Sam Bankman-Fried

Identity and role

Samuel Bankman-Fried co-founded FTX with Gary (Zixiao) Wang and Nishad Singh and was its chief executive. He also owned Alameda Research, which the SEC described as his privately held crypto hedge fund. FTX was not a PPP lender or a relief recipient.

Biography / career arc

According to the statement Bankman-Fried submitted to a House Agriculture subcommittee in June 2022, FTX began international operations in May 2019 and opened its U.S. exchange in 2020. By then the group included FTX.com, which was closed to U.S. users; FTX.us, a spot exchange registered with FinCEN as a money services business; and FTX US Derivatives, licensed by the CFTC as an exchange and clearinghouse. The SEC later said FTX, based in the Bahamas, had raised more than $1.8 billion from equity investors since May 2019, about $1.1 billion of it from roughly 90 U.S. investors.

Pandemic-relief / PPP-EIDL role

FTX's U.S. business dates from 2020. The AP describes FTX as once the world's second-largest cryptocurrency exchange, a company that advertised during the Super Bowl and collected endorsements from Tom Brady, Stephen Curry and Larry David while its founder testified before Congress. The prosecution and the SEC case described where some of the money went. The SEC's December 13, 2022 complaint alleged that he diverted FTX customers' funds to Alameda and gave Alameda "a virtually unlimited 'line of credit' funded by the platform's customers," exempt from "certain key FTX risk mitigation measures." It alleged that he used commingled customer funds for venture investments, real estate and "large political donations." The SEC's allegations were not tried; the criminal case was.

Their own relief

No PPP or EIDL loan to Bankman-Fried personally, or to FTX, appears in the records cited here. SBA's PPP loan data list a $370,518 loan to Alameda Research LLC, 2000 Center Street, Berkeley, California, approved on April 27, 2020 through Signature Bank. The borrower reported 20 jobs and put all of the money down for payroll. The data record the loan as paid in full on May 20, 2022, with no forgiveness. The Berkeley address is the one Voyager Digital's bankruptcy filings gave for Alameda Research Ventures; Voyager's July 2022 declaration also listed $376.8 million in loans outstanding to Alameda Research Ltd. The money in his criminal case came from FTX's customers, investors and lenders.

Legal status / controversies

A federal jury in Manhattan convicted Bankman-Fried of fraud and conspiracy in November 2023, after a trial at which Alameda's former chief executive, Caroline Ellison, testified against him. By the time the House Financial Services Committee met on December 14, 2022, Chairwoman Maxine Waters said, he had been indicted on eight criminal counts. Judge Lewis A. Kaplan sentenced him to 25 years in prison; the district court's judgment is dated March 29, 2024. At sentencing Kaplan said Bankman-Fried had repeatedly committed perjury in testimony that was "often evasive, hair-splitting, dodging questions," and put the losses at about $8 billion for customers, $1.7 billion for investors and $1.3 billion for lenders.

Where they are now (2025–2026)

On June 12, 2026 the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit upheld the conviction, rejecting his argument that the judge's evidentiary rulings made the trial unfair. The government's evidence, Judge Barrington D. Parker wrote for the panel, was "conservatively stated, robust." The court said that while he was reassuring customers and regulators, "he was simultaneously using FTX as his own personal piggy bank." CNBC reported on June 8, 2026 that he had filed a formal request for a presidential pardon, listed as pending in Justice Department records; in January, President Trump had told the New York Times he had "no intention of pardoning" him.

Sources held in this archive

FTX Was a Pandemic Money Story

Caroline Ellison — Alameda Research CEO and chief cooperating witness at his trial.
Damian Williams — U.S. Attorney whose office brought the FTX prosecution.
Brian Armstrong — Coinbase chief executive, FTX's pandemic-era rival.