As the FTX bankruptcy case continues, the administrators continue to discover critical issues that could have led to the crash. Recall that the founder and CEO Sam Bankman-Fried mismanaged the customers’ funds leading to the exchange crash last year.
The latest discovery by the US Feds FTX Task Force is that SBF and some top executives in Alameda Research took out $3.2 billion in loans and payments from both platforms. The FTX Debtors shared this discovery in the latest financial statement filing. This is besides other amounts they used for personal expenses.
More Discoveries Of Missing Funds In FTX
Since the collapse of FTX, the task force and its new CEO John Ray III have been tracking the funds of the exchange to determine the misappropriated sums. In one of the records, they disclosed that more than $8 billion is missing from the exchange.
Recently, FTX debtors stated that the recent financial statements filed in the Delaware Bankruptcy Court show that SBF and top executives of Alameda took billions of dollars in loans and payments. It also disclosed that more funds came from the Alameda Research trading house.
The top executives include FTX co-founder Gary Wang, its former director Nishad Singh, and former CEO of Alameda Research Caroline Ellison. The other two recipients were the former co-CEO of FTX Digital Markets, Ryan Salame, and former co-CEO of Alameda Research, John Samuel Trabucco.
The filing revealed that Sam Bankman-Fried alone received $2.2 billion, the more significant part of the missing funds. A further breakdown shows that Nishad Singh received $587 million while Gary Wang took out $246 million. Ryan Salame received $87 million, Caroline Ellison took $6 million, and John Samuel Trabucco took $25 million out of the funds.
These amounts were in the form of loans and payments and didn’t include others not under the two categories. For instance, the top brass spent $240 million to buy luxury properties in the Bahamas and donated to charity and political movements. They also made some considerable transfers to other subsidiaries not related to FTX.
FTX Management Makes Efforts to Recover Missing Funds
According to its statement last month, the new FTX management is making moves to recover the funds misappropriated by the former executives. It also disclosed plans to pursue potential action against those who received the funds.
Notably, FTX debtors sent confidential messages to political action funds, political figures, and other recipients of payments and contributions made by SBF or other officers. The deadline to return the funds was February 28, beyond which Debtors can commence legal action to get the funds.
However, the management also stated it could not predict the timing and the monetary recoveries the exchange could get from the move. Interestingly, similar complexities have been seen in regulatory recoveries and fund tracking efforts in sectors like Delaware sports betting. But, three executives, Singh, Ellison, and Wang, pleaded guilty to the charges and are cooperating with the federal prosecutors. But, three executives, Singh, Ellison, and Wang, pleaded guilty to the charges and are cooperating with the federal prosecutors.
Featured image from Forbes and chart from Tradingview.com
