Tag: sam bankman-fried

FTX Founder Sam Bankman-Fried Objects to Stricter Bail, Says Prosecutors Put Him in ‘Worst Possible Light’

Lawyers for Sam Bankman-Fried on Saturday urged a US judge not to ban the indicted FTX cryptocurrency executive from communicating with former colleagues as part of his bail, saying prosecutors “sandbagged” the process to put their client in the “worst possible light.”

The lawyers were responding to a Friday night request by federal prosecutors that Bankman-Fried not be allowed to talk with most employees of FTX or his Alameda Research hedge fund without lawyers present, or use the encrypted messaging apps Signal or Slack and potentially delete messages automatically.

Bankman-Fried, 30, has been free on $250 million (roughly Rs. 2,038 crore) bond since pleading not guilty to charges of fraud in the looting of billions of dollars from the now-bankrupt FTX.

Prosecutors said their request was in response to Bankman-Fried’s recent effort to contact a potential witness against him, the general counsel of an FTX affiliate, and was needed to prevent witness tampering and other obstruction of justice.

But in a letter to US District Judge Lewis Kaplan in Manhattan, Bankman-Fried’s lawyers said prosecutors sprung the “overbroad” bail conditions without revealing that both sides had been discussing bail over the last week.

“Rather than wait for any response from the defense, the government sandbagged the process, filing this letter at 6:00pm on Friday evening,” Bankman-Fried’s lawyers wrote. “The government apparently believes that a one-sided presentation – spun to put our client in the worst possible light – is the best way to get the outcome it seeks.”

Bankman-Fried’s lawyers also said their client’s efforts to contact the general counsel and John Ray, installed as FTX’s chief executive during the bankruptcy, were attempts to offer “assistance” and not to interfere.

A spokesman for US Attorney Damian Williams in Manhattan declined to comment.

Bankman-Fried’s lawyers proposed that their client have access to some colleagues, including his therapist, but not be allowed to talk with Caroline Ellison and Zixiao “Gary” Wang, who have pleaded guilty and are cooperating with prosecutors.

They said a Signal ban isn’t necessary because Bankman-Fried is not using the auto-delete feature, and concern he might is “unfounded.”

The lawyers also asked to remove a bail condition preventing Bankman-Fried from accessing FTX, Alameda or cryptocurrency assets, saying there was “no evidence” he was responsible for earlier alleged unauthorized transactions.

In an order on Saturday, Kaplan gave prosecutors until Monday to address Bankman-Fried’s concerns.

“The court expects all counsel to abstain from pejorative characterizations of the actions and motives of their adversaries,” the judge added.

Affiliate links may be automatically generated – see our ethics statement for details.

Check out our Latest News and Follow us at Facebook

Original Source

New FTX CEO Says Bankrupt Crypto Exchange Could Restart Business: Report

Bankrupt crypto exchange FTX is looking into the possibility of reviving its business, Chief Executive Officer John Ray told the Wall Street Journal on Thursday.

Ray, who took over the reins in November, has set up a task force to explore restarting FTX.com, the company’s main international exchange, he said in an interview with the WSJ.

The CEO also told the Journal that he would look into whether reviving FTX’s international exchange would recover more value for the company’s customers than his team could get from simply liquidating assets or selling the platform.

FTX’s native token FTT surged nearly 30 percent after the report.

“I’m glad Mr. Ray is finally paying lip service to turning the exchange back on after months of squashing such efforts!” FTX founder and former CEO Sam Bankman-Fried said in a tweet.

“I’m still waiting for him to finally admit FTX US is solvent and give customers their money back,” Bankman-Fried added.

A legal representative for FTX did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.

Bankman-Fried has been accused of stealing billions of dollars from the exchange’s customers to pay debts incurred by his crypto-focused hedge fund, Alameda Research. He has pleaded not guilty to fraud charges.

The future of customer funds, however, remains unclear. Earlier this week, FTX said in a report to creditors that hackers stole about $415 million (roughly Rs. 3,369 crore) in crypto from its international and US exchanges since its bankruptcy in November.

