Posts

Sam Bankman-Fried’s Girlfriend and a Co-Founder of FTX Have Pled Guilty to Criminal Fraud Charges

/0 Comments/in , /by

Sam Bankman-Fried’s girlfriend Caroline Ellison and another co-founder of FTX pleaded guilty to criminal fraud charges related to the billion-dollar FTX cryptocurrency exchange, according to unsealed court documents.

The report on Friday came after Bankman-Fried was extradited from the Bahamas to the United States to face charges, including wire fraud and money laundering.

Bankman-Fried was lauded by many as a genius when he co-founded the massive cryptocurrency exchange FTX. He shrouded his actions by claiming that he was amassing billions in wealth in order to donate much of it to charity.

Ellison had been the CEO of Alameda Research, a privately-controlled hedge fund. Bankman-Fried is accused of illegally and covertly transferring billions from FTX to Alameda without properly notifying his investors. She pleaded guilty to seven counts, including conspiracy to commit commodities fraud, conspiracy to commit securities fraud, and conspiracy to commit money laundering. (Read more from “Sam Bankman-Fried’s Girlfriend and a Co-Founder of FTX Have Pled Guilty to Criminal Fraud Charges” HERE)

Delete Facebook, Delete Twitter, Follow Restoring Liberty and Joe Miller at gab HERE.

Sam Bankman-Fried Says He’s Not to Blame for FTX Collapse: ‘Didn’t Ever Try to Commit Fraud’

/0 Comments/in , /by

Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder and former CEO of now-bankrupt crypto exchange FTX, attempted to distance himself from suggestion of fraud in his first public appearance since his company’s collapse stunned investors and left creditors facing losses totaling billions of dollars.

Speaking at the New York Times’ Dealbook Summit with Andrew Ross Sorkin at what he said was against the advice of his lawyers, Bankman-Fried said that he did not knowingly commingle customer funds on FTX with funds at his proprietary trading firm, Alameda Research.

The liquidity crunch at FTX came after Bankman-Fried secretly moved $10 billion of FTX customer funds to Alameda Research, Reuters reported, citing two people familiar with the matter. At least $1 billion in customer funds had vanished, the people said.

Bankman-Fried told Reuters the company did not “secretly transfer” but rather misread its “confusing internal labeling.

FTX filed for bankruptcy and Bankman-Fried stepped down as chief executive on Nov. 11, after traders pulled $6 billion from the platform in three days and rival exchange Binance abandoned a rescue deal. (Read more from “Sam Bankman-Fried Says He’s Not to Blame for FTX Collapse: ‘Didn’t Ever Try to Commit Fraud'” HERE)

Delete Facebook, Delete Twitter, Follow Restoring Liberty and Joe Miller at gab HERE.

Mother of Disgraced Crypto Billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried Is a Democratic Fundraiser Who Once Wrote Essay Blasting ‘Personal Responsibility’

/0 Comments/in , /by

The mother of former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried is a law professor and Democratic fundraiser who once wrote an essay decrying “personal responsibility.”

The cryptocurrency platform filed for bankruptcy last week after users discovered that adjacent trading firm Alameda Research had allegedly been using consumer holdings from FTX to make investments. Following the incident, in which billions of customers’ dollars may have been stolen, the life of Bankman-Fried has come under scrutiny.

Barbara Fried, the mother of Bankman-Fried, is a law professor at Stanford University who has written about “questions of distributive justice” in areas such as tax policy and political theory. She also runs a political action committee called Mind the Gap, which fundraises for the Democratic Party among executives in Silicon Valley. The organization raised nearly $4 million in the most recent midterm election cycle, according to data from Open Secrets, which showed that FTX Director of Engineering Nishad Singh made a $1 million contribution.

Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt have also backed the organization, according to a report from Vox, which described one of the entity’s purposes as avoiding “public detection.”

Bankman-Fried himself contributed nearly $39 million to various campaigns during the recent midterm elections, with 99.6% of funds benefiting Democratic candidates, according to more data from Open Secrets, which listed him as the nation’s sixth-largest individual midterm donor. He was previously the second-largest contributor to President Joe Biden amid his successful bid for the White House. (Read more from “Mother of Disgraced Crypto Billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried Is a Democratic Fundraiser Who Once Wrote Essay Blasting ‘Personal Responsibility’” HERE)

Delete Facebook, Delete Twitter, Follow Restoring Liberty and Joe Miller at gab HERE.

