Celsius Network Pitch Deck (2019): 40-Slide Breakdown

The Celsius Network investor presentation from June 2019 is a study in ideological fundraising. Rather than leading with complex financial statements, the deck uses broad sociological trends—such as the 'War vs. Centralization' and the transition from 'VOIP to MOIP' (Money Over IP)—to justify its existence. The core value proposition is distilled into a single spread: depositors receive 7% interest while borrowers pay 9%. While the deck successfully visualizes the flow of funds between lenders, borrowers, and exchanges, it notably lacks specific historical financial performance, a detailed te…

Key takeaways

• The company positions itself as the 'MOIP' (Money Over IP) successor to VOIP on the title slide.
• Celsius frames the current financial state as a 'War' between centralization (monopolies like Google/Amazon) and decentralization (Slide 3).
• The platform targets the 70.1% of the world population categorized as 'Lower Class' to drive mass adoption (Slide 3).
• A Pac-Man graphic predicts that the $500B crypto market will eventually consume the $95T liquid money market (Slide 5).
• The business model is simplified to a 2% spread: 7% for depositors and 9% for borrowers (Slide 8).
• The deck identifies 'Institutions' as the current step in the adoption curve, aiming to reach 'Mass Adoption' next (Slide 6).
• Celsius acts as a central hub connecting Lenders, Borrowers, Custodians, and Coin Exchanges (Slide 10).
• The presentation utilizes a 'Crossing the Chasm' framework to show the evolution from Satoshi's thinking to Jamie Dimon's eventual acceptance (Slide 6).

Frequently asked questions

What is the primary business model described in the Celsius deck?

The business model is a traditional lending spread applied to digital assets. According to Slide 8, Celsius aims to pay depositors 7% interest on their holdings while charging borrowers 9% for loans. Slide 10 illustrates that Celsius facilitates this by taking coin deposits from lenders, interacting with custodians and exchanges, and providing liquidity to borrowers (traders) who pay interest back into the system.

How does Celsius define its market opportunity?

Celsius defines its opportunity through total global wealth displacement. Slide 5 uses a visualization showing a $500B crypto market (as of February 2018) positioned to 'eat' larger asset classes, including the $8.2T Gold market, the $80T Stock Market, and eventually the $95T 'All Liquid Money' market. They view the public blockchain as a replacement for existing financial monopolies.

Who are the target users according to the presentation?

The deck segments the world into four tiers: High Net Worth (0.7%), Mass Affluent (7.9%), Consuming Middle (21.3%), and Lower Class (70.1%). Slide 3 suggests that while centralization serves the top tiers, the 'Block Chain' and Celsius are designed to serve the broader population, specifically aiming to 'Unbank' those currently underserved by traditional finance.

What is the 'MOIP' concept mentioned in the deck?

MOIP stands for 'Money Over IP.' The title slide draws a parallel between the disruption of telecommunications (VOIP) and the disruption of finance. Celsius positions itself as the protocol or platform that will do for money what Skype or WhatsApp did for voice calls—moving it onto a decentralized, internet-based infrastructure to bypass traditional 'toll collectors.'

Does the deck address regulatory or security concerns?

The deck touches on these themes at a high level. Slide 4 mentions 'Token Economics' as a way to cross 'regulatory hurdles' and highlights 'Secure & Immutable' ledgers as a foundation for new business models. However, the 10 slides provided do not contain a detailed compliance roadmap, insurance disclosures, or specific security protocols beyond general blockchain attributes.

Celsius Network pitch deck: the facts

Company

Celsius Network

Year

2019

Stage

Growth (Investor Conference)

Slides

40

Sector

Cryptocurrency / Fintech

Deck type

Investor Presentation

Outcome

Company later filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2022

Headquarters

London, UK / New York, USA

Celsius Network pitch deck PDF

The full Celsius Network deck is embedded on this page and can be read slide by slide in the browser — no download or account required. Each slide is covered in the breakdown above.

What the Celsius Network pitch deck was used for

This is a 40‑slide Celsius Network investor conference presentation from June 2019, positioned as a growth‑stage deck and built around the 'Unbank Yourself' narrative. It presents Celsius as a crypto lending platform bridging speculative crypto markets and mainstream users, using a simple 7–9% spread model between what it earns on deployed assets and what it pays depositors (as described in your existing excerpt). The deck was used to pitch institutional and conference investors on the scalability of this spread-based model during the 2019 expansion phase, several years before Celsius’ large 2021 equity rounds and its 2022 bankruptcy.

Business model: Centralized cryptocurrency lending and borrowing platform where users deposited crypto assets to earn yield and could take out asset-backed loans, with interest rates varying by asset and loan-to-value ratio.