© Thomson Reuters 2023

Affiliate links may be automatically generated – see our ethics statement for details.

Check out our Latest News and Follow us at Facebook

Original Source

Bankman-Fried blames Changpeng Zhao for campaign against FTX

Sam Bankman-Fried accused Binance boss Changpeng “CZ” Zhao of waging a lengthy campaign to destroy his crypto empire on Thursday while making yet another attempt to explain what led to FTX’s catastrophic bankruptcy.

In a lengthy Substack post, the disgraced former FTX CEO alleged that Zhao’s “fateful tweet” on Nov. 6 capped a “extremely effective months-long PR campaign against FTX.”

“In November 2022, an extreme, quick, targeted crash precipitated by the CEO of Binance made Alameda insolvent,” Bankman-Fried wrote.

The disgraced FTX founder’s business collapsed shortly after Zhao tweeted that Binance was dumping its position on FTX’s in-house digital token FTT.

The tweet started a domino effect that pushed Bankman-Fried’s crypto hedge fund Alameda Research into insolvency and FTX filed for bankruptcy on Nov. 11.

The Post has reached out to Binance for further comment.

The blog post marked some of Bankman-Fried’s first public comments since he pleaded not guilty to eight federal charges of fraud in connection to FTX’s collapse on Jan. 3. The feds have accused the 30-year-old of perpetuating a scheme to bilk FTX customers out of billions of dollars that were used to fund his ritzy lifestyle and prop up risky bets at Almeda.

Bankman-Fried and Zhao have regularly exchanged insults since FTX’s downfall. In December, Zhao responded directly to claims that his actions caused the bankruptcy, tweeting that “FTX killed themselves (and their users) because they stole billions of dollars in user funds.”

Changpeng Zhao has denied his actions caused FTX’s downfall.
REUTERS

“No healthy business can be destroyed by a tweet,” Zhao added.

Bankman-Fried cycled through many of his other oft-repeated defenses in the post and maintained his innocence on the fraud charges. The former FTX boss, who has claimed to be down to his last $100,000, also denied having a secret stash of money.

“I didn’t steal funds, and I certainly didn’t stash billions away,” Bankman-Fried said. “Nearly all of my assets were and still are utilizable to backstop FTX customers.”

Sam Bankman-Fried faces 115 years in prison.
GC Images

Bankman-Fried has been in a separate legal battle in bankruptcy court with the feds and multiple creditors over a $460 million stake in Robinhood. Bankman-Fried’s lawyers have argued he should retain control of the stake to fund his legal defense.

“[I have] offered to contribute nearly all of my personal shares in Robinhood to customers — or 100%, if the Chapter 11 team would honor my D&O legal expense indemnification,” he wrote.

Bankman-Fried’s post included several charts detailing his “estimates” of the financial situations at FTX and Alameda. He claimed that Alameda had a net asset value of $100 billion as recently as 2021.

Zhao is CEO of Binance.
REUTERS

“All of which is to say: no funds were stolen,” Bankman-Fried wrote. “Alameda lost money due to a market crash it was not adequately hedged for.”

Bankman-Fried is currently under house arrest at his parents’ mansion in California. He faces up to 115 years in prison if convicted on all charges.

SBF penned a lengthy blog post on FTX’s demise.
REUTERS

Several former FTX and Alameda executives, including Caroline Ellison and Gary Wang, are cooperating with authorities on their case against Bankman-Fried.



Check out our Latest News and Follow us at Facebook

Original Source

FTX’s Sam Bankman-Fried May Enter Guilty Plea on Cheating Charges

Sam Bankman-Fried is expected on Tuesday to enter a plea of not guilty to criminal charges that he cheated investors and looted billions of dollars at his now-bankrupt FTX cryptocurrency exchange, according to a source familiar with the matter.

Bankman-Fried is accused of illegally using FTX customer deposits to support his Alameda Research hedge fund, buy real estate and make millions of dollars in political contributions.

He is scheduled to appear at 2pm EST on Tuesday (12:30am IST on Wednesday) before US District Judge Lewis Kaplan in Manhattan to enter a plea.

