Collapsed crypto exchange FTX’s founder Sam Bankman-Fried fitted every entrepreneurial cliché of the past two decades - and the finance industry loved him for it.
Experts say a plea deal for the cryptocurrency exchange boss is unlikely as US authorities tend to negotiate with lower-level staff.
Crypto analysts,riding high from the successes of 2021,have endured a brutal reality check as the crypto party comes to an end.
A Manhattan federal judge known for swift decisions and a no-nonsense demeanour during three decades of overseeing numerous high-profile cases is presiding over the Sam Bankman-Fried’s cryptocurrency case.
Prosecutors are investigating an alleged cybercrime that drained more than half a billion dollars out of FTX just hours after the cryptocurrency exchange filed for bankruptcy last month.
The popular reggae phrase “money can’t done” means that fabulous wealth makes its own rules. In the Bahamas,it has become a gleeful reference to the disgraced founder of fallen crypto exchange FTX.
Some of the world’s savviest distressed debt investors are already looking to make a FTX play.
The cryptocurrency entrepreneur will be released on strict bail terms including what is believed to be the largest US federal pretrial bond ever of $US250m.
Carolyn Ellison,the former CEO of Alameda Research and Gary Wang,the co-founder of FTX,have pleaded guilty to charges “related to their roles in the fraud that contributed to FTX’s collapse.”
A boy wonder. A bitter corporate rivalry. Luxury penthouses and secret political donations. What brought down the FTX empire? And what is its founder charged with?
Bankman-Fried has agreed to extradition to the US,where prosecutors have charged him with orchestrating “one of the biggest financial frauds in American history”.