Sam Bankman-Fried, disgraced crypto mogul and formerly one of the richest people in the world, is by most accounts very low on funds today following the well publicized implosion of his cryptocurrency exchange FTX. But then things somehow got even worse for Bankman-Fried. Federal prosecutors have seized nearly $700 million worth of financial assets with ties to Bankman-Fried.
The biggest proportion of the seized assets is made up of more than 55 million Robinhood shares valued at an estimated $526 million. But since the shares are alleged by prosecutors as having been purchased with funds stolen from bilked FTX consumers, their true ownership remains in limbo, with several different parties claiming it.
"The 55 million-plus Robinhood shares are at the heart of a contentious multi-party battle between Caribbean litigants, representatives of bankrupt crypto lender BlockFi, Bankman-Fried himself, and FTX's bankruptcy leadership."
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In addition to the more than half a billion in Robinhood stock, the rest of the assets seized by the feds includes $50 million in a Moonstone Bank account and another $6 million at Silvergate Bank, both in the name of FTX Digital Markets, a Bahamian subsidiary of the company. Then there's the undisclosed sums held in Binance and Binance US accounts that were also part of the seizure.
Bankman-Fried is facing charges of criminal fraud over his role in the FTX scandal. He's currently living under house arrest at his parents' home in Northern California. His trial is expected to start in October 2023.