A lawyer for Bankman-Fried did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

It is not unusual for criminal defendants to initially plead not guilty. Defendants are free to change their plea at a later date.

Bankman-Fried has been free on $250 million (roughly Rs. 2,000 crore) bond following his extradition last month from the Bahamas, where he lived and where the exchange was based.

Since his release, Bankman-Fried has been subject to electronic monitoring and required to live with his parents, both professors at Stanford Law School in California.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology graduate has been charged with two counts of wire fraud and six conspiracy counts, including to launder money and commit campaign finance violations. He could face up to 115 years in prison if convicted.

Bankman-Fried has admitted to making mistakes running FTX but said he did not believe he was criminally liable.

The 30-year-old crypto mogul rode a boom in the value of bitcoin and other digital assets to become a billionaire several times over and an influential political donor in the United States, until FTX collapsed in early November after a wave of withdrawals. The exchange declared bankruptcy on November 11.

The prosecution case was strengthened by last month’s guilty pleas of two of Bankman-Fried’s closest associates.

Caroline Ellison, who was Alameda’s chief executive, and Gary Wang, FTX’s former chief technology officer, pleaded guilty to seven and four criminal charges, respectively, and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.

Ellison told prosecutors she agreed with Bankman-Fried to hide from FTX’s investors, lenders and customers that the hedge fund could borrow unlimited sums from the exchange, according a transcript of her December 19 plea hearing.

© Thomson Reuters 2022

Affiliate links may be automatically generated – see our ethics statement for details.

Catch the latest from the Consumer Electronics Show on Gadgets 360, at our CES 2023 hub.

Check out our Latest News and Follow us at Facebook

Original Source

Sam Bankman-Fried is fighting to keep $450m stake in Robinhood

Sam Bankman-Fried is battling to keep a $450 million stake in retail stock Robinhood that FTX’s new boss is trying to claw back from the indicted crypto huckster, according to court records.

The ousted FTX founder claims he is entitled to the assets listed under Emergent Fidelity Technologies, a holding company Bankman-Fried registered in Antigua.

The filings released Thursday in a Delaware bankruptcy court show Bankman-Fried is the sole director and majority stakeholder of Emergent.

However, new FTX CEO John J. Ray III — who is seeking to regain billions in investor funds that Bankman-Fried allegedly swindled from them to prop up his hedge fund Alameda Research — argued the stake in Robinhood belongs to FTX.

The matter is complicated further by the fact that two other investors — the crypto lending firm BlockFi and FTX creditor Yonatan Ben Shimon — are also claiming ownership of the Robinhood stake.

John J. Ray III was installed as CEO of FTX after the company was placed in Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
AP

In May, Emergent and Bankman-Fried revealed that it owned a 7.6% stake in Robinhood. According to SEC filings, Bankman-Fried paid $648 million for more than 56.3 million shares in the app.

On Friday, shares of Robinhood were trading at $8, putting the stake’s worth at $447 million — a $200 million loss.

FTX, which has been placed under the stewardship of Ray while being administered under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, seeks to freeze any activity in the shares while the legal process plays out.

Bankman-Fried’s Antigua-based holding company bought a 7.6% stake in Robinhood earlier this year.
Robin App

“The debtors are conducting an investigation into the business affairs of the FTX group,” FTX said in the filing.

“This investigation to date indicates that the Robinhood shares are property of the debtors’ estates, held only nominally by Emergent.”

Last month, BlockFi filed suit against Bankman-Fried, claiming that Alameda Research promised to secure $1 billion in loans that included the Robinhood stake.

BlockFi alleged that Caroline Ellison, Bankman-Fried’s on-again, off-again girlfriend who ran Alameda Research, made the pledge.

But FTX, which is contesting BlockFi’s claim, said Ellison had no standing to make such a promise.

Yonatan Ben Shimon, a fintech executive and FTX creditor, claims he is the rightful owner of the Robinhood stake.
virtualhumans.org

“The Robinhood Shares were included in these pledged assets by Alameda’s then-CEO, despite the fact that the Robinhood Shares were nominally held by Emergent, because Alameda had then, and continues to have, a property interest in the Robinhood Shares,” FTX said in its court filing.

Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev told CNBC earlier this month that he expects the stake in his company to be tied up in bankruptcy proceedings for the foreseeable future.

Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev said that ownership of the stake in his company will be determined in bankruptcy proceedings.
AP

“I’m not surprised that it’s one of the more valuable assets they have on their balance sheet, because it is public company’s stock,” Tenev told CNBC.

 “We’re just watching this unfold. And it’s going to be locked up in bankruptcy proceedings — most likely for some time — and so we’re just kind of seeing how that plays out.”

Bankman-Fried was freed on $250 million bond on Thursday. He awaits trial on federal charges including wire fraud and securities fraud.

Ellison and FTX co-founder Gary Wang have pledged guilty to federal charges of fraud. They have indicated they will cooperate with investigators. The have both been released on $250,000 bail.

Check out our Latest News and Follow us at Facebook

Original Source

FTX Founder Sam Bankman-Fried Allowed $250 Million Bond, House Arrest

The cryptocurrency entrepreneur Sam Bankman-Fried can post $250 million (nearly Rs. 2, 070 crore) bond and live in his parents’ home in California while he awaits trial on charges that he swindled investors and looted customer deposits on his FTX trading platform, a judge said Thursday.

Assistant US Attorney Nicolas Roos said in the US District Court in Manhattan that Bankman-Fried, 30, “perpetrated a fraud of epic proportions.” Roos proposed strict bail terms, including a $250 million bond and house arrest at his parents’ home in Palo Alto, California.

An important reason for allowing bail was that Bankman-Fried agreed to waive extradition, Roos said.

Magistrate Judge Gabriel W Gorenstein agreed to the bond and also approved the house arrest proposal. He also said Bankman-Fried would be required to get an electronic monitoring bracelet before leaving the Manhattan courthouse.

Bankman-Fried wore a suit and tie in court and sat between his attorneys. Two US marshals sat behind him.

Bankman-Fried, arrested in the Bahamas last week, was flown to New York late Wednesday after deciding not to challenge his extradition.

While he was in the air, the US attorney in Manhattan announced that two of Bankman-Fried’s closest business associates had also been charged and had secretly pleaded guilty.

Carolyn Ellison, 28, the former chief executive of Bankman-Fried’s trading firm, Alameda Research, and Gary Wang, 29, who co-founded FTX, pleaded guilty to charges including wire fraud, securities fraud and commodities fraud.

US Attorney Damian Williams said in a video statement that both were cooperating with investigators and had agreed to assist in any prosecution. He warned others who enabled the alleged fraud to come forward.

“If you participated in misconduct at FTX or Alameda, now is the time to get ahead of it,” he said. “We are moving quickly, and our patience is not eternal.”

Prosecutors and regulators contend that Bankman-Fried was at the center of several illegal schemes to use customer and investor money for personal gain. He faces the possibility of decades in prison if convicted on all counts.

In a series of interviews before his arrest, Bankman-Fried said he never intended to defraud anyone.

Bankman-Fried is charged with using money, illicitly taken from FTX customers, to enable trades at Alameda, spend lavishly on real estate, and make millions of dollars in campaign contributions to U.S. politicians.

FTX, founded in 2019, rode the crypto investing phenomenon to great heights quickly, becoming one of the world’s largest exchanges for digital currency. Seeking customers beyond the tech world, it hired the comic actor and writer Larry David to appear in a TV ad that ran during the Super Bowl, hyping crypto as the next big thing.

Bankman-Fried’s crypto empire, however, abruptly collapsed in early November when customers pulled deposits en masse amid reports questioning some of its financial arrangements.

Check out our Latest News and Follow us at Facebook

Original Source

Sam Bankman-Fried Said to Reverse Decision to Contest Extradition to the US

Former FTX Chief Executive Sam Bankman-Fried is expected to appear in court in the Bahamas on Monday to reverse his decision to contest extradition to the United States, where he faces fraud charges, a person familiar with the matter said on Saturday.

