Sam Bankman-Fried is now under arrest and won't be making an appearance at Congressional hearings on the downfall of FTX but the Wall Street Journal acquired the full text (pdf) of his planned comments.
They contain the usual explanations for what was a fraud from the start but, looking ahead, the questions now are about rival Binance and SBF appears determined to take his rival down with him. He once again accused Binance of orchestrating the demise of FTX, which is ridiculous given that SBF blatant broke the law regarding the security of client funds.
But he had this to say on Binance:
There is much more to say about Binance, its role in the cryptocurrency ecosystem, and its relationship with FTX, but this is neither the place nor the time for it.
To be fair, he's said the same kind of thing before but in his testimony he also highlighted that Binance was causing KYC issues for FTX.
It's particularly notable because there's a bit of a run on the bank going on at Binance at the moment. Bitcoin is up 4% on lower CPI and that will stem some of the tide but the next few weeks in crypto are going to be dicey.
As for SBF, the guy is an obvious fraud and a con man. Nothing he says stands up against any scrutiny and I don't see how can avoid decades in prison. He even says that he has a path to FTX restarting operations in his testimony, which is beyond laughable for a brand now synonymous with financial fraud.
Update: The charges against SBF have now been unsealed. "Bankman-Fried’s arrest took the public and lawmakers by surprise. The accelerated timeline suggests prosecutors have a high level of confidence at securing a conviction, a legal expert told CNBC."