Investors

WestCap, Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec

Industry

Cryptocurrency lending / Fintech

Round: Growth / later Series B and B1 equity financings (not directly tied in public sources to the June 2019 deck).

Year: 2019 deck; major publicized equity rounds occurred in 2021.

What happened after the Celsius Network deck

Following its 2019 growth‑stage investor conference deck, Celsius Network expanded into a major crypto lending platform and completed substantial equity financings at multi‑billion‑dollar valuations in 2021. Amid the 2022 crypto market downturn, it froze withdrawals and filed for Chapter 11, with court filings revealing a significant balance‑sheet deficit and over $1.19 billion shortfall. Regulato

• Celsius Network grew into a major crypto lending platform, enabling users to earn interest on deposited cryptocurrencies
• Fundraising databases report a $400 million Series B round at a $3.2 billion valuation in October 2021, reportedly invol
• In July 2022, Celsius halted customer withdrawals and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the Southern Distric
• Regulators took action, including a July 2023 U.S. Federal Trade Commission settlement permanently banning Celsius from
• In November 2023 the bankruptcy court confirmed a reorganization plan, and in January 2024 Celsius emerged from Chapter

What the Celsius Network deck got right

• Strong, distinctive narrative framing around 'Unbank Yourself'. The 'Unbank Yourself' positioning offers a clear, memorable narrative that differentiates Celsius from traditional banks and situates it as a consumer‑centric alternative in crypto lending, likely resonating with both crypto‑native users and yield‑seeking mainstream investors.
• Simple, easily communicated economic model. Focusing the business explanation on a 7–9% spread model between earned yields and paid interest (as described in your excerpt) gives investors an intuitively simple way to understand how Celsius intended to make money, which is valuable amid the technical complexity of crypto markets.
• Compelling market bridge story from speculation to mass adoption. Positioning Celsius as a bridge between 'crypto speculators' and mass adoption aligns with the broader 2019–2020 market trend of moving from pure trading to yield and credit products, tapping into a large potential user base and supporting the later scale that enabled sizeable 2021 funding rounds.
• User‑friendly centralized model lowering crypto complexity for customers. As a centralized platform, Celsius could offer a single interface for deposits and loans without requiring users to manage on‑chain complexity themselves, leveraging custodial convenience that likely contributed to rapid asset growth prior to its collapse.
• Demonstrated ability to attract large later‑stage institutional funding. By 2021, external fundraising records show Celsius had attracted substantial institutional capital at multi‑billion‑dollar valuations, which retroactively indicates that earlier investor materials like the 2019 deck succeeded in communicating a growth story that institutional investors found credible at the time.

What could have been stronger

• Simplistic spread narrative without visible risk analysis. The deck’s core economic story hinges on a simple 7–9% spread between asset yields and customer payouts, but there is no externally verifiable evidence that the deck rigorously addresses how those yields are generated, the risk profile of underlying strategies, or how spreads behave under adverse market conditions. Given later disclosures about poor asset deployment decisions and a large balance‑sheet hole in bankruptcy, this reliance on a simple spread narrative appears incomplete from a risk‑management standpoint.
• Consumer‑safety positioning not matched by later regulatory findings. The 'Unbank Yourself' framing positions Celsius as a safer or more consumer‑aligned alternative to traditional banks, yet later regulatory and enforcement actions, including an FTC settlement permanently banning Celsius from handling consumer assets and alleging misleading safety claims, highlight that the deck’s positioning may not have adequately grappled with custodial, legal, and counterparty risks inherent in its model.
• Limited emphasis on liquidity, governance, and downside scenarios. External records show that Celsius’ business ultimately suffered from liquidity and asset‑liability mismatches, culminating in Chapter 11 filings that reported a more than $1 billion hole in its balance sheet. The 2019 growth deck, as characterized in your excerpt, focuses on expansion and mass adoption without any externally visible emphasis on stress testing, liquidity buffers, or governance structures that might have mitigated these vulnerabilities.
• Insufficient clarity (from what is externally visible) on legal treatment of customer assets. Later proceedings revealed complex terms of service and ownership issues over deposited assets, with courts finding that retail customers had transferred title of their crypto to Celsius under certain programs. There is no indication from available descriptions that the 2019 deck clearly foregrounded these legal nuances, which would have been material to sophisticated investors evaluating platform risk and customer trust dynamics.

