The FTX brand on a laptop computer display.
Andrey Rudakov | Bloomberg by way of Getty Images
FTX’s high chapter, authorized, and monetary advisors have billed the corporate greater than $19.6 million in charges for work performed in 2022, in response to Tuesday chapter court docket filings. More than $10 million of that was for work performed in Nov. 2022, as Sam Bankman-Fried’s crypto empire entered chapter safety in Delaware.
The companies will initially solely be paid a bit over $15.5 million, or 80% of the worth of their work, beneath a court-ordered interim compensation plan.
The legislation companies that billed FTX are Sullivan & Cromwell, Landis Rath & Cobb, and Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan. Professional advisor Alvarez & Marsal and monetary advisor AlixPartners additionally billed the corporate.
Some of the work that the companies billed for concerned conferences with different firms that additionally have been billing FTX for his or her time, or concerned corresponding with former and present executives, together with Caroline Ellison, the previous CEO of Bankman-Fried’s hedge fund, Alameda Research.
Landis Rath & Cobb and Sullivan & Cromwell, FTX’s major authorized companies, billed the corporate a mixed $10.7 million for over 8,400 hours of labor. Landis Rath & Cobb billed $1.16 million for work performed between Nov. 11 and Nov. 30.
Sullivan & Cromwell, a goal for each lawmakers and Bankman-Fried over their pre-petition work with FTX, sought over $9.5 million in compensation for over 6,500 billable hours, within the interval between Nov. 12 and Nov. 30. Over a 3rd of these billable hours, totaling over $4.8 million, have been for the work of companions, who sometimes cost the very best hourly fee.
Sullivan & Cromwell assigned over two dozen companions to FTX’s case, in response to the filings. Jim Bromley, a accomplice at Sullivan & Cromwell and a lead legal professional on the case, billed over 178 hours for the weeks between Nov. 12 and Nov. 30.
The authorized filings provide a glimpse into the ferocious work performed by advisors to untangle FTX’s advanced internet of accounts and slipshod accounting requirements. Sullivan & Cromwell legal professionals spent over 1,900 hours in November alone on work associated to analyzing and recovering FTX’s international asset base, in response to the filings.
Alvarez & Marsal, an advisory agency, billed $1.9 million for over 2,300 hours of labor on “business operations,” assembly with legal professionals, FTX executives, analyzing FTX’s holdings utilizing blockchain explorers, and reviewing “cybersecurity scenarios.” Those operations included a number of hours in November corresponding with and calling Ellison, 5.3 hours in a single day imaging iPad information and different digital gadgets, and a first-day listening to convention name that lasted 2.5 hours.
Quinn Emanuel, which billed over $1.5 million for work performed between November and December, assigned over a dozen legal professionals to the case, 9 of whom have been companions. One of these companions, Sascha Rand, billed over $13,000 for a single day’s work in November, corresponding and reviewing first-day points. Another Quinn lawyer filed for over $17,000 on a “non-working travel” day journey starting Nov. 21, returning on Nov. 22.
AlixPartners, a monetary consulting agency, billed $1.1 million for work performed over the course of a bit greater than a month, from Nov. 28 to Dec. 31.
FTX’s advisors aren’t entitled to their full charges but. Under an interim compensation order, skilled advisors are paid 80% of their filed charges, supplied that no objection is filed. Full compensation for authorized and advisor charges won’t happen till a ultimate charge software is filed, each time FTX’s chapter saga concludes.
That does not imply that advisors will not get their due, nevertheless. A 2019 Federal Reserve research stated skilled and consulting charges in Lehman Brothers’ chapter have been over $2.56 billion.
Lawyers for Sullivan & Cromwell did $40,000 price of labor simply to look in FTX’s first chapter listening to on Nov. 22, primarily based on court docket filings of hours billed and hourly charges.
Source: www.cnbc.com”