The 30-year-old cryptocurrency mogul was indicted in federal court in Manhattan on Tuesday and accused of engaging in a scheme to defraud FTX customers by using billions of dollars in stolen deposits to pay for expenses and debts and to make investments for his crypto hedge fund, Alameda Research LLC.

His decision to consent to extradition would pave the way for him to appear in U.S. court to face wire fraud, money laundering and campaign finance charges.

Upon arrival in the United States, Bankman-Fried would likely be held at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, though some federal defendants are being held at jails just outside New York City due to overcrowding at the facility, said defense lawyer Zachary Margulis-Ohnuma.

At his initial court hearing in Manhattan, Bankman-Fried would be asked to enter a plea and a judge would make a determination on bail, Margulis-Ohnuma said. The attorney added that such a hearing must take place within 48 hours of Bankman-Fried’s arrival in the United States, though it would likely be sooner.

Prosecutors will likely argue that Bankman-Fried is a flight risk and should remain in custody because of the large sums of money involved in the case and the unclear location of those funds.

“The missing money gives prosecutors strong arguments that he is a flight risk,” said former federal prosecutor and white-collar defense attorney Michael Weinstein. “I expect that if a judge grants pretrial release, they would impose very restrictive and onerous conditions.”

Any trial is likely more than a year away, legal experts told Reuters.

A spokesman for Bankman-Fried declined to comment. Bankman-Fried has acknowledged risk management failings at FTX but has said he does not believe he has criminal liability.

A spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Manhattan declined to comment.

‘Biggest financial frauds in American history’

It was not immediately clear what prompted Bankman-Fried to change his mind and decide not to contest extradition.

He was remanded on Tuesday to the Bahamas’ Fox Hill prison after Chief Magistrate JoyAnn Ferguson-Pratt rejected his request to remain at home while awaiting a hearing on his extradition.

The U.S. State Department in a 2021 report said conditions at Fox Hill were “harsh,” citing overcrowding, rodent infestation and prisoners relying on buckets as toilets. Authorities there say conditions have since improved.

Bankman-Fried amassed a fortune valued at over $20 billion as he rode a cryptocurrency boom to build FTX into one of the world’s largest exchanges. His arrest last Monday in the Bahamas, where he lives and where FTX is based, came just a month after the exchange collapsed amid a flurry of customer withdrawals.

Damian Williams, the top federal prosecutor in Manhattan, described the collapse of FTX as one of the “biggest financial frauds in American history.” He has described the office’s investigation as ongoing, and urged people with knowledge of wrongdoing at FTX or Alameda to cooperate.

One top executive at FTX, Ryan Salame, told securities regulators in the Bahamas on November 9 that assets belonging to the exchange’s customers were transferred to Alameda to cover the hedge fund’s losses, according to a document made public as part of FTX’s bankruptcy proceedings in Delaware.

FTX filed for bankruptcy on November 11, the same day Bankman-Fried stepped down as CEO.

A lawyer for Salame did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Affiliate links may be automatically generated – see our ethics statement for details.

Check out our Latest News and Follow us at Facebook

Original Source

BlockFi Files for Bankruptcy in the US, Cites Exposure to FTX Amid Crypto Meltdown

Cryptocurrency lender BlockFi has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, it said on Monday, the latest industry casualty after the firm was hurt by exposure to the spectacular collapse of the FTX exchange earlier this month.

The filing in a New Jersey court comes as crypto prices have plummeted. The price of bitcoin, the most popular digital currency by far, is down more than 70 percent from a 2021 peak.

“BlockFi’s Chapter 11 restructuring underscores significant asset contagion risks associated with the crypto ecosystem,” said Monsur Hussain, senior director at Fitch Ratings.

New Jersey-based BlockFi, founded by fintech executive-turned-crypto entrepreneur Zac Prince, said in a bankruptcy filing that its substantial exposure to FTX created a liquidity crisis. FTX, founded by Sam Bankman-Fried, filed for protection in the United States this month after traders pulled $6 billion (roughly Rs. 49,020) from the platform in three days and rival exchange Binance abandoned a rescue deal.

