FTX crypto Sam Bankman-Fried

Litigator Renato Mariotti says embattled FTX crypto exchange founder Sam Bankman-Fried should have one main goal: avoid going to prison in connection with ...

Cryptocurrency exchange founder pledges to testify 'once I have finished learning and reviewing what happened'

The House Financial Services Committee plans to hold a hearing to investigate the FTX collapse and expects to hear from the firms and people involved, ...

Sam Bankman-Fried is ramping up his apology tour from a humble $30 million penthouse in the Bahamas, but first…

He was lauded for his major donations to Democrats, but now he says he was secretly giving to Republicans in roughly equal measure.

[In an interview with Tiffany Fong this week](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DezodR9hNI&t=842s), he said he gave roughly the same amount to Republicans and was the party’s second- or third-largest donor as well, mostly in the primary. During a [chat interview](https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/23462333/sam-bankman-fried-ftx-cryptocurrency-effective-altruism-crypto-bahamas-philanthropy), Vox’s Kelsey Piper asked Bankman-Fried whether his very public commitment to ethical behavior was “mostly a front.” “Yeah,” he replied. That points to the hard truth about his donations too: Although Bankman-Fried claimed to be acting out of lofty motives such as stopping Trump, he appears to have been more invested in trying to shape favorable regulation. As for the big gaps in Democratic and Republican coffers that FTX’s collapse leaves, they’re probably fleeting. The answer is hilarious in retrospect: Like the smooth operator he was, Bankman-Fried starts out with an apparent admission against interest, gamely admitting that he deserves skepticism. Overall, according to [Open Secrets](https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/ftx-us/recipients?id=D000073694), FTX donations to candidates were very slightly GOP-leaning, although contributions to individual politicians were only a small slice of the $70 million. When confronted by his rivals with his past donations to Democrats, he didn’t flinch. And Bankman-Fried isn’t a reliable source, but it seems like an odd thing to lie about now, as he The reason was cynical, if realistic: “Reporters freak the fuck out if you donate to a Republican,” he told Fong. [as much as $1 billion](https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2022-election/crypto-billionaire-says-spend-record-breaking-1-billion-2024-election-rcna30351) in the 2024 election cycle, in part to defeat Donald Trump if necessary. [according to Open Secrets](https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/ftx-us/summary?topnumcycle=2020&toprecipcycle=2020&contribcycle=2020&outspendcycle=2022&id=D000073694&lobcycle=2020), FTX employees gave $7 million total. Third, Bankman-Fried has said in interviews that he personally actually gave nearly as much to GOP candidates and causes as to Democratic ones, using dark-money vehicles.

Lots of people are asking why ex-FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried isn't behind bars. Legal experts explain here the reasons.

“Firstly, the fact that SBF and FTX have Bahamian ties adds a further layer of complexity to the U.S. “That creates some problems, because you’ve got different laws governing different aspects of the organization,” he told Decrypt. Speaking to the New York Times, he “I wasn’t even trying to manage risk.” Sam feels the need to speak and is going against all legal counsel — a huge mistake born from hubris. And if criminal charges are brought forward, it will be some time before anyone is behind bars. In a bankruptcy filing, Ray

The city's digital-asset faithful are vowing to move forward after the rapid demise of FTX, which had pledged to make Miami the US crypto capital.

Yesha Yadav is an associate dean at Vanderbilt University's law school. Yadav's research focuses include international bank and financial regulation, securities ...

So that’s a condition before we get to mail and wire fraud, which tend to be not just things that have very expansive reach, in other words, you’ve used the postal service in the case of mail fraud, or emails and things in the case of wire fraud. So certainly as you say, there is a very strong likelihood to the extent that regulators want to show they’re serious in the case of prosecuting bad behavior in crypto, as well as in the financial markets, that this could certainly be one way forward here: to be extremely aggressive in their prosecution of Sam Bankman-Fried. What are the chances that any of the things he’s said on this press junket show up in a criminal filing against him in the next two years? So it’s not surprising to me that it’s taking a little bit of time, because the Justice Department needs to get this right in order to make sure that something of this magnitude and of the scale and public importance is treated with absolute confidence in the evidence that they collect. That’s likely to be the first port of call because it tends to be so effective in financial fraud cases. So there are a couple of different hurdles to jump through in order to get him in custody or having him charged criminally, which means that because it’s so high-profile, the Justice Department has to make sure the case is airtight. So it’s not surprising to me that it’s taking time for the Justice Department to build a case before any kind of custodial issues arise. So the Justice Department has a big job to do from the criminal side, and interestingly, now the bankruptcy court obviously has a huge job to do from the bankruptcy side. Could there be a domestic turf war over who gets control of this case, in addition to the international one? One, the fact of losing all of this business and just seeing it vaporize in the space of a week and all the fallout being revealed as one part a function of extremely bad mismanagement internally. So in that context, the Bahamians were set up as being a regulated crypto jurisdiction of the future. authorities are going to take enormous amounts of interest in getting to the bottom of what’s going on.

FEC filings show the vast majority of his donations went to Democrats, but the FTX founder claims he made "dark-money" contributions to Republicans.

[a Democratic megadono](https://www.marketwatch.com/story/meet-the-10-biggest-megadonors-for-the-2022-midterm-elections-11665517736?mod=article_inline)r — has claimed he made contributions that don’t show up in FEC disclosures. Such secret contributions, allowed by the [Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United ruling](https://www.marketwatch.com/story/secret-political-spending-on-track-to-reach-1-billion-milestone-2018-11-20?mod=article_inline), wouldn’t show up in the FEC disclosures used to compile MarketWatch’s list. Hassan did not respond to requests for comment. A representative for Sen. [was backed by Bankman-Fried](https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/11/15/the-sbf-bill-whats-in-the-crypto-legislation-backed-by-ftx-founder/), plans to donate the contributions to a local charity. Kirsten Gillibrand got at least $10,000.