Crypto Investors Panic During Market Bloodbath

/0 Comments/in , /by

Crypto investors panicked on Thursday as bitcoin plummeted to its lowest price in more than a year and other cryptocurrencies endured even worse sell-offs.

Victims of the bloodbath — which comes amid a broader stock market rout — range from the billionaire crypto titans who run leading marketplaces such as Coinbase and Binance to lowly retail investors who have poured their life savings into cryptocurrencies.

“I lost over 450k usd, I cannot pay the bank,” reads one of the top posts on the Reddit forum for Terra Luna, a cryptocurrency that has lost more than 99% of its value over the past week. “I will lose my home soon. I’ll become homeless. suicide is the only way out for me.”

“My ex-colleague attempted suicide,” reads another top post on the forum. “He basically moved all of his savings to crypto in 2021 and LUNA was a massive player in his portfolio.”

While Luna’s collapse is the most spectacular, other cryptocurrencies are also in freefall. Bitcoin was trading around $28,300 Thursday afternoon, down 20% over the past week and nearly 60% lower than its all-time high of $69,000 in November 2021. Other major cryptocurrencies including ethereum and solana are now worth fractions of their all-time highs. (Read more from “Crypto Investors Panic During Market Bloodbath” HERE)

Photo credit: Flickr

Delete Facebook, Delete Twitter, Follow Restoring Liberty and Joe Miller at gab HERE.

The Biden Administration Is Preparing to Regulate Bitcoin

/0 Comments/in , /by

The Biden administration is preparing to draft Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency regulations.

“The Biden administration is preparing to release an initial government-wide strategy for digital assets as soon as next month and task federal agencies with assessing the risks and opportunities that they pose,” Bloomberg reported.

President Joe Biden’s approach could potentially enable the entirety of the federal government’s administrative apparatus to regulate cryptocurrency under the guise of national security.

Bloomberg said, “The late-stage draft of the executive order details economic, regulatory and national security challenges posed by cryptocurrencies. Meanwhile, the directive would also require other agencies to weigh in — carving out roles for everyone from the State Department to the Commerce Department.”

Globally, there are hundreds of millions of people who use cryptocurrency to store and grow their wealth and to make transactions. Largely, the appeal of cryptocurrency is that it is unregulated and not connected to global financial institutions. There are trillions of dollars invested in cryptocurrencies; this asset class was able to grow so rapidly and robustly precisely because there was minimal regulation restricting its growth and use. (Read more from “The Biden Administration Is Preparing to Regulate Bitcoin” HERE)

Delete Facebook, Delete Twitter, Follow Restoring Liberty and Joe Miller at gab HERE.

How Puerto Rico Became a Tax Haven for High-Flying Crypto Millionaires

/1 Comment/in , /by

. . .Many of them are here thanks to a near-irresistible combo — of legal and financial incentives, great weather and a critical mass of cryptocurrency gurus — that has been transforming the island like a gold rush. The surge is helping reshape Puerto Rico into America’s homegrown answer to Dubai. . .

Both Comm and Yoshino came here for crypto gigs. He is a self-employed entrepreneur and podcast host, while she helps run the Puerto Rico Blockchain Trade Association, which hosted a week-long shindig in early December, timed for jetsetters to bounce down to the island after Art Basel Miami.

Among the boldfaced names on-island full-time are controversial YouTuber Logan Paul — who started his own NFT trading game, CryptoZoo and who is reportedly splashing out $55,000 per month on a home — and Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen. She admitted she’d decamped to the Enchanted Isle from Silicon Valley earlier this year and has she’s been living off crypto investments. . .

One way they could have scored such primo investments? Slashing taxes and red tape, a tactic that Puerto Rico has followed with gusto. Put simply, thanks to changes in the law, which are lumped together and known as Act 60, you can live there and keep two things: both your American passport and huge chunks of your earnings that Uncle Sam would otherwise grab.

Spend 183 days on-island each year, and you’re free of taxes on capital gains. If you operate a firm that exports its services from Puerto Rico — say, as a crypto consultant — you’ll pay a paltry 4 percent corporate tax rate. No wonder crypto types, already wary of centralized oversight and focused on cashing in fast and rich, have flocked here. (Read more from “How Puerto Rico Became a Tax Haven for High-Flying Crypto Millionaires” HERE)

Delete Facebook, Delete Twitter, Follow Restoring Liberty and Joe Miller at gab HERE.