Less than a week ago, Sam Bankman-Fried took an extremely high-stakes gamble: he would testify in his own defense in the sprawling criminal trial that threatens to keep him in prison for the rest of his life. On Thursday night, he found out that the gamble didn’t work.
A jury found Bankman-Fried guilty on all seven counts of fraud and conspiracy on Thursday after about four hours of deliberation, a rapid conclusion to the largest cryptocurrency fraud trial in history. The founder of FTX and Alameda Research — the conjoined crypto exchange and hedge fund whose collapse eviscerated $9 billion in customer funds — is now facing decades in prison.
“Sam Bankman-Fried perpetrated one of the biggest financial frauds in American history,” Damian Williams, the Manhattan U.S. Attorney, said during a news conference outside the courthouse after the verdict. Behind him were the prosecutors who argued much of the case, Danielle Sassoon and Nicolas Roos. “This case has always been about lying, cheating, and stealing, and we have no patience for it,” Williams said.
The trial had taken nearly a month, and was packed with exhibits that showed the extent of the fraud, as well as testimony from four of his top executives who said, over and over again, that Bankman-Fried was the one who orchestrated it. (Three of those former executives, including his ex-girlfriend Caroline Ellison, have already pleaded guilty.)
SBF had argued that, essentially, he didn’t do anything in bad faith, and he more or less lost the $9 billion by accident. He pointed to his lack of access to certain databases, or his failure to hire a risk management team. Prosecutors, however, had a mountain of evidence — about 10 million documents, in fact — that said, actually, he had destroyed evidence using Signal. Ellison testified that he knew very well that the fraud was occurring, because he had ordered her to help him commit it.
Sentencing will take place in March. Judge Kaplan will decide the sentence then. SBF will probably appeal the ruling. “We respect the jury’s decision,” SBF’s lawyer, Mark Cohen, said in a statement emailed to reporters. “But we are very disappointed with the result. Mr. Bankman-Fried maintains his innocence and will continue to vigorously fight the charges against him.”
This post has been updated to include additional reporting.
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