King of Crypto Falls: Sam Bankman-Fried Sentenced to 25 Years in Prison!

The most popular and well-known “King of Crypto,” Sam Bankman-Fried, was sentenced to 25 years in prison on Thursday, March 28. As the king himself has fallen, so has his cryptocurrency exchange, FTX which he co-founded in 2019. The sentence was delivered by U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan who directly sent a strong and powerful message to everyone in the cryptocurrency industry that ‘fraud will not be ignored, fraud will have severe consequences.’

Bankman-Fried’s cryptocurrency exchange, FTX, was booming and was one of the top cryptocurrency exchanges around the world. The 32-year-old entrepreneur was known to be a genius and highly trustworthy, as a result of which he was able to secure some very high-profile endorsements from celebrities including Tom Brady and Larry David for his exchange company and even appeared in Super Bowl Commercials. Due to such a high level of appreciation and his good luck, he was able to capture the attention of investors and get billions of dollars for his company.

But in November 2022, everything trickled down. There were reports about some financial irregularities at FTX after which many customers withdrew their money without a second thought. After investigations took place, it was found that the company was following some unethical accounting practices and was dealing with risky investments. Just a few days later, FTX filed for bankruptcy and hundreds and thousands of customers were left with huge losses. According to Judge Lewis Kaplan, customers lost around $8 billion, investors lost around $1.7 billion and lenders were at a loss of $1.3 billion.

With further investigations came a surprise for everyone, including customers, investors and lenders that the company was involved in a highly tangled web of fraud. Bankman-Fried was cleverly working behind the scenes with his scheme to deceive investors and customers. The court charged him with eight counts which included wire fraud, securities fraud as well as money laundering.

The cryptocurrency industry that is booming around the world saw a side nobody expected. Bank-man Fried continued to maintain his innocence throughout the proceedings and showed himself as ‘just an unlucky entrepreneur who failed.’ But the jury was not fooled. They saw through his defense and ultimately convicted him on all eight counts in November 2023.

In the recent sentence hearing on Thursday, the Judge Kaplan criticized Bankman-Fried’s crimes and also referred to his fraud as “one of the biggest financial frauds in American history” while mentioning how badly the investors have been affected and how his fraud has caused a destabilization in the crypto industry. The judge responded to the young entrepreneur’s claims of innocence by saying, “There is no other way to explain what happened here except intentional fraud,” clearly stating that his crime was huge and not to be forgiven.

The 25-year sentence also shows how severe the crime was and the lesson that everyone should take from this case. According to Lewis Kaplan, “This sentence is meant to deter others who might be tempted to engage in similar conduct,” making it clear that a crime like this will not be forgiven. If somebody is planning to engage in fraud, they must be ready for the dire consequences.

Apart from 25 years of imprisonment, Bankman-Fried has also been ordered to pay a fine of $1 billion which is not even a tiny bit equal to the billions of dollars lost by FTX customers.

After finally realizing and accepting his crime, this is what Sam Bankman-Fried had to say,

“A lot of people feel really let down. And they were very let down. And I’m sorry about that. I’m sorry about what happened at every stage.”

This crime will be remembered as one of the most cleverly planned in history and will definitely serve as a lesson for many!

Read also: Bitcoin Fog: Roman Sterlingov Convicted In A $400 Million Crypto Laundering Operation.