“Although the debtors’ exposure to FTX is a major cause of this bankruptcy filing, the debtors do not face the myriad issues apparently facing FTX,” said the bankruptcy filing by Mark Renzi, managing director at Berkeley Research Group, the proposed financial advisor for BlockFi. “Quite the opposite.”

BlockFi said the liquidity crisis was due to its exposure to FTX via loans to Alameda, a crypto trading firm affiliated with FTX, as well as cryptocurrencies held on FTX’s platform that became trapped there. BlockFi listed its assets and liabilities as being between $1 billion (roughly Rs. 8,170 crore) and $10 billion (roughly Rs. 81,700 crore).

BlockFi on Monday also sued a holding company for Bankman-Fried, seeking to recover shares in Robinhood Markets Inc pledged as collateral three weeks ago, before BlockFi and FTX filed for bankruptcy protection.

Renzi said BlockFi had sold a portion of its crypto assets earlier in November to fund its bankruptcy. Those sales raised $238.6 million (roughly Rs. in cash, and BlockFi now has $256.5 million (roughly Rs. 2,100 crore) in cash on hand.

In a court filing on Monday, BlockFi listed FTX as its second-largest creditor, with $275 million owed on a loan extended earlier this year. It said it owes money to more than 100,000 creditors. The company also said in a separate filing it plans to lay off two-thirds of its 292 employees.

Under a deal signed with FTX in July BlockFi was to receive a $400 million (Rs. 3,270 crore) revolving credit facility while FTX got an option to buy it for up to $240 million (roughly Rs. 1,960 crore).

BlockFi’s bankruptcy filing also comes after two of BlockFi’s largest competitors, Celsius Network and Voyager Digital, filed for bankruptcy in July, citing extreme market conditions that had led to losses at both companies.

Crypto lenders, the de facto banks of the crypto world, boomed during the pandemic, attracting retail customers with double-digit rates in return for their cryptocurrency deposits.

Crypto lenders are not required to hold capital or liquidity buffers like traditional lenders and some found themselves exposed when a shortage of collateral forced them – and their customers – to shoulder large losses.

BlockFi’s first bankruptcy hearing is scheduled to take place on Tuesday. FTX did not respond to a request for comment.

Creditor list

BlockFi’s largest creditor is Ankura Trust, which represents creditors in stressed situations and is owed $729 million ( roughly Rs. 5,600 crore). Valar Ventures, a Peter Thiel-linked venture capital fund, owns 19 percent of BlockFi equity shares.

BlockFi also listed the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission as one of its largest creditors, with a $30 million (roughly Rs. 245 crore) claim. In February, a BlockFi subsidiary agreed to pay $100 million (roughly Rs. 820 crore) to the SEC and 32 states to settle charges in connection with a retail crypto lending product the company offered to nearly 600,000 investors.

Bain Capital Ventures and Tiger Global co-led BlockFi’s March 2021 funding round, BlockFi said in a press release issued at the time. Both firms did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In a blog post, BlockFi said its Chapter 11 cases will enable the company to stabilize its business and maximize value for all stakeholders.

“Acting in the best interest of our clients is our top priority and continues to guide our path forward,” BlockFi said.

In its bankruptcy filing, BlockFi said it had hired Kirkland & Ellis and Haynes & Boone as bankruptcy counsel.

BlockFi had earlier paused withdrawals from its platform.

In a filing, Renzi said Blockfi intends to seek authority to honor client withdrawal requests from its customer wallet accounts, in which crypto assets are held in custody. However, the company did not disclose plans for how it might treat withdrawal requests from its other products, including interest-bearing accounts.

“BlockFi clients may ultimately recover a substantial portion of their investments,” Renzi said in the filing.

Origins

BlockFi was founded in 2017 by Prince, currently the company’s chief executive officer, and Flori Marquez. Though headquartered in Jersey City, BlockFi also has offices in New York, Singapore, Poland and Argentina, according to its website.

In July, Prince had tweeted that “it’s time to stop putting BlockFi in the same bucket / sentence as Voyager and Celsius.”

“Two months ago we looked the ‘same.’ They shut down and have impending losses for their clients,” he said.

