Originally published on: November 13, 2024
US prosecutors are making a bold move to seize cryptocurrency believed to be tied to bribes paid to Chinese officials by Sam Bankman-Fried, co-founder of FTX. The court filing on Nov. 12 in a New York District Court claims that a Binance account, initially valued at $8.6 million as of Dec. 12, 2023, has since surged to about $18.5 million due to market activity. This account is alleged to have been used for money laundering to pay off bribes prior to FTX’s collapse in 2022.
The prosecutors state that Chinese law enforcement froze Alameda Research’s accounts on Chinese crypto exchanges in 2021, which held a staggering $1 billion in cryptocurrency. Bankman-Fried supposedly transferred a $40 million TetherUSDT$1.00 bribe to a private wallet on Nov. 16, 2021, resulting in the release of Alameda’s frozen accounts. Following this, additional payments amounting to tens of millions of dollars in cryptocurrency were authorized to complete the alleged bribe.
US authorities are aiming to gain access to the account with five linked deposit accounts which they believe were used to hide the bribe payments made by Bankman-Fried. Testimony from Caroline Ellison, Alameda Research’s former CEO, suggests that the total bribe paid amounted to around $150 million.
After Bankman-Fried’s trial on Dec. 21, 2023, Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered the seizure of the account. The prosecutors have revealed that the account reportedly still holds various cryptocurrencies including Solana, Cardano, XRP, internet Computer (IC), and Avalanche.
Incidents surrounding the collapse of FTX in 2022 led to Bankman-Fried’s conviction on seven felony counts and a 25-year prison sentence by Judge Kaplan. While initially facing more charges related to bank fraud and foreign bribery conspiracy, they were eventually dropped.
Bankman-Fried’s lawyers have since filed an appeal on Sept. 13, claiming unfair treatment during the trial. Stay tuned for updates on this intriguing legal battle.
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