Fallen crypto mogul Sam Bankman-Fried gets 25 years jail term | Africanews (2024)
Former crypto entrepreneur Sam Bankman-Fried was sentenced Thursday (Mar. 28) to 25 years in prison for a massive fraud on hundreds of thousands of customers that unravelled with the collapse of FTX, once one of the world’s most popular platforms for exchanging digital currency.
The sentence was half of what prosecutors sought and less than a quarter of the 105 years recommended by the court's probation officers.
Bankman-Fried was convicted in November of fraud and conspiracy — a dramatic fall from a crest of success that included testimony before Congress and celebrity endorsem*nts.
Kaplan imposed the sentence in the same Manhattan courtroom where, four months previously, Bankman-Fried testified that he had intended to revolutionize the emerging cryptocurrency market with his innovative and altruistic ideas, not steal.
The judge said Bankman-Fried repeatedly committed perjury on the witness stand in testimony that was “often evasive, hair-splitting, dodging questions.”
Kaplan said the sentence reflected the risk that Bankman-Fried “will be in position to do something very bad in the future. And it’s not a trivial risk at all.” He added that the sentence was fashioned “for the purpose of disabling him to the extent that can appropriately be done for a significant period of time.”
Kaplan said he would advise the Federal Bureau of Prisons to send Bankman-Fried to a medium-security prison near San Francisco because his notoriety, his association with vast wealth, his autism and his social awkwardness are likely to make him especially vulnerable at a high-security facility.
He ordered Bankman-Fried to pay $11 billion in forfeiture to the US government.
The 32-year-old California man apologized in a rambling statement.
Wearing his khaki-colored prison uniform and chained at the ankles, he seemed to briefly get emotional as he spoke for about 20 minutes, expressing regret about “a lot of mistakes” but casting some blame onto others. His trademark messy and bushy hair had returned from the trimmer look he displayed at trial.
Bankman-Fried’s attorneys, friends and family had urged leniency, saying he was unlikely to re-offend. They also said FTX's investors have largely recovered their funds — a claim disputed by bankruptcy lawyers, FTX and its creditors.
Prosecutors said tens of thousands of people and companies worldwide lost billions of dollars since 2017 after Bankman-Fried looted his FTX customer accounts that he promised were safe to make illegal political donations, bribes, make risky investments, buy luxury real estate in the Caribbean and live lavishly.
FTX let investors buy dozens of virtual currencies, from Bitcoin to more obscure ones like Shiba Inu Coin. Flush with billions of dollars of investors’ cash, Bankman-Fried took out a Super Bowl advertisem*nt to promote his business and bought the naming rights to an arena in Miami.
But the collapse of cryptocurrency prices in 2022 took its toll on FTX, ultimately leading to its downfall. FTX’s hedge fund affiliate, Alameda Research, had bought billions of dollars of various crypto investments that lost considerable amounts of value in 2022. Bankman-Fried tried to plug the holes in Alameda’s balance sheet with FTX customer funds.
Three people from Bankman-Fried’s inner circle pleaded guilty to related crimes and testified at his trial.
Samuel Benjamin Bankman-Fried (born March 5, 1992), commonly known as SBF, is an American entrepreneur who was convicted of fraud and related crimes in November 2023.
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Sam_Bankman-Fried
was sentenced Thursday (Mar.28) to 25 years in prison for a massive fraud on hundreds of thousands of customers that unravelled with the collapse of FTX
FTX
FTX Trading Ltd., commonly known as FTX (short for "Futures Exchange"), is a bankrupt company that formerly operated a cryptocurrency exchange and crypto hedge fund.
Fallen 'Crypto King' Sam Bankman-Fried gets 25 years for fraud. Sam Bankman-Fried, co-founder of the failed crypto exchange FTX, has been sentenced to 25 years in prison for defrauding customers and investors of his now-bankrupt firm.
Samuel Benjamin Bankman-Fried (born March 5, 1992), commonly known as SBF, is an American entrepreneur who was convicted of fraud and related crimes in November 2023.
Bankman-Fried earned the name'Crypto King' due to his remarkable success with FTX. The exchange became the world's second-largest, facilitating the trade of numerous virtual currencies, including Bitcoin. The platform helped him shoot to fame and amass a net worth of $26 billion by the age of 30.
Sam Bankman-Fried: Disgraced 'crypto king' jailed for 25 years after stealing billions of dollars from FTX customers. Secret back doors had been established that allowed SBF's other company, Alameda Research, to access money belonging to FTX customers and make risky bets without their knowledge.
NEW YORK (AP) — Crypto entrepreneur Sam Bankman-Fried was sentenced Thursday to 25 years in prison for a massive fraud on hundreds of thousands of customers that unraveled with the collapse of FTX, once one of the world's most popular platforms for exchanging digital currency.
Changpeng Zhao became crypto's richest person while evading sanctions laws. His pleading guilty to money laundering charges is unlikely to change that–at least for now.
For the third year running, Changpeng Zhao, founder and former CEO of crypto exchange Binance, is crypto's wealthiest person. Despite pleading guilty to U.S. money laundering charges in November, CZ, as he's known, is now worth an estimated $33 billion, up from $10.5 billion last year.
FTX crashed due to mismanagement of funds, lack of liquidity and the large volume of withdrawals. Binance announced it would buy FTX to prevent a larger market crash, but quickly bailed out of the deal as more news reports of mishandled customer funds surfaced.
FTX Trading Ltd., commonly known as FTX (short for "Futures Exchange"), is a bankrupt company that formerly operated a cryptocurrency exchange and crypto hedge fund.
Nov. 8: Binance founder and CEO Changpeng Zhao said his company had signed a letter of intent to buy FTX because the smaller exchange was experiencing a “significant liquidity crunch.” That deal would be contingent, however, on a look at the books at FTX. The price for bitcoin tumbles 13%.
Sam Bankman-Fried, the jailed founder of bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange FTX, is sworn in as he appears in court for the first time since his November fraud conviction, at a courthouse in New York, U.S., February 21, 2024 in this courtroom sketch. Internal discussions were different.
Vitaly Dmitrievich Buterin (Russian: Вита́лий Дми́триевич Буте́рин), better known as Vitalik Buterin (Russian: Вита́лик Буте́рин; born 31 January 1994), is a Canadian computer programmer and co-founder of Ethereum.
Andreas Markos Antonopoulos (born 1972 in London) is a British-Greek Bitcoin advocate, tech entrepreneur, and author. He is a host on the Speaking of Bitcoin podcast (formerly called Let's Talk Bitcoin!) and a teaching fellow for the M.Sc. Digital Currencies at the University of Nicosia.
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