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Daring drive-by at SBF’s: 3 men drove into barricade and fled: Lawyers

The lawyer’s didn’t specify the date or time at which the incident took place, and claimed the security personnel were unable to get the license plate details.

Three men reportedly drove their car into the metal barricade outside Sam Bankman-Fried’s parent’s home where he is currently under house arrest, SBF’s lawyers claim.

In a filing to the federal court, the lawyers for the former FTX CEO said the three men got out of the car after hitting the barricade and told a security guard guarding the home: “You won’t be able to stop us.”

The unidentified trio were then able to drive away before security guards could record the car’s license plate.

According to a Reuters report, the incident was described in a Jan. 19 court filing which they said underscored the security risks faced by the FTX founder and those linked to him, including the two individuals who secured Bankman-Fried’s $250 million bond, stating:

“Given the notoriety of this case and the extraordinary media attention it is receiving, it is reasonable to assume that the non-parent sureties will also face significant privacy and safety concerns if their identities are disclosed.”

The lawyers however didn’t specify the date or time at which the incident took place.

On Jan. 12, lawyers representing some of the largest U.S. media outlets — including Bloomberg, CNBC, Reuters and the Financial Times — wrote a letter to U.S. District Court judge Lewis Kaplan to request for the names of the guarantors.

The media’s lawyers argued the public’s right to know Bankman-Fried’s guarantors significantly outweighed their privacy and safety rights.

Given that Bankman-Fried shares close ties to some of the wealthiest and most politically-connected individuals on the planet, the lawyers argued that such non-disclosure could undermine public confidence in U.S. government institutions.

Related: FTX profited from Sam Bankman-Fried’s inflated coins: Report

Bankman-Fried was extradited to the U.S. in December and pleaded not guilty to all eight fraud and conspiracy-based charges laid against him on January 3, 2023.

All charges relate to his alleged involvement in FTX’s catastrophic collapse in November.The controversial figure remains under house arrest at his parent’s California home until his trial date, which is set for October 2, 2023.

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Major media outlets demand identities of SBF’s $250M bond guarantors

The media’s lawyers argued the public’s right to know Bankman-Fried's sureties outweighed their privacy and safety rights, but Bankman-Fried’s lawyers strongly disagreed.

Eight major media companies including Bloomberg, The Financial Times and Reuters have demanded public disclosure of the two individuals responsible for guaranteeing FTX former CEO Sam Bankman-Fried's $250 million bond. 

In a Jan. 12 letter addressed to New York District Court Judge Lewis Kaplan, attorneys from Davis Wright Tremaine LLP — acting on behalf of the media giants — argued that “the public’s right to know Bankman-Fried's guarantors outweighed their privacy and safety rights.”

Media organizations looking to persuade the judge to unseal the identities of Bankman-Fried's guarantors include the Associated Press, Bloomberg, CNBC, Dow Jones, The Financial Times, Insider and the Washington Post.

Cast your vote now!

In making their case, the media’s lawyers used case precedent from Ghislaine Maxwell’s Dec. 2020 case — where the bond guarantors' names weren’t revealed — to argue that Sam Bankman-Fried’s financial crimes were not as serious as Maxwell’s involvement in Jeffery Epstein’s child sex traffic ring scandal:

"While Mr. Bankman-Fried is accused of serious financial crimes, a public association with him does not carry nearly the same stigma as with the Jeffrey Epstein child sex trafficking scandal.”

According to a Jan. 12 report from Reuters, Bankman-Fried’s lawyers previously argued that Bankman-Fried's sureties should be kept under wraps as Joseph Bankman and Barbara Fried — the parents and co-signers of Bankman-Fried’s $250 million bond — have received ongoing physical threats since FTX's catastrophic collapse in early November.

Related: Sam Bankman-Fried: ‘I didn’t steal funds, and I certainly didn’t stash billions away’

If the guarantor’s names were revealed, there would be a “serious cause for concern” for the safety and welfare of those two people, Bankman-Fried’s lawyers argued.

On Jan. 3, Bankman-Fried pleaded not guilty against all eight criminal charges related to the shock collapse of his former cryptocurrency exchange FTX, which includes wire fraud and violations of campaign finance laws among other charges.

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Sam Bankman-Fried’s Lawyers Say $5,000,000,000 in Assets Now Recovered From Collapsed Crypto Exchange: Report

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Sam Bankman-Fried’s attorneys are revealing that billions of dollars worth of liquid assets has been recovered from bankrupt crypto exchange FTX. According to a new report by CNBC, lawyers representing the disgraced former CEO have told a judge that $5 billion in cash, digital assets, and other securities have been recovered from FTX. Attorney Adam […]

The post Sam Bankman-Fried’s Lawyers Say $5,000,000,000 in Assets Now Recovered From Collapsed Crypto Exchange: Report appeared first on The Daily Hodl.

