The founder of collapsed cryptocurrency exchange FTX, Sam Bankman-Fried has been arrested in the Bahamas.
In a statement, the attorney general of the Bahamas, says: “SBF’s arrest followed receipt of formal notification from the United States that it has filed criminal charges against SBF and is likely to request his extradition.”
He is scheduled to appear in a magistrates’ court today in the Caribbean country’s capital, Nassau.
FTX filed for bankruptcy last month, leaving its fifty largest creditors $3.1 billion out of pocket.
A poster child for the cryptocurrency movement, Bankman-Fried’s fall from grace has been sudden and dramatic.
A report by newly-installed FTX CEO John Ray last month, blasted his predecessor for “a complete failure of corporate controls and a complete absence of trustworthy financial information”.
The new CEO also warned that a “substantial portion” of assets held with FTX may be “missing or stolen” and reveals that corporate funds were “used to purchase homes and other personal items for employees and advisors”.
The SEC’s director of enforcement, Gurbir S. Grewal, welcomed the news from the Bahamas: “We commend our law enforcement partners for working to secure the arrest of Mr. Sam Bankman-Fried in the Bahamas on federal criminal charges. The Securities and Exchange Commission has separately authorised charges relating to Mr. Bankman-Fried’s violations of our securities laws, which will be filed publicly (Tuesday) in the Southern District of New York.”
Prior to his arrest Bankman-Fried was scheduled to testify today before the US House of Representatives Committee on Financial Services. According to a copy of his testimony obtaind by Forbes, he was to begin his address with the words: “I fucked up.”
Ghana
Meanwhile, in Ghana, some crypto investors and traders who were caught in FTX bankruptcy web, still have their moneys locked in between two financial institutions (names to be revealed soon). One of the institutions is regulated while the other is not even licensed in Ghana.
But a few of the victims have managed to retrieve their moneys from at least one of the two financial institutions.
It is known that the FTX Africa team are working on investing depositors funds in other ventures instead of returning their moneys to them. Meanwhile, Bank of Ghana is monitoring events in that space, even though the space is not regulated.
Source: Techgh24, https://www.nytimes.com/