According to a profile of BlockFi published earlier this year by Inc, Prince was raised in San Antonio, Texas, and financed his college education at the University of Oklahoma and Texas State University with winnings from online poker tournaments. Before starting BlockFi with Marquez, he held jobs at Orchard Platform, a broker dealer, and at Zibby, a lease-to-own lender now called Katapult.

Marquez previously worked at Bond Street, a small business lending outfit that was folded into Goldman Sachs in 2017, according to Inc.

© Thomson Reuters 2022

Affiliate links may be automatically generated – see our ethics statement for details.

Check out our Latest News and Follow us at Facebook

Original Source

FTX: Avengers Endgame’s Russo Brothers to Direct, Produce Amazon Prime Video Series on Cryptocurrency Firm

Joe and Anthony Russo — the directors of Marvel’s biggest movie of all time, Avengers: Endgame — are reportedly involved in directing and producing a new Amazon Prime Video series that details the rise and fall of cryptocurrency platform FTX.

The Russo Brothers’ production banner AGBO will be behind the untitled Amazon FTX series. They are expected to direct the first episode.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Prime Video’s FTX show will be penned by David Weil, who earlier created Hunters for the streaming service.

Founded by Sam Bankman-Fried in 2019, FTX quickly became one of the biggest crypto exchanges on the market.

However, a series of revelations in the past month led to devastating losses at FTX, and its related trading firm Alameda Research.

FTX eventually filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the US, and a group of investors sued the company and several celebrity endorsers for fraud.

Apart from Endgame, Joe and Anthon Russo are also behind Marvel blockbusters such as Captain America: Civil War, and Avengers: Infinity War.

Since the Endgame days, the Russo Brothers have gone on to direct the Tom Holland-led Cherry for Apple TV+, and the Ryan Gosling and Chris Evans-starrer The Gray Man at Netflix.

Both were among the most expensive movies for the respective platforms. A sequel for The Gray Man is in the works, with Joe and Anthony expected to return as directors.

The untitled FTX series is not the first partnership between Amazon and the Endgame directors.

The Russos are currently awaiting the release of the Prime Video spy series Citadel, starring Priyanka Chopra Jonas and Richard Madden.

In the feature film space, they have set up Millie Bobby Brown-led sci-fi film The Electric State at Netflix, which is also said to carry a huge budget

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

  • Release Date 26 April 2019
  • Language English
  • Genre Action, Adventure, Fantasy, Superhero
  • Cast

    Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Don Cheadle, Paul Rudd, Brie Larson, Karen Gillan, Danai Gurira, Bradley Cooper, Josh Brolin

  • Director

    Anthony Russo, Joe Russo

  • Music Alan Silvestri
  • Producer

    Kevin Feige

  • Production

    Marvel Studios

  • Certificate 13+
  • Release Date 6 May 2016
  • Language English
  • Genre Action, Adventure, Superhero
  • Duration 2h 27min
  • Cast

    Chris Evans, Robert Downey Jr, Scarlett Johansson, Sebastian Stan, Anthony Mackie, Don Cheadle, Jeremy Renner, Chadwick Boseman, Paul Bettany, Elizabeth Olsen, Paul Rudd, Emily VanCamp, Tom Holland, Frank Grillo, William Hurt, Daniel Brühl

  • Director

    Anthony Russo, Joe Russo

  • Music Henry Jackman
  • Producer

    Kevin Feige

  • Production

    Marvel Studios

  • Certificate 13+
  • Release Date 27 April 2018
  • Language English
  • Genre Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi, Superhero
  • Duration 2h 29min
  • Cast

    Robert Downey Jr., Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Benedict Cumberbatch, Don Cheadle, Tom Holland, Chadwick Boseman, Paul Bettany, Elizabeth Olsen, Anthony Mackie, Sebastian Stan, Tom Hiddleston, Idris Elba, Peter Dinklage, Benedict Wong, Pom Klementieff, Karen Gillan, Dave Bautista, Zoe Saldaña, Vin Diesel, Bradley Cooper, Gwyneth Paltrow, Benicio del Toro, Josh Brolin, Chris Pratt

