Former star of cryptocurrencies, Sam Bankman-Fried, the ex-boss of the FTX platform, now faces heavy criminal penalties, after his arrest in the Bahamas and his indictment by American justice.
Prosecuted among other things for fraud and money laundering by the federal prosecutor of New York, Mr. Bankman-Fried is also under the charge of American regulatory bodies. He appeared on Tuesday before Bahamian judge Joyann Ferguson Pratt, before whom he opposed his extradition to the United States.
The fall is dizzying for the man who, a few months ago, was a star in the cryptocurrency sector, at the head of a company valued at 32 billion dollars at the start of the year. FTX’s sudden implosion in November marked the beginning of the downfall for the 30-year-old, recognizable by his abundant mane and often casual style of dress.
Considered one of the world’s leading crypto exchanges, FTX was no longer able at the beginning of last month to return to its customers the money they had deposited there. The group announced its bankruptcy filing on November 11, and Mr. Bankman-Fried was forced out of office.
Suspected of having played a major role in the collapse of FTX, the one who is nicknamed “SBF” nevertheless continued to express himself extensively in the media and on social networks, without always seeming to measure the seriousness of the situation. A few hours before his arrest on Monday, he participated in an audio conversation on Twitter, arousing the amazement of his interlocutors when he confessed to simultaneously playing a video game.
Raised to the skies
Mr. Bankman-Fried had enjoyed a meteoric rise. After founding cryptocurrency investment and brokerage firm Alameda Research in 2017, he moved to Hong Kong and co-founded FTX there. The platform grew as did SBF’s personal fortune, estimated at $25 billion by the magazine. Forbes few months ago ; he now claims to have lost almost everything.
SBF moved the headquarters of FTX to the Bahamas, where taxes are almost non-existent, justifying its choice by the fact that it is “one of the few countries to have a complete regime on the granting licenses for cryptocurrencies”.
The success of FTX has allowed the platform to forge prestigious partnerships, notably with American football legend Tom Brady and Brazilian model Gisele Bündchen. The band also featured comedian Larry David in a Super Bowl commercial, the most-watched sporting event in the United States.
Comfortable in front of journalists and politicians, Mr. Bankman-Fried has appeared several times before US parliamentarians, championing better regulation of digital assets. He had also pledged to donate almost all of his fortune to causes that are dear to him, such as animal welfare or the fight against global warming.
This son of academics, a graduate in physical sciences from the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), had more recently made himself the white knight of a drifting sector, coming to the rescue of several struggling cryptocurrency companies.
Collapse
He suddenly saw his star fade when a press article revealed questionable relations between FTX and Alameda and when Changpeng Zhao, the boss of the rival platform Binance, expressed in the wake of doubts on the solvency of Alameda.
Faced with massive withdrawals from its clients and posting a deficit of several billion dollars, FTX, along with around a hundred related entities, filed for bankruptcy in the United States. Large sums loaned to Alameda would actually be investments from FTX clients, which were presumably lost in risky investments.
Questioned at the beginning of December by the journalist George Stephanopoulos, of the ABC chain, who wanted to know if he feared a prison sentence, SBF had kicked into touch. “There are a lot of things that worry me at the moment, the young man had retorted, looking contrite. I’m trying to focus as best I can on what I can do to be helpful and let the ongoing regulatory and legal processes go smoothly. »