•Sam Bankman-Fried, former head of the digital currency exchange FTX, is asking the judge overseeing his case to dismiss most of the criminal charges against him.
•FTX rose to prominence in 2022 and its founder Sam Bankman-Fried had a net worth in billions.
•Binance eventually backed away from a possible buyout of FTX claiming that the problems were too big for it to handle, leading to bankruptcy and SBF’s resignation.
Background on Sam Bankman-Fried
Sam Bankman-Fried is the former head of the digital currency exchange FTX which collapsed into bankruptcy and fraud last November. He is currently facing 13 separate criminal charges and has requested that the judge toss out a total of ten, leaving only three. Even if he gets his way, there will likely still be certain penalties imposed on him. His attorneys have commented that they believe government jumped in with both feet improperly seeking to turn civil and regulatory issues into federal crimes.
Rise of FTX Exchange
FTX first opened its doors for business in 2019 and quickly became one of the top five digital currency trading platforms in the world by 2022. Its founder Sam Bankman-Fried was lauded as a genius by many with his net worth being in the billions towards the end of 2022.
Liquidity Crunch
In mid-November, SBF complained of a liquidity crunch on social media saying he needed fast cash to keep his business running which prompted him to turn to Binance about a possible buyout. While things appeared to be moving forward with this potential deal, Binance eventually backed away citing that problems FTX was facing were too big for them to handle.
Bankruptcy & Resignation
The situation resulted in bankruptcy filing for FTX followed by SBF’s resignation from his post as chief executive officer. This would already have been bad enough but further difficulties arose from this incident leading to various criminal charges being brought against him including fraud allegations among others.
SBF’s Request For Dismissal
Given these circumstances, Sam Bankman-Fried along with his legal team are requesting that most of these criminal charges be dismissed outright due their belief that traditional civil and regulatory processes should have sufficed instead resulting in government overstepping their boundaries with this situation.