Sam Bankman-Fried, founder of the FTX cryptocurrency platform which collapsed in the fall of 2022, was sentenced on Thursday March 28 to twenty-five years in prison by New York judge Lewis A. Kaplan. The prosecutor’s office had requested between forty and fifty years of imprisonment in their request to the judge: “The defendant harmed tens of thousands of people and businesses, across multiple continents, over a period of years. He stole money given to him by his clients; he lied to investors; he sent false documents to lenders; he pumped millions of dollars in illegal donations into our political system; and he bribed foreign officials. Each of these crimes deserves a long sentence. »
The 32-year-old’s lawyers argued for a maximum of 6.5 years of imprisonment. This “is not the evil genius portrayed in the media or the greedy villain portrayed in the trial”declared his lawyer, describing his client as “offender, non-violent, first time.” Above all, according to the defense, customers are on the way to recovering most of their funds.
Indeed, since the trial, cryptocurrencies have come out of their “financial winter”, with bitcoin breaking new records with a price above 70,000 dollars (approximately 64,800 euros). As a result, assets managed by liquidator John Ray have vanished, and he may be able to compensate most of FTX’s creditors. According to CNBC, he would have recovered up to $7 billion. Among FTX’s assets is its 8% stake in artificial intelligence start-up Anthropic, in which Sam Bankman-Fried had invested $500 million, and which could be sold for $884 million.
“A thief who takes his loot to Las Vegas…”
The judge refuted those estimates, saying he found a loss of $1.7 billion for investors in FTX, a loss of $1.3 billion for lenders to its Alameda subsidiary and a loss of $8 billion dollars for FTX clients. Above all, he refused to take the argument into account. “A thief who takes his loot to Las Vegas and successfully bets the stolen money is not entitled to a reduced sentence”, asserted Judge Kaplan, who had extended his grievances by accusing Mr. Bankman-Fried of having attempted to bribe witnesses and of having committed perjury during the trial. The maximum possible penalty was one hundred and ten years’ imprisonment.
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