FTX founder claims he did not know of Alameda's missing transfer, but how did the hedge fund not notice?

It was the announcement several days later of a [sale of FTT](https://twitter.com/cz_binance/status/1589283421704290306?lang=en) by Changpeng Zhao, CEO of rival exchange Binance, that brought the FTX situation to the public eye. It transpired that much of Alameda’s holdings was in the FTX Tokens (FTT), a cryptocurrency issued by the exchange. Published reports put it at about $8 billion, and Bankman-Fried said Tuesday that FTX only discovered it had a “deep liquidity hole” early last month, when speculation that its finances were shaky generated demand for withdrawals that it could not meet amid a slump in the overall cryptocurrency market. “I think it was posting collateral in general but I'm not sure it was for the people who are sort of wiring to it,” he stated. Part of the inadequate bookkeeping had to do with transfers between FTX and its sister company, the hedge fund Alameda Research, that were never made. Alameda’s balance sheet was unlikely to have been that complex.

Bankman-Fried's father—and his colleague—are reportedly consulting with the disgraced founder of the crypto exchange, who was raised on the prestigious ...

[Term Sheet](https://mynewsletters.fortune.com/term-sheet), a daily newsletter on the biggest deals and dealmakers. Financial terms were not disclosed. State of Mind Ventures, Flybridge, toDay Ventures, Merlin Ventures seed fund, and others invested in the round. Salesforce and GBTEC invested in the round. Radical Ventures led the round and was joined by Index Ventures. Partech, Level Equity, Quadrille Capital, XAnge, Serena Capital, and Bpifrance invested in the round. [Slingshot Aerospace](https://slingshotaerospace.com/), an El Segundo, Calif.-based space simulation and analytics products producer for space sustainability, raised $40.85 million in Series A2 funding. “I’ve definitely broken the news to people,” says the student, who noted they have been following the situation. Copies of Stanford’s student newspaper, the Stanford Daily, laying around campus included a damning headline: “President Under Investigation.” (Bankman-Fried reportedly parted ways with his lawyers at Paul Weiss, [per Semafor](https://www.semafor.com/article/11/17/2022/sam-bankman-fried-parts-ways-with-paul-weiss-lawyers).) And it appears that Bankman-Fried’s father is clearing up his schedule: We didn’t find any courses on Bankman’s schedule for [the next quarter](https://law.stanford.edu/courses/?tax_and_terms=AQF_20222023-20212022-20202021&instructor=4477&page=1) (Stanford uses quarters instead of semesters), and two Stanford students confirmed to Fortune that professor Bankman had withdrawn as the professor for a class he was supposed to teach in the upcoming quarter. “Honestly, Sam Bankman-Fried is very lucky that he has these connections that he can have access to top practitioners—not everyone is going to have a Stanford Law team behind them,” says a third-year law student at Stanford, who spoke with Anne and me outside of Stanford’s law school yesterday. It’s also where the recent CEO of FTX has been getting legal advice from one of Stanford’s own white-collar crime professors.

FTX founder and former chief executive Sam Bankman-Fried and Caroline Ellison, head of its now-defunct trading affiliate, have tapped defense attorneys as ...

The Wall Street Journal has [previously reported](/technology/alameda-ftx-executives-knew-crypto-exchange-was-using-customer-funds-wsj-2022-11-12/) that Ellison and senior FTX officials knew the crypto exchange had dipped into its customer funds to help Alameda meet liabilities. Spokespeople for the Manhattan U.S. Federal prosecutors in New York are asking for details on any communications such firms have had with the crypto firm and its executives, including Bankman-Fried, the sources said. authorities have sought information from investors and potential investors in FTX, according to two sources with knowledge of the requests. The crypto exchange [filed for bankruptcy](/technology/ftx-says-will-file-us-bankruptcy-latest-blow-crypto-2022-11-11/) last month after a liquidity crisis that saw at least $1 billion of [customer funds vanish](/markets/currencies/exclusive-least-1-billion-client-funds-missing-failed-crypto-firm-ftx-sources-2022-11-12/). Ellison, who ran trading firm Alameda Research, has hired Washington-based law firm Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr to represent her, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters.

A spokesperson for Sam Bankman-Fried said the former FTX CEO has retained a defense attorney amid civil litigation from investors and investigations by ...

[made appearances on several media outlets](https://cointelegraph.com/news/sam-bankman-fried-still-speaking-at-events-and-the-community-is-furious) and spoken to reporters many times following FTX’s collapse, despite criticism from many in the crypto space. The former FTX CEO has [repeatedly apologized for his role](https://cointelegraph.com/news/sam-bankman-fried-updates-investors-we-got-overconfident-and-careless-claims-13b-leverage) in the exchange’s downfall and said he planned to “make it up” to affected team members, but did not offer a concrete plan to make investors whole. [filed for bankruptcy](https://cointelegraph.com/news/ftx-ftx-us-and-alameda-file-for-chapter-11-bankruptcy-in-us-sbf-resigns) under Chapter 11 in the District of Delaware on Nov. Filings in bankruptcy court suggested FTX could be accountable to more than 1 million creditors. 13, but the former CEO suggested he would only testify after “learning and reviewing what happened.” It’s unclear whether he would speak in person or remotely from the Bahamas. Cohen, a co-founder of law firm Cohen & Gresser, was a former assistant U.S.

Sam Bankman-Fried, the embattled co-founder of bankrupt crypto exchange FTX, has retained New York defense attorney Mark Cohen to represent him, ...