  • Director

    Russo brothers, Anthony Russo, Joe Russo

  • Music Alan Silvestri
  • Producer

    Kevin Feige

  • Production

    Marvel Studios, Jason Roberts Productions, South Pictures

  • Certificate 13+
  • Release Date 12 March 2021
  • Language English
  • Genre Crime, Drama
  • Cast

    Tom Holland, Ciara Bravo

  • Director

    Anthony Russo, Joe Russo

  • Music Henry Jackman
  • Producer

    Joe Russo, Anthony Russo, Mike Larocca, Jonathan Gray, Matthew Rhodes, Jake Aust, Chris Castaldi

  • Production

    AGBO, Hideaway Entertainment

  • Release Date 22 July 2022
  • Language English
  • Genre Action, Thriller
  • Cast

    Ryan Gosling, Chris Evans, Ana de Armas, Jessica Henwick, Regé-Jean Page, Wagner Moura, Julia Butters, Dhanush, Alfre Woodard, Billy Bob Thornton, Callan Mulvey, Eme Ikwuakor, Robert Kazinsky, DeObia Oparei, Shea Whigham

  • Director

    Anthony Russo, Joe Russo

  • Music Henry Jackman
  • Producer

    Anthony Russo, Joe Russo, Joe Roth, Jeff Kirschenbaum, Mike Larocca, Chris Castaldi, Palak Patel

  • Production

    AGBO, Roth/Kirschenbaum Films

For the latest tech news and reviews, follow Gadgets 360 on Twitter, Facebook, and Google News. For the latest videos on gadgets and tech, subscribe to our YouTube channel.

Further reading: FTX, FTX series, FTX Amazon, FTX Prime Video, Amazon Prime Video, Joe Russo, Anthony Russo, Russo Brothers, AGBO, David Weil, Sam Bankman Fried, Hollywood

Vi Brings International Roaming Packs for the Ongoing FIFA World Cup 2022: All Details

Hodlnaut Crypto Lender Under Scanner in Singapore, Being Probed for Fraud

Featured video of the day

Asus ROG Phone 6: Unboxing And First Look



Check out our Latest News and Follow us at Facebook

Original Source

Sam Bankman-Fried Cashed Out $300 Million During FTX’s Fundraise in October 2021

FTX founder and former CEO Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) quietly cashed out $300 million (roughly Rs. 2,430 crore) in personal stakes after a $420 million (roughly Rs. 3,410 crore) fundraising in October 2021, as per a recent report. At the time of the fundraising, Bankman-Fried told investors that the raise would be used for things like helping grow FTX and working closely with regulators, but a large portion of the cash was used as a reimbursement for a month’s earlier buyout of Binance’s stake in FTX.

As highlighted by a Wall Street Journal report, the move is being widely criticised as cashing out such a huge amount is taboo in regard to startup-world standards as it allows the founder to reap profit before investors. Note that the $2 billion (roughly Rs. 17,000 crore) capital came during a six-month fundraising effort led by investors like Sequoia Capital, BlackRock, and Temasek. This fundraising valued FTX at $25 billion (roughly Rs. 2,02,950 crore).

Moreover, Binance received $2.1 billion (roughly Rs. 17,050 crore) in the form of BUSD and FTT tokens for its FTX shares. In early November, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao declared that the business would be selling tokens due to recent revelations. This decision was perceived as an indication that something was wrong with FTX.

Later, the FTX exchange suffered an abrupt collapse, revealing an $8 billion (roughly Rs. 64,940 crore) shortfall as a result of murky dealings. To top it up, FTX filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. This, understandably, started a series of investigations to reveal potentially exposed parties.

When the FTX crash became a contentious issue among community and government regulators, SBF kept on engaging in disruptive tweets and conversations with reporters disparaging the government authorities.

For this reason, Sam Bankman-Fried’s lawyer, Paul Weiss, dropped the case as Bankman kept on jeopardising his defence by speaking publicly in recent days.

Affiliate links may be automatically generated – see our ethics statement for details.

Check out our Latest News and Follow us at Facebook

Original Source

Exit mobile version