Yesterday’s testimony hearing of new FTX CEO John Ray III to the U.S. House of Representatives Financial Services Committee brought to light some new findings that are not likely to please former customers of the exchange.
After Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) was arrested by Bahamian authorities yesterday, Ray took the job of testifying before the U.S. Congress. The new CEO dropped a bombshell that it would be impossible to recoup all customer losses.
Many former customers will not get their money back. “At the end of the day, we’re not going to be able to recover all of the losses here,” Ray stated.
New FTX CEO Says US Clients Fare Better
SBF’s successor also revealed that customers in the U.S. are likely to fare better. Nevertheless, Ray falsely rejected SBF’s claim that FTX.US is fully liquid.
As Bitcoinist reported yesterday, Bankman-Fried had planned to repeatedly claim FTX US was fully solvent in his prepared speech to the U.S. Congress. “I wish I had not clicked on a button on Docusign at 4:30 am, leaving some of FTX under destructive leadership,” SBF planned to say.
Ray denied this statement, saying, “We still have a hole in the US. It’s not solvent, it’s inaccurate and I don’t even know how he knows that.”
At the same time, the bankruptcy trustee stressed that he is more confident about the U.S. entity because of the number of customers and trading volume on the U.S. exchange was much lower than it was for the international entity (FTX.com).
As of yesterday, however, Ray and his team have found only “a few hundred million dollars of value” for the US entity. However, this is not the final verdict, as private keys to the FTX US wallets are still missing.
As we find those keys, we’ll hopefully be able to find more assets and contribute them to the US silo. Certainly, there is a pathway to recovery there. It’s just premature to make a determination.
Whether there was a commingling of funds between FTX.US, Alameda and the international entity, the trustee did not want to answer yet. “That’s what we are looking for right now. I can’t give you a clear answer on that as of today.”
Ray also claims that a total of $1 billion worth of assets have been secured. However, most of the creditors are from outside the U.S., so the process will take weeks and months, he said.
The House Committee probed FTX CEO John J. Ray III on co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried’s leaked testimony claim that FTX could pay off all his customers “tomorrow” had he not been arrested https://t.co/VdbmQObqdy pic.twitter.com/380yhh7uoX
— Bloomberg Crypto (@crypto) December 13, 2022
SEC Charges SBF With Fraud From Day 1
Notably, the SEC filing was also released yesterday, in which the U.S. agency accuses Bankman-Fried of stealing customer funds from day one.
From the inception of FTX, Bankman-Fried diverted FTX customer funds to Alameda, and he continued to do so until FTX’s collapse in November 2022.
At press time, the Bitcoin price was little volatile at $17,788, in anticipation of today’s FOMC meeting.
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