Two colleagues of FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried have pleaded guilty to fraud linked to the collapse of the cryptocurrency exchange, according to US officials.FTX co-founder Gary Wang and former Alameda Research executive director Caroline Ellison have pleaded guilty and agreed to cooperate with authorities in the ongoing investigation, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York. ‘s Damian Williams said in a correspondence statement late Wednesday. Williams did not disclose the charges Wang and Ellison pleaded guilty to, but said the announcement would not be the last his office will make regarding the FTX investigation.”Let me repeat the call I made last week. If FTX or he has ever been complicit in cheating on Alameda, now is the time to get ahead. We are moving fast and our patience is It doesn’t last forever,” Williams said. “We are working 24/7 and we are not done yet,” he added.
In a separate announcement, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) on Wednesday announced that Ellison and Wang’s FTX client assets would be pledged in support of Alameda to pledge collateral for margin trading. filed a civil suit. Bankman-Fried, Ellison, and Wang let investors hold on when the FTT and the rest of the card houses collapsed. Investor risk remains until crypto platforms comply with well-established securities laws. ”The SEC said Ellison and Wang are cooperating in an ongoing investigation.CFTC Chairman Rostin Behnam said the agency “acted aggressively to hold everyone committing fraudulent activity accountable and to protect customers from additional damage and loss.
” Lawyers for Bankman-Fried declined to comment. Bankman-Fried, once considered the richest millennial in the world after Mark Zuckerberg, was accused last week by U.S. officials of what prosecutors called “one of the biggest financial frauds in American history.” After dropping the charges, he announced that he had been arrested in the Caribbean country. Bankman-Fried is accused of stealing FTX customer deposits to fund risky bets and political contributions by his affiliated trading firm, Alameda. Bankman-Fried’s arrest earned him high-profile backers, including Seinfeld creator Larry David and his NFL star Tom Brady, making him one of Washington, DC’s most well-connected donors. capped off his stunning fall from grace as a 30-year-old ex-golden boy of the crypto industry. The collapse of his FTX, which was once valued at $32 billion, fueled skepticism about the credibility of cryptocurrencies, sparked calls for tighter regulation, and raised questions about the future of crypto assets in general.
