• Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF), the former FTX co-founder, allegedly bribed a Chinese government official with $40 million in cryptocurrency in order to unfreeze accounts belonging to his hedge fund Alameda Research.
• Federal prosecutors have accused SBF of fraud for using the funds from the bribe to keep Alameda’s loss-generating trades afloat.
• SBF has agreed to new bail conditions limiting his technology access as he denies involvement in all charges brought against him.
Alleged Bribery of CCP Official by Sam Bankman-Fried
According to federal prosecutors, Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) allegedly paid tens of millions of dollars worth of bribes to at least one Chinese government official in order to unfreeze accounts belonging to his hedge fund, Alameda Research. It is believed that around November 2021, the Chinese police issued a freezing order on these accounts which held about $1 billion worth of crypto. Despite personal and legal efforts failing, SBF directed a bribe retain the accounts and used them to prop up Alameda’s loss-generating trades – an action which the government deemed as fraud.
FTX Bankruptcy Case Ongoing
Following this incident, FTX and Alameda collapsed in November 2022 and SBF faced federal indictment and civil charges from both the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and The Securities And Exchange Commission (SEC). Following this, judge Lewis Kaplan shut down SBF’s electronic access but after some negotiation with U.S Prosecutors, he has since been allowed limited tech access with certain limitations imposed on himself.
Binance Facing Allegations Too
The day before this news broke out regarding SBFs case, U.S regulators had come for Binance with allegations relating to facilitating terrorist financing and U.S derivatives law violations.
SBFs Denial Of Involvement In Charges
So far, SBF has denied involvement in any charges brought against him despite evidence obtained by federal government against him pertaining bribery charges but judge Lewis Kaplan said he was not taking any chances due his closed electronic access initially imposed on him .
Conclusion
Whilst it remains unclear what will happen next regarding the outcome for both Binance’s allegations and also SBFs case , it appears that US regulators are cracking down on financial misconduct within crypto space .