Now Facing Two Criminal Cases Is FTX Founder Sam Bankman-Fried

Sam Bankman-Fried, a co-founder of FTX, is now facing two distinct trials for his alleged mismanagement of the cryptocurrency exchange after the DOJ's charges against him were added after his extradition to the U.S. A District Judge ordered a separate trial for those charges, which were added after his extradition.

Source: nymag.com

A total of 13 allegations involving fraud, fraud conspiracy, and bribery are being brought against Bankman-Fried. On October 2, a trial for all the charges was slated to start. In a decision issued on June 15 by United States District Court Judge Lewis Kaplan, five of those counts will now be divided into a second trial scheduled for March 11, 2024. Initially facing eight accusations, the FTX founder was extradited to the United States in December 2022. Subsequent indictments added five more counts in February and March 2023.

The charge division occurs as DOJ prosecutors ask the Bahamian government for permission to trial Bankman-Fried on the five extra counts they brought against him following his extradition from the island. The co-founder of FTX's attorneys launched an effort to get the charges dropped, arguing that he could not be punished for crimes committed after his extradition.

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On June 14, attorneys for the DOJ said that they will go on with the trial of Bankman-Fried on the first eight counts they brought against him. They cited the possible length of the procedure if the court had to wait for the acceptance of a request made by Bankman-Fried in The Bahamas. The allegations of conspiring to commit bribery, conspiring to run an unauthorized money-transfer company, conspiring to commit bank fraud, and conspiring to commit derivatives and securities fraud will be the main topics of the upcoming trial in March.

The additional charges include allegations of money laundering as well as numerous wire, derivatives, and securities fraud and conspiracies allegedly committed at FTX and Alameda Research. With regard to cryptocurrency derivatives, every exchange saw losses in the wake of the demise of FTX, except Bitget, whose average six-month trading volume rose by 4.85% sequentially to $204.1 billion. 

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