- SBF says he plans to raise liquidity to restart FTX and make customers whole.
- Market participants have met his claim of having illiquid assets with doubt.
Sam Bankman-Fried, the former CEO of FTX exchange, has come out to reveal that the company has illiquid assets worth $9 billion and could restart if plans he is putting in motion to make customers whole.
He made the statement in a Twitter thread which he wrote over several days with the disclaimer that the information shared is not legal or financial advice and may not be completely accurate.
16) Maybe I'll fail. Maybe I won't get anything more for customers than what's already there.
I've certainly failed before. You all know that now, all too well.
But all I can do is to try. I've failed enough for the month.
And part of me thinks I might get somewhere.
— SBF (@SBF_FTX) November 16, 2022
He noted that at the time of FTX’s filing for bankruptcy, Alameda Research had more assets than liabilities, although the assets are not liquid. Alameda also had a margin position on FTX International, while FTX.US had enough to repay all customers.
SBF further stated that the crash happened because there was too much leverage coupled with FTX experiencing a bank and market crash that exhausted liquidity. SBF added that he is attempting to raise liquidity with the one goal of returning funds lost by FTX’s customers and if possible refunding investors while conceding that the plan could fail.
“My goal—my one goal—is to do right by customers. I’m contributing what I can to doing so. I’m meeting in-person with regulators and working with the teams to do what we can for customers. And after that, investors. But first, customers,” he wrote.
SBF’s explanation has been met with skepticism
The plan has been met with much skepticism from crypto market participants. Analysts have noted that it is unclear if the plans SBF is making are in line with those being worked on by FTX’s new CEO and chief restructuring officer John Ray III.
Similarly, allegations have been made that SBF could have been trying to fool algorithms that track deleted tweets with the way he published the thread. The former CEO was initially writing the thread one letter per tweet which led some persons to speculate that he was simultaneously deleting tweets in which he lied.
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Still, others have questioned why he is still walking free and yet in the custody of law enforcement agents for irresponsibly trading with customers’ assets, and raising funds using false valuations backed by FTT tokens which the company created.
Fortune reports that the Justice Department will only pursue criminal charges if it is determined that there was deception involved in the FTX collapse. According to the report, SBF is still in the Bahamas where FTX is headquartered.
