Former President of FTX US Brett Harrison has promised to reveal more about collapsed cryptocurrency exchange owned by Sam Bankman-Fried.
“Use powers of inference,” said Harrison, who stepped down from his FTX role in September, before the group’s implosion in November. FTX’s downfall, spurred by a liquidity crisis, has rocked the crypto industry and is dragging on other firms such as Gemini and BlockFi. Bankman-Fried has pleaded not guilty to the fraud and other criminal charges against him, linked to a suspected loss of $8 billion in FTX customer funds.
The US authorities investigating the case are reportedly digging deeper into what the company’s executives were aware of. They have doubled down on looking at Bankman-Fried’s inner circle by turning their attention to top engineer, Nishad Singh.
Prior to joining FTX US, Harrison had worked for almost two years at market maker Citadel Securities and more than seven years as the head of trading systems technology at investment firm Jane Street. In December, It was reported that Harrison is seeking to raise $6 million for a new crypto startup focused on building crypto trading software for big investors at a valuation of $60 million.
FTX US was one of the more than 130 group entities that slid into bankruptcy in November last year after its parent company FTX filed for bankruptcy. Sam Bankman-Fried, the disgraced founder of collapsed cryptocurrency exchange FTX, was arrested in The Bahamas in December last year and was eventually extradited to the US to face a litany of criminal charges.
The Southern District of New York, which is investigating Bankman-Fried and the collapse of FTX and its sister trading firm Alameda, indicted SBF on eight criminal charges including wire fraud and conspiracy by misusing customer funds. Separately, the Securities and Exchange Commission charged SBF with “orchestrating a scheme to defraud equity investors in FTX.”
Bankman-Fried is being investigated for eight separate counts of criminal activity, including money laundering and fraud. According to the allegations made by the prosecutors, he took consumer funds from FTX deliberately in order to bankroll Alameda Research, his trading business that was run by Caroline Ellison.
It is important to note that Ellison is purportedly cooperating with authorities and has confessed to engaging in unlawful activities across Bankman-Fried’s combined empire. According to the reports, co-founder and former Chief Technology Officer Gary Wang also made a plea agreement alongside Ellison.