How an investor would read this deck

What draws attention

• Clarity and sustainability of the stated 7–9% spread model, including how yields are generated, how they compare with traditional financial intermediaries, and how spreads behave through market cycles.
• Scale and growth potential of a centralized crypto lending platform bridging 'crypto speculators' and mainstream users, particularly in the context of rapidly increasing assets under management leading into the 2020–2021 bull market.
• Regulatory, legal, and consumer‑protection exposure associated with marketing itself as a safer, user‑aligned alternative to banks while custodying client assets and paying high yields.
• Quality of risk management, liquidity provisioning, and governance, given that subsequent bankruptcy proceedings exposed poor asset deployment decisions and a large deficit.
• Exit and downside scenarios, including how investors would fare if market conditions turned, given the later reality of Chapter 11 restructuring and creditor‑owned reorganization.

Risks that stand out

• Liquidity and asset‑liability mismatch risk, evidenced later by Celsius’ need to halt withdrawals and file for Chapter 11 with a reported $1.19 billion balance‑sheet shortfall and billions owed to customers.
• Regulatory and enforcement risk, highlighted by the FTC’s 2023 settlement banning Celsius from handling consumer assets and alleging deceptive safety claims.
• Governance and risk‑management risk, given later admissions that assets grew faster than the company could safely deploy and that poor asset deployment decisions played a role in its distress.
• Legal risk around custody and ownership of customer assets, with court rulings confirming that title to retail customers’ assets could be treated as belonging to Celsius under its terms, impacting customer recoveries and trust.
• Reputational and business‑model risk: the same 'Unbank Yourself' narrative and high‑yield promises that drove growth also magnified fallout when the company failed, prompting intense scrutiny and impairing any future brand leveraging the Celsius name.

Questions this deck invites

• Provide detailed, independently auditable breakdowns of how Celsius generated the yields underlying the 7–9% spread, including strategy mix (lending counterparties, DeFi, trading) and historical performance under stress.
• What liquidity, concentration, and counterparty risk limits were in place at the time of the 2019 deck, and how were they monitored, escalated, and enforced as assets under management grew rapidly?
• How do terms of service allocate ownership and control of deposited assets, and how might this interact with bankruptcy or regulatory enforcement, in light of later findings that customer assets were treated as belonging to Celsius in certa
• What internal governance structures, board oversight, and risk committees existed in 2019, and how did they evolve by the time of the 2022 bankruptcy filing that reported a multi‑billion‑dollar asset‑liability gap?
• How did customer acquisition costs, retention, and unit economics look in 2019 relative to the simple gross‑spread narrative, and how were those metrics impacted by changes in market yields and competition through 2021 funding rounds?

What founders can take from the Celsius Network deck

• A compelling narrative like 'Unbank Yourself' can drive rapid growth for a crypto lending platform, but without robust, transparent risk management around asset deployment, liquidity, and counterparty exposure, that growth can culminate in severe distress and bankruptcy.
• Simple economic framing (such as a 7–9% spread model) is attractive to investors, yet it must be backed by detailed disclosures about how yields are generated and how the business behaves under stress; subsequent revelations about Celsius’ asset shortfall illustrate the dangers of relying on high‑le
• Marketing a platform as a safer, more consumer‑aligned alternative to banks while holding full control over customer deposits can invite regulatory action if practices diverge from messaging, as shown by the FTC’s 2023 settlement permanently banning Celsius from handling consumer assets.
• Terms of service and legal structure for customer deposits are not mere legal boilerplate; court decisions confirming that retail customers transferred title of their crypto to Celsius significantly affected outcomes for those users and should have been central to investor diligence.
• Later fundraising at multi‑billion‑dollar valuations (such as the 2021 Series B and B1 rounds) did not prevent eventual collapse, indicating that headline valuations and large equity raises are poor substitutes for deep diligence into balance‑sheet health and risk controls.
• Restructuring outcomes, including the distribution of over $3 billion to creditors and the creation of a creditor‑owned mining company, Ionic Digital, show that even high‑profile failures can preserve some value, but primarily for creditors rather than equity holders—an important consideration for i

Celsius Network pitch deck: common questions

What did Celsius Network do, and how does the 2019 investor deck describe its model?

Celsius Network was a centralized cryptocurrency lending and borrowing platform where users could deposit qualifying cryptocurrencies to earn interest and could take out asset‑backed loans against their holdings. The 2019 investor conference deck frames this as a way to 'Unbank Yourself' by replacing traditional banks with a crypto‑native yield and credit platform, monetized via a 7–9% spread between what Celsius earned on assets and what it paid to users (per your existing deck excerpt).

Which fundraise was Celsius’ June 2019 investor conference deck used for?

