Sam Bankman-Fried, the former chief executive of FTX, indicated on Sunday that he is unlikely to testify in the upcoming US House committee hearing into the collapse of his crypto exchange, saying he is still ” learns and assesses what happened”.
In a tweet to Financial Services Committee Chair Maxine Waters and the committee, Bankman-Fried, who is accused of embezzling money from clients, suggested he testify at a later date.
The US House Financial Services Committee announced last month that it plans to hold a hearing in December to investigate the collapse of crypto exchange FTX, which was one of the world’s largest before the implosion. The committee said it expected to hear from the companies and individuals involved, including FTX founder Bankman-Fried, Alameda Research and Binance. Waters said earlier this month that the hearing is scheduled for December 13.
The slow pace of US authorities investigating FTX and its leaders has frustrated many entrepreneurs and crypto investors who believe that Bankman-Fried, who allegedly embezzled billions of dollars from customers, is getting away with one of the biggest frauds in history with little to no control.
The move follows Bankman-Fried, once a celebrated billionaire in the crypto ecosystem, who gave a series of interviews to media outlets and on Crypto Twitter where he consistently claimed he lacked knowledge about the loans FTX funded to affiliated trading firm Alameda Investigation — or any misuse of customer funds.
Reuters reported last month that Bankman-Fried secretly transferred $10 billion in customer FTX funds to Alameda Research. Bankman-Fried told the publication that the transfer of the money was a misreading of the “confusing internal labeling”.
FTX filed for bankruptcy last month and stepped down as CEO.
Newly appointed FTX chief executive John Ray said in a filing last month that “in his 40 years of legal and restructuring experience” he had never seen “such a complete failure of corporate controls and such a complete absence of reliable financial information as happened here.” ” .” Ray was previously CEO of Enron after the energy titan’s implosion.
