from “new Buffett” to arrest for fraud – Corriere.it

None of the cryptocurrencies he happily traded between video games has been overrated more than Sam Bankman-Friedfounder of Ftx, cryptocurrency intermediary between the exchange (to buy cryptocurrencies) and the platform tout court (to exchange tokenized shares), arrested yesterday in the Bahamas for having – according to the SEC, the US federal body which supervises, or should supervise, the Stock Exchange – “orchestrated a scam that lasted years”, that is, a pyramid scheme that caused a hole of tens of billions (which also involves 100,000 investors Italians).

He talked too much

Overrated not only as a “crypto” genius but also as a crime genius: these cases, for American prosecutors, require months of work, but the indictment of the New York federal prosecutor arrived in two weeks, a record. The reason? fried banker, who worked from the Bahamas to take advantage of the loose financial rules and has recently chosen not to flee to a country that does not have extradition to the United States, after the failure of Ftx he tweeted often and willingly, giving plenty of material to the prosecutors who were investigating the rubble of his financial pyramid, essentially deposing not in court (there will be time) but in a public forum in which he incredibly accused himself (it can be ruled out that the “tweets” had been vetted by a lawyer).

Unlimited credit

“The next Warren Buffett?” he wondered Fortune
in the title of a really badly aged cover. He was the leader of the «top 400» of the new digital finance in another cover (Forbes). Now the SEC is accusing him of hiding from FTX investors (more than a million worldwide, their accounts now zeroed) that the funds were being transferred to Alameda Research, speculative fund run by his partner and ex-girlfriend Caroline Ellison (daughter of two MIT professors), 28, who had effectively “an unlimited line of credit”.

Today in court

“We argue that Sam Bankman-Fried built a house of cards based on deception while telling investors that it was one of the safest buildings in the crypto market,” SEC Chairman Gary Gensler said, hinting that this could only be the first of several future indictments. According to the SEC, investigations into “other violations of the law” and other entities and individuals are underway. The agency added that another regulator, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, is also investigating Bankman-Fried, 30, who will appear in court today in Nassau, the Bahamas.

He slept in the office

Ftx seemed able to unseat Binance from the podium of the number 1 “bank” in the field of cryptocurrencies and instead managed to burn thirty billion euros of its customers in one of the most sensational — and, frankly, bizarre — bankruptcy cases in the history of finance.
Bankman-Fried it seemed a sort of Einstein of cryptocurrenciesslept in his office on a 1970s ottoman-type armchair, played video games in meetings, attended conferences with Tony Blair and Bill Clinton, financed parties, sponsored the Miami Heat stadium of the NBA basketball championship, was interviewed by New Yorker
And Vogue.

He talked too much

Own Voguesix months ago, he blessed Gisele Bundchen’s partnership with Bankman-Fried, and Bundchen’s role as a company ambassador. Now Bundchen and her – soon ex, are separated – husband Tom Brady football champion, as testimonial Ftx who have lost tens of millions (about 70, it is assumed, 45 him and 25 her) must also beware of the gigantic class action on which they work undoubtedly better lawyers than those of Bankman-Fried, led by that David Boies who in the 90s damned Microsoft and who is now trying to recover at least part of the money of Ftx’s customers.

He talked too much

John Jay Ray, one of the technicians appointed by the bankruptcy court to investigate how it is possible to restructure FTX’s debt in view of the bankruptcy process, defined the situation as “unprecedented” due to the “concentration of control in the hands of a very small group of inexperienced, unsophisticated, and potentially compromised individuals.