ensure the interests of their customers.

Summary

Above are some interesting details about the Winklevoss brothers, who are among the world’s first cryptocurrency billionaires. Their successes in trading have demonstrated an effective and far-reaching vision. In addition, despite the difficulties faced by the Gemini exchange, the Winklevoss brothers have continued to navigate it in a responsible manner, fulfilling their commitments to their customers.