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Sam Bankman-Fried To Be Under GPS-Monitored Home Confinement After Release on Largest-Ever Pretrial Bond: Report

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Disgraced FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried will reportedly be under monitored house arrest after posting what prosecutors are calling the largest pretrial bond of all time. According to a new report by CNBC, Bankman-Fried will be released on a staggering $250 million bail as he awaits trial for allegedly defrauding investors and mismanaging customer funds. The […]

The post Sam Bankman-Fried To Be Under GPS-Monitored Home Confinement After Release on Largest-Ever Pretrial Bond: Report appeared first on The Daily Hodl.

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‘Visibly Shaking’ FTX Co-Founder Hammers out a ‘Wasted Day’ in Court as Bahamian, US Legal Team Prep for Extradition

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The post CNBC’s Jim Cramer Says He’s ‘Negative’ on Dogecoin (DOGE), XRP and One Top-20 Altcoin – Here’s Why appeared first on The Daily Hodl.

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The post Binance CEO Says the World’s Largest Crypto Exchange by Volume Holds Customer Assets One-to-One appeared first on The Daily Hodl.

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Just 8% of Americans have a positive view of crypto: CNBC survey

CNBC’s All-America Economic Survey was conducted towards the end of November, just a few weeks after the collapse of crypto exchange FTX.

A new CNBC survey suggests that only 8% of Americans have a favorable view of cryptocurrency as of the end of November, down significantly from the 19% recorded in March.

CNBC’s All-America Economic Survey was conducted between Nov. 26 and Nov. 30. It, however, should be taken with a grain of salt as, despite its name, it had a relatively small sample size of 800 respondents across the U.S. in total, with a margin error of +/- 3.5%.

The survey was published on Dec. 7, and alongside the declining number of crypto friendly respondents, CNBC highlighted that the number of haters (those with negative crypto views) has grown rapidly, increasing from 25% in March to 43% by November.

CNBC suggested the results indicate a “dramatic fall for an investment that was touted as its own asset class and had a celebrated coming-out party on the global stage with multiple Super Bowl ads and celebrity endorsements.”

“That popularity attracted many ordinary Americans to crypto and the survey shows 24% of the public invested in, traded or used cryptocurrency in the past, up from 16% in March.”

The survey also indicated that a fair amount of crypto investors are turning sour on the asset class too, as 42% of such respondents indicated to have a “somewhat or very negative view” of crypto.

“According to the survey, 42% of crypto investors now have a somewhat or very negative view of the asset, in line with the 43% result for all adults in the survey. The main difference: 17% of crypto investors are ‘very negative’ compared with 47% for non-crypto investors,” CNBC notes.

While the survey did not postulate what caused the negative sentiment between March and November, recent events in the crypto industry are likely to have played a part.

In May, Do Kwon’s brainchild U.S. dollar-pegged stablecoin Terra USD (UST) imploded, wiping $44 billion out of the market. In July crypto lender Celsius — among a handful of others — went bankrupt and locked up an inordinate amount of customer funds.

November saw the biggest shock this year, with FTX, the third-largest crypto exchange by trading volumes filing for bankruptcy on Nov. 11, wiping billions out of the market again and locking up customer funds.

Speaking at the CNBC Financial Advisor Summit this week, Brian Brook, the CEO of crypto exchange Bitfury emphasized that crypto is “90% retail market, which means the sentiment of mom-and-pop investors really matters.”'

"And so when you read FTX stories on the front page of the Wall Street Journal, literally every day for the last 30 days…what it does is for relative new entrants, they get scared. "

"And so as a result, liquidity is thinner than it would have been and people's willingness to invest is lower," he added. 

Related: Vitalik Buterin on the crypto blues: Focus on the tech, not the price

That being said, it’s not all doom and gloom, at least when it comes to institutional investors.

According to a Coinbase-sponsored survey released on Nov. 22 and conducted between Sep. 21 and Oct. 27, it had found that 62% of institutional investors invested in crypto had increased their allocations over the past 12 months.

This week, Crypto exchange Bitstamp also claimed that institutional registrations within its digital asset trading platform were up 57% in November, despite FTX dominating the headlines all month.

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Billionaire Mike Novogratz Says Bitcoin and Ethereum Not Going Away Despite Crisis of Confidence in Crypto

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The post Billionaire Mike Novogratz Says Bitcoin and Ethereum Not Going Away Despite Crisis of Confidence in Crypto appeared first on The Daily Hodl.

Crypto Trader Says One Top-50 Altcoin Could Go Up by Over 100%, Updates Outlook on Bitcoin and Ethereum