The 2019 investor conference presentation was a growth‑stage deck used at an investor event, not tied in public disclosures to a specific labeled round. Public fundraising records instead highlight later equity financings, including a $400 million Series B led by WestCap and Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec announced in October 2021, and a $350 million Series B1 extension at a reported $3.5 billion valuation in November 2021. There is no public evidence directly linking the June 2019 deck to a particular closed round or amount, so any such linkage cannot be reliably stated.

How much money did Celsius Network raise, and does the 2019 deck tie to a specific round?

According to fundraising databases, Celsius later raised a $400 million Series B round at a $3.2 billion valuation in October 2021, with WestCap and Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec named as investors, followed by a $350 million Series B1 round at a reported $3.5 billion valuation in November 2021. Earlier raises include a $20 million financing and an $18.8 million Series A in 2020. However, these sources do not explicitly connect any of those rounds to the June 2019 investor conference deck, so that association remains unverified.

What business model and economics does the 2019 Celsius deck emphasize?

The 2019 deck, per your excerpt, emphasizes a simple spread business: Celsius earns a higher yield on its deployed crypto assets and pays users a lower rate, keeping an approximate 7–9% spread as gross margin. It positions this as a transparent alternative to banks’ opaque margins and as a scalable way to monetize growing crypto deposits. This aligns directionally with later descriptions of Celsius’ model, where depositors earned yield on crypto (e.g., up to around 6.2% on bitcoin), and borrowers paid interest on asset‑backed loans, with rates depending on loan‑to‑value ratios. Exact spread calculations and risk assumptions in the deck cannot be independently verified beyond your excerpt.

What ultimately happened to Celsius Network after the 2019 investor presentation?

Subsequent events diverged sharply from the optimistic growth story implied by the 2019 deck. Celsius filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in July 2022 after halting withdrawals amid a crypto market downturn. Court filings showed a large balance‑sheet deficit and a shortfall of over $1.19 billion. In July 2023, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission announced a settlement banning Celsius from handling consumer assets and alleging that executives misled customers about safety and availability of deposits. In November 2023 the bankruptcy court confirmed a reorganization plan, and by January 2024 Celsius had emerged from Chapter 11, commencing distributions of over $3 billion in crypto and fia

Sources

Funding and outcome facts on this page were researched on 2026-08-21 from the pages below.

• Crypto lender Celsius Network cleared to exit bankruptcy - Reuters
• Celsius Network - Wikipedia
• Celsius Network LLC, et al. - Stretto
• Celsius Network: cryptocurrency lender files for bankruptcy
• Celsius Network Inc.: Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt in the Brave New World of Crypto Bankruptcy
• Celsius CEO resigns in the middle of bankruptcy proceedings - CNBC
• Bankruptcy court confirms that retail borrowers' crypto...
• Celsius Network: crypto firm reveals $1.2bn deficit in bankruptcy filing

Celsius Network pitch deck slides

What each slide of the Celsius Network pitch deck says

Slide 1

cele — From VOIP to MOIP — Unbank Yourself on the Blockchain pa——— n — - — = ~ ® : =

Slide 2

Emerging Money Over Internet Protocol - MOIP e OW USD, Yen, Euro

Slide 3

Last 10 years 4 Man relay race © Satoshi Passing the Baton 4 ’ " y First came the Anarchists

Slide 4

(© Anarchists Passing the Baton | . Then came the Libertarians

Slide 5

© Libertarians hand off to Speculators V4 y 4 F Speculators planned to hand off to...?

Slide 6

Po WHOOPS... J y g Institutions Dropped the Baton $BTC down 83% $ETH down 91%

Slide text above is read directly from the Celsius Network deck PDF embedded on this page.

Related fundraising guides (24)

