Sam Bankman-Fried has been extradited to the US from The Bahamas as he faces prison prices regarding the collapse of cryptocurrency trade FTX.
Authorities within the Bahamas mentioned the FTX founder had waived his proper to problem the extradition and Bankman-Fried was witnessed leaving a Justice of the Peace court docket in Nasssau in a darkish SUV.
According to Reuters, a aircraft carrying the previous chief government departed the Bahamas from a non-public airfield by Nassau’s airport.
Bankman-Fried is because of land at Westchester County Airport in New York and can doubtless seem in entrance of a US decide in a while Thursday.
It comes after two of his associates pleaded responsible to prison prices associated to the FTX collapse.
Carolyn Ellison, former chief government of Alameda Research – a buying and selling agency began by Bankman-Fried – and Gary Wang, who co-founded FTX, pleaded responsible to charged “related to their role sin the fraud that contributed to FTX’s collapse”, US Attorney Damian Williams mentioned.
Bankman-Fried had earlier determined to comply with extradition partly out of a “desire to make the relevant customers whole”, based on the affidavit, which is dated 20 December.
His lawyer instructed the decide that his consumer was “anxious to leave”.
The listening to was adjourned after the statements.
Federal prosecutors in Manhattan final week charged the cryptocurrency mogul with stealing billions of {dollars} in FTX buyer property to plug losses at his hedge fund, Alameda Research, in what US Attorney Damian Williams known as “one of the biggest financial frauds in American history”.
Bankman-Fried was arrested on a US extradition request final week in The Bahamas, the place he lives and FTX is predicated.
He initially mentioned he would contest extradition, nevertheless it was reported over the weekend that he would reverse that call.
Bankman-Fried has acknowledged risk-management failures at FTX however mentioned he doesn’t consider he has prison legal responsibility.
His private wealth is assumed to have swelled to $20bn (£16.2bn) on the trade’s peak, however has since reportedly shrunk to $100,000 (£83,000).
Wednesday’s listening to adopted a complicated sequence of occasions this week that left the standing of Bankman-Fried’s anticipated extradition unclear.
On Monday, following the information studies he had agreed to be extradited, Bankman-Fried arrived on the courthouse in a black van marked “Corrections” sporting a blue swimsuit jacket and white shirt.
At the listening to, his native defence lawyer, Jerone Roberts, mentioned he was not knowledgeable of the aim of the proceedings.
After a quick recess, Mr Roberts mentioned his consumer had seen an affidavit outlining the fees towards him however wished entry to the total indictment earlier than consenting to extradition.
The proceedings had been then adjourned. They had been anticipated to renew on Tuesday morning, however Bankman-Fried’s authorized papers weren’t filed in time.
Bankman-Fried rode a crypto growth to turn out to be a billionaire a number of instances over and an influential US political donor, earlier than FTX’s crash worn out his wealth and tarnished his fame.
The collapse was pushed by a wave of buyer withdrawals amid considerations over co-mingling of funds with Alameda.
The cryptoexchange declared chapter on 11 November with Bankman-Fried stepping down as CEO the identical day.
Source: information.sky.com”