Sam Bankman-Fried received new criminal charges on Thursday, indicting the founder of the now-bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange FTX for conspiring to make more than 300 illegal political donations.
Bankman-Fried is currently facing 12 criminal charges, including four counts of fraud and eight counts of conspiracy.
New indictments are mounting pressure on the 30-year-old former billionaire. He is also trying to convince a judge that he should be released on bail.
A Bankman-Fried spokeswoman declined to comment.
Political contributions were illegal: prosecutors
Bankman-Fried conspired with two other former FTX executives to donate tens of millions of dollars to lobby lawmakers to pass legislation favorable to the company, prosecutors said.
The donations were illegal because they were made with “straw” donors or corporate funds, often allowing Bankman-Fried to circumvent donation restrictions, prosecutors said.
Bankman-Fried was one of the largest contributors to the Democratic campaign in the 2022 midterm elections, but the indictment states that he “has never been known to be partisan of the left, or has been publicly harassed by any Republican candidate.” I didn’t want his name on it.”
Prosecutors said Bankman-Fried directed one executive to donate primarily to left-wing candidates and organizations, and another to Republicans.
front burner23:36The Fall of the “Crypto King”
Over the past two years, cryptocurrency exchange FTX has spent millions of dollars advertising the likes of NFL quarterback Tom Brady and Curb Your Enthusiasm’s Larry David. FTX also sponsors MLB, the Mercedes Formula One racing team and Canadian businessman Kevin O’Leary. Bloomberg earlier this month ranked platform founder Sam Bankman-Fried among the 100 richest people in the world. But now, Bankman-Fried is worth virtually nothing after a financial data breach caused massive withdrawals and trading halts. FTX recently went bankrupt from his $32 billion US valuation. Today, CBC Senior Business Writer Pete Evans returns to explain how one of the world’s three largest cryptocurrency exchanges closed down so quickly.
According to the indictment, a political consultant working for Bankman-Fried told one of the executives, identified as CC-1, “that you are the center-left face of our spending means that many It means donating to awakened people.”
“Bankman-Fried exploited the trust that FTX customers placed in him and his exchange to steal FTX customer deposits and use the stolen funds to divert billions of dollars,” said Wednesday. Read the new indictment filed on
Bankman-Fried’s new indictment details how he used stolen FTX client funds to cover up losses at his hedge fund, Alameda Research.
Additional charges include collusion in committing bank fraud and collusion in operating an unlicensed money transfer business.
Prosecutors said Bankman-Fried said he wanted to open a trading company account with an unnamed California bank, but that he actually used the account to process deposits and withdrawals for FTX customers.
Prosecutors say the bank had previously told him it was unwilling to process such transactions.
Former Alameda CEO Caroline Ellison and former FTX executive Gary Wang have pleaded guilty to fraud charges and agreed to cooperate with the investigation.
