A US judge has sentenced disgraced FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried to 25 years in prison after the former crypto magnate was convicted of fraud last year.
District Judge Lewis A. Kaplan also sentenced Bankman-Fried to three years of supervised release and ordered him to pay an $11 billion forfeiture fee.
FTX imploded and filed for bankruptcy in November 2022 amid allegations that Bankman-Fried mishandled the exchange’s funds by lending billions of dollars in customer deposits to Alameda Research, the company’s trading arm.
The multi-billion dollar stock market collapse led to a sharp drop in crypto prices, and US federal authorities arrested Bankman-Fried the following month.
Last November, a US jury found the former CEO of FTX guilty of bank fraud and conspiracy to commit bank fraud against FTX’s customers; bank fraud and conspiracy to commit bank fraud against Alameda’s lenders; conspiracy to commit securities fraud against FTX investors; conspiracy to commit commodity fraud against FTX customers; and conspiracy to commit money laundering. The jury deliberated for only four hours before reaching a verdict.
Damian Williams, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, says Bankman-Fried stole more than $8 billion in customers’ money and committed one of the largest financial frauds in history.
“His deliberate and persistent lies demonstrated a blatant disregard for customer expectations and disrespect for the rule of law, all so he could secretly use his customers’ money to expand his own power and influence. The scale of his crimes is measured not only by the amount of money stolen, but also by the extraordinary damage caused to the victims, who in some cases had their life savings wiped out overnight.
Bankman-Fried plans to appeal his sentence, the Guardian reports.
Thanks to rising crypto prices and a lucrative investment in an artificial intelligence company, bankrupt FTX is reportedly ready to pay its former clients 120-140% of the value of their holdings on the day the company filed for bankruptcy .
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