Latin American crypto exchange Bitso laid off 80 employees on Thursday, the company told CoinDesk.
"Our decisions about the people who work in our company are made based on our long-term business strategy and in support of our customers and our corporate strategy," Bitso said in a statement.
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Bitso, which employed more than 700 people before the layoffs, still has more than 60 open positions on its jobs website.
In the statement, the company cited the need to rethink the skills needed by employees to move faster in the crypto industry as one of the reasons for the cuts. No difficulties in raising capital were mentioned.
The layoffs at Bitso come two days after Buenbit, a crypto exchange based in Argentina, laid off 45% of its staff - about 80 employees - due to the "global upheaval" the tech industry has gotten into, according to its CEO, Federico Ogue.
Bitso has more than four million users in Mexico, Argentina, Colombia and Brazil. The company told CoinDesk in January that it aims to become the largest exchange in Brazil by the end of 2022. In that country, the company competes with local exchange Mercado Bitcoin, which leads with more than four million customers.
Bitso's last investment round took place in May 2021, when it raised $250 million at a valuation of $2.2 billion, becoming the first crypto unicorn in Latin America.
This article was translated by Marina Lammertyn.