FTX scammer says he isn't to blame for the collapse: "Didn't ever try to commit fraud"

Photo: NY Post

Founder and CEO of now-bankrupt crypto exchange FTX, Sam Bankman-Fried, appeared in public for the first time since his company's collapse and did all he could to try distancing himself from his involvement that left creditors having to deal with billions of dollars in losses. [H/T NY Post]

Bankman-Fried spoke with Andrew Ross Sorkin at the NY Times' Dealbook Summit at what he claimed was against the advice of his lawyers. Sounding a bit like James Clapper, he claimed that he did not knowingly [aka wittingly] commingle customer funds on FTX with funds at his proprietary trading firm, Alameda Research.

The proverbial excrement hit the fan after Bankman-Fried secretly moved $10 billion of FTX customer funds to Alameda Research, Reuters reported. No less than $1 billion in customer funds had vanished, according to people involved with the transaction who spoke with Reuters.

Bankman-Fried told Reuters the company did not “secretly transfer” but rather misread its “confusing internal labeling.

And if you believe that he knew nothing, I have an investment that will make you millions.

FTX filed for bankruptcy and Bankman-Fried stepped down as chief executive on Nov. 11, after traders pulled $6 billion from the platform in three days and rival exchange Binance abandoned a rescue deal.

“By late on Nov. 6 we were putting together all of the data…that obviously should have been part of the dashboards I was always looking at…and when we looked at that, there was a serious problem there,” Bankman-Fried claimed.

Bankman-Fried added that he “didn’t ever try to commit fraud” and that he doesn’t think he has any criminal liability because laws are for suckers.

“The real answer is that’s not what I’m focusing on. There’s going to be a time and place for me to sort of think about myself and my own future,” he said.

He might have more time to do that thinking than he thinks he has.

The 30-year-old entrepreneur launched FTX in 2019 and became an influential Democrat donor and pledged to donate most of his earnings to charities. It turns out that his favorite charities were the Democratic Party and the Sam Bankman-Fried Fund for Wayward Scammers.

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