“I didn’t try to cheat,” says the former head of the cryptocurrency platform
After the confession, former cryptocurrency star Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of the FTX platform, comes to apologize. The former ousted boss said to himself on Wednesday as the probe tightens to understand how FTX was able to amass €3.1 billion in debt and lead to his and his clients’ collapse. deeply sorry after the company went bankrupt. However, he denied that he committed fraud.
“I am very sorry for what happened” Sam Bankman-Fried said in her first public interview since the FTX default. Apologies reminiscent of the first crypto tycoon, the Frenchman Marc Karpeles, who led the MtGox platform to bankruptcy in 2014, apologized just four years later.
But the pressure is greater for this new business, potentially involving other cryptocurrencies. “I was the managing director of FTX, which means that whatever happened, I had an obligation to protect the interests of shareholders and customers.”He was questioned as part of the conference where he knew his old leader New York Times.
10 billion dollars
Caught in a wave of panic that prompted users to attempt to withdraw their funds from the platform en masse, FTX initially suspended withdrawals before being forced into bankruptcy on November 11.
“I obviously made a big mistake, I would give anything to make it right today”He continued at the age of 30.
Sam Bankman-Fried is suspected of using funds deposited on the platform by FTX clients with his employees to carry out speculative financial transactions with another company, Alameda Research.
If proven, these facts can be criminally prosecuted.
according to The Wall Street Journalduring the bankruptcy filing, amounts received by Alameda without express authorization and from the accounts of FTX customers reached approximately $10 billion.
A number of American media reported that more than one billion dollars of this amount is untraceable today.
“I wasn’t running Alameda”
“I didn’t want to cheat anyone”– assured the entrepreneur.
“I didn’t try to mix funds” and the duplex videotaping of Sam Bankman-Fried from the Bahamas, where FTX is headquartered and still lives, using client money to make risky investments without their knowledge. .
During the interview, Sam Bankman-Fried was upset by the events and only partially looked at the underside of FTX’s failure.
“I wasn’t running Alameda”he said, although he is the main shareholder. “I didn’t know the extent of their position”that is, the amount borrowed from FTX secured this physics graduate from the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Sam Bankman-Fried’s successor, John Ray III, criticized FTX’s management in mid-November and described a company with centralized control. “In the hands of a very small group of inexperienced, undeveloped and potentially corrupt individuals”.
Sam Bankman-Fried, who was asked about a transition that may be in front of the court, said that he did not (focus on) not on “, he added that his lawyers advised him not to speak openly.
Once valued at $26 billion based entirely on FTX and Alameda’s valuation, the youngster lost everything when his platform collapsed.
“Most of what we did was distracting”it gives us a ” an incredibly important topic where we fail completely: risksetc”, Sam Bankman-Fried admitted.
“Risks related to risk management, client investments or conflicts of interest”detailed “SBF”.
(via AFP)