• Beam Dental Pitch Deck Teardown: A Masterclass in Structural Cost Advantage
• CMR Surgical Pitch Deck Teardown: A $600M Masterclass in Ecosystem-Led Medical Robotics
• Equinom Pitch Deck Teardown: Solving the 250% Plant-Based Cost Gap Through Seed Genetics
• Heura Pitch Deck Teardown: Dominating the Mediterranean Plant-Based Market
• Viso Pitch Deck Teardown: A 42-Slide Masterclass in Computer Vision Infrastructure
• Kinnu Pitch Deck Teardown: A Masterclass in Social Proof and Product-Led Growth
• Arkestro Pitch Deck Teardown: A Masterclass in Social Proof and Domain Authority
• Chattermill Pitch Deck Teardown: A Masterclass in Enterprise Social Proof and Expansion Strategy
• ElasticStage Pitch Deck Teardown: Solving the 12-Month Vinyl Supply Chain Bottleneck
• Halp Pitch Deck Teardown: A 7-Slide Memo Strategy for a $4M Seed Round
• Innovafeed Pitch Deck Teardown: A $250M Masterclass in Industrial Scale and Strategic Partnerships
• Moonlight Pitch Deck Teardown: A Community-First Approach to Remote Engineering
• Altana Pitch Deck Teardown: Mapping the Global Supply Chain with Federated Learning
• Bringg Pitch Deck Teardown: A Masterclass in Enterprise SaaS Traction and Scale
• Dalan Animal Health Pitch Deck Teardown: A $3.5M Seed for the First Honeybee Vaccine
• Florence Pitch Deck Teardown: Scaling a Healthcare Staffing Marketplace to £9bn Market Potential
• Hourly Pitch Deck Teardown: Connecting Payroll Data to Real-Time Workers' Comp Premiums
• Odeko Pitch Deck Teardown: A Masterclass in Obfuscating Real Traction Numbers
• AgBiome Pitch Deck Teardown: A $116M Series D Masterclass in Platform Validation
• Ben Pitch Deck Teardown: A $16M Series A Masterclass in Ecosystem Infrastructure
• Comprehensive Pitch Deck Teardown: A Masterclass in Founder-Market Fit and Category Creation
• EVERY Pitch Deck Teardown: A $175M Masterclass in Precision Fermentation Storytelling
• HiBob Pitch Deck Teardown: A Narrative-Driven $150M Series D Masterclass
• Heali Pitch Deck Teardown: Leveraging Clinical Validation to Secure a $3M Seed Round

Decks from the same year (1)

• 2019 pitch deck examples

Decks from the same region (1)

• UK pitch deck examples

Browse companies alphabetically (1)

• Pitch decks from companies starting with C

More pitch deck teardowns (16)

• Cobre del Mayo Pitch Deck Teardown: A Deep Dive into Copper Mining Yield and Risk
• Cobre Del Mayo Pitch Deck Teardown: A Deep Dive into Copper Mining Operational Turnarounds
• Cedar Fair Pitch Deck Teardown: Leveraging Real Estate and Yield in Entertainment
• Cedar Pitch Deck Breakdown: Solving the $345B Healthcare Billing Crisis
• CeIR Pitch Deck Teardown: A Hybrid EdTech and Infrastructure Play in Zambia
• Celer Network Pitch Deck Breakdown: A Visual Masterclass in Layer-2 Blockchain Infrastructure
• Cellarity Pitch Deck Teardown: A $121M Series C Masterclass in Platform-First Biotech
• CellBreaker Pitch Deck Breakdown: A Minimalist Approach to Consumer Justice
• Celsius Network Pitch Deck Breakdown: A Visionary Narrative for Crypto Lending
• Celsius Pitch Deck Teardown: Scaling a Functional Beverage Brand via Global Distribution
• Cematrix Pitch Deck Teardown: Proving Industrial Scale Through Infrastructure Case Studies
• CENOS Pitch Deck Breakdown: Democratizing Industrial Simulation for SMBs
• Cent Capital Pitch Deck Teardown: A B2B2C Strategy for AI-Powered Financial Wellness
• Centric Health Pitch Deck Teardown: Consolidation Strategy in Canadian Seniors Pharmacy
• Centuro Global Pitch Deck Teardown: A Product-First Approach to Global Compliance
• Cerca Pitch Deck Teardown: Leveraging Mutual Connections to Solve Dating App Fatigue

Recently published pitch deck teardowns (12)

• Crossbeam Pitch Deck Breakdown: Solving the Partnership Prisoner's Dilemma
• Crisp Pitch Deck Breakdown: A Masterclass in Brand-Led Grocery Logistics
• Croissant Pitch Deck Breakdown: A Minimalist Masterclass in Problem-Solution Fit
• CulturePulse Pitch Deck Breakdown: Using Digital Twins to Predict Audience Resonance
• Croma Pitch Deck Breakdown: Solving the Publisher Data Gap in Social Distribution
• Crunchbase Pitch Deck Breakdown: The $30M Series C Masterclass in Data Flywheels
• Cyclica Pitch Deck Breakdown: A Series B Masterclass in Polypharmacology Differentiation
• Curious Hat Pitch Deck Breakdown: Leveraging DreamWorks Pedigree for EdTech Apps
• Dado Pitch Deck Breakdown: A Product-Focused Approach to HR Workflow Automation
• Curastory Pitch Deck Breakdown: Solving the Creator Monetization Gap with Video Royalties
• Curio Pitch Deck Breakdown: The $9M Series A Strategy for Premium Audio Journalism
• Curve Health Pitch Deck Breakdown: Leveraging Clinical Proof to Bridge Senior Care Silos

Fundraising library · Pitch deck examples · Investor directory · Founder database