Former FTX CEO Arrested, Charged with List of Financial Crimes

The U.S. government charged Samuel Bankman-Fried, the founder and former CEO of cryptocurrency exchange FTX, with a host of financial crimes on Tuesday, alleging he intentionally deceived customers and investors to enrich himself and others, while playing a central role in the company’s multibillion-dollar collapse.

Federal prosecutors say that beginning in 2019 Bankman-Fried devised “a scheme and artifice to defraud” FTX’s customers and investors. He illegally diverted their money to cover expenses, debts and risky trades at his crypto hedge fund, Alameda Research, and to make lavish real estate purchases and large political donations, prosecutors said in a 13-page indictment.

Bankman-Fried, 30, was arrested Monday in the Bahamas at the request of the U.S. government, which charged him with eight criminal violations, ranging from wire fraud to money laundering to conspiracy to commit fraud. If convicted of all the charges, Bankman-Fried — referred to by crypto enthusiasts as “SBF” — could face decades in jail.

Read the source article at abcnews.go.com