Former crypto king Sam Bankman-Fried is facing up to 110 years in prison!

The founder of FTX, one of the world’s biggest cryptocurrency trading platforms, has been found guilty on seven charges of fraud!

Before his business imploded last year, Sam Bankman-Fried’s net worth was estimated to be around US$15 billion.  Now he’s facing decades in prison. 

Some quick background if you’re not familiar with this whole situation.

Sam Bankman-Fried used to be one of the biggest names in the cryptocurrency world. He founded FTX, which up until November last year was the second-largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world. FTX allowed users to connect their wallets to conduct trades and exchange digital currencies, among other things. 

The company and its owner were really popular. People called Bankman-Fried the poster boy for crypto, saying he’s the future of the industry.  He even donated over US$40 million to both the Democratic and Republican political parties. FTX also reportedly paid US$135 million to rename the Miami Heat arena to “FTX Arena” in 2021.  They also sponsored F1 teams. 

So both Bankman-Fried and FTX were riding high… until about a year ago, when news emerged that there was some funny business going on at FTX.

According to court testimony, while Bankman-Fried was selling the exchange to investors as safe and secure, the company was falsifying numbers and using customer funds to bankroll his other business. 

Once that news was out, all hell broke loose! FTX customers made a mad dash to pull their investments. And that of course, revealed more cracks because they couldn’t afford to pay back everyone all at once. The company ended up filing for bankruptcy, which triggered another crypto-winter. 

The price of Bitcoin fell dramatically.  Other crypto exchanges had to conduct mass layoffs, and a couple of them even went out of business.

Now, Bankman-Fried has been found guilty of seven fraud charges, including wire fraud, conspiracy to commit wire fraud, and conspiracy to commit money laundering.

In his defence, the former crypto king said he had no malicious intent and that he just honestly failed at running a high-risk business. He denied ever being directly involved in the misuse of customer funds.  But his former coworkers testified the opposite and well… the jury found him guilty, so.

Bankman-Fried is headed back to court in March for his sentencing.  He’s facing up to 110 years in prison … and that’s the bottom line.