Sounds fishy, but SBF is trading mackerel in prison: Report

November 24, 2023 Coin Telegraph

The former billionaire paid four “macks” for a haircut before his trial while staying at the Brooklyn Metropolitan Detention Center.

The crypto trading days of former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried are over, and the recently convicted founder has found a new thing to trade while in jail — fish.

The Wall Street Journal reported on Nov. 23 that Bankman-Fried recently traded four packets of Mackerel — known in prison as “macks” — for a haircut before his criminal trial last month.

Mackerel packets have risen to be the hottest trading commodity in United States prisons since tobacco products were banned. Postage stamps and soup packets — “soups” — respectively come second and third on the value hierarchy. The commissary of the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) where Bankman-Fried is housed sells mackerel packets for $1.30.

Bankman-Fried is sharing a cell at the Brooklyn prison with former Honduran president Juan Hernández and a former senior Mexican police officer, sources familiar with the matter told The Journal.

Social media pundits questioned the legitimacy of the reports and controversial tech figure Martin Shkreli known as “pharma bro” — who spent more than four years in federal prison — confirmed macks were a staple currency in U.S. jails.

In a Nov. 24 post on X (formerly Twitter), Shkreli claimed paying four macks for a haircut was a “rip off” but noted it was still less than paying someone a book of stamps.

Shkreli explained in the MDC that the market for macks was larger than stamps compared to a regular state federal prison but warned against holding too many mack packs, saying any more than 500 becomes suspicious.

four mack is a ripoff. but if you're stunting you would toss homie a book (a book of stamps).

in MDC mac spot market is bigger than stamp spot market. in prison prison, stamp spot market is more liquid. mac is very dense and its suspicious to be holding 500 macs. however, it's…
— Martin Shkreli (e/acc) (@wagieeacc) November 23, 2023

As a vegan, Bankman-Fried wouldn’t eat mackerel, making them a more easily traded commodity for the recently convicted former billionaire.

On Nov. 21, the court of appeals denied Bankman-Fried’s request to be released from prison while he awaits his sentencing hearing, currently scheduled for March 28 next year.

Bankman-Fried was found guilty of seven fraud- and money laundering-related charges on Nov. 2.

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FTX’s Bankman-Fried Is Allegedly Using Alameda Funds to Pay for Legal Defense

March 29, 2023 Bitcoin.com

New FTX CEO Told Members of Congress SBF’s Family ‘Certainly Received Payments’ From the Business

December 18, 2022 Bitcoin.com

FTX hires forensics team to find lost customers’ billions: Report

December 8, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Alameda Research

Lawyers have claimed FTX assets are either stolen or missing and now a team of financial forensic experts is attempting to trace the money trail.

The new management for bankrupt crypto exchange FTX has reportedly hired a team of financial forensic investigators to track down the billions of dollars worth of missing customer crypto.

Financial advisory company AlixPartners was chosen for the task and is led by former Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) chief accountant, Matt Jacques, according to a Dec. 7 report from the Wall Street Journal.

It is understood that the forensics firm will be tasked with conducting “asset-tracing” to identify and recover the missing digital assets and will complement the restructing work being undertaken by FTX.

On Nov. 11 hackers drained wallets owned by FTX and FTX.US of over $450 million worth of assets.

Former CEO Sam Bankman-Fried claimed in an interview recorded on Nov. 16 with crypto blogger Tiffany Fong that he was close to finding who the hacker was and that he had “narrowed it down to eight people” believing it was “either an ex-employee or somewhere someone installed malware on an ex-employee’s computer.”

On Nov. 22, a lawyer representing FTX debtors stated that “a substantial amount of assets have either been stolen or are missing” from FTX, and revealed at the time that blockchain analytics firms such as Chainalysis had been enlisted to help as part of the proceedings.

The stolen funds from FTX have since been on the move through various crypto mixers and exchanges to launder the funds.

The hacker transferred their Ether (ETH) holdings on Nov. 20 to a new wallet address and swapped some of the ETH for an ERC-20 version of Bitcoin (BTC) afterward bridging the funds to the BTC Network.

They then used a laundering technique called peel chaining that subdivides the holdings into increasingly smaller amounts across multiple wallets and sent the BTC through a crypto mixer then to the OKX exchange on Nov. 29.

The hacker also attempted more peel chaining by splitting 180,000 ETH across 12 newly created wallets on Nov. 21.

Former CEO Sam Bankman-Fried has also previously claimed to have “unknowingly commingled” customer funds at FTX and its sister trading firm Alameda Research with customer funds at FTX loaned to Alameda.

FTX’s new CEO and chief restructuring officer, John Ray III, was scalding in his initial bankruptcy filing saying that “never” in his 40-year career had he “seen such a complete failure of corporate controls.”

He claimed Bankman-Fried and his closest colleagues are “potentially compromised” and used “software to conceal the misuse of customer funds.”

Legal professionals astonished as SBF admits failures, apologizes 12 times in interview

December 1, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Andrew Sorkin

The former FTX CEO has offered multiple apologies and admitted failings at least a dozen times during the one-hour interview.

Former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried apologized or admitted failure at least 12 times during his appearance at the New York Times' DealBook Summit on Nov. 30.

In a wide-ranging video interview, Bankman-Fried was asked to answer a number of questions surrounding the downfall of the now-defunct exchange, with some even suggesting that some of his statements could be used to incriminate him in legal proceedings.

In a Nov. 30 Twitter post, crypto attorney Jeremy Hogan, Partner at Hogan & Hogan said that the “light cross-examination” of Bankman-Fried at the DealBook Summit has already returned “at least 3 incriminating statements so far.”

SBF is getting a light cross-examination at the NYT/Dealbook Summit and has made at least 3 incriminating statements so far.

Why are his lawyers (or parents) letting him do this?? pic.twitter.com/Nd0poutAA0
— Jeremy Hogan (@attorneyjeremy1) November 30, 2022

Alan Rosca from the law firm Rosca Scarlato said it was “pretty astonishing that he’s in effect testifying at the DealBook summit. Hard to think of a precedent for this.”

Bankman-Fried’s first concession came while greeting interviewer Andrew Sorkin, when he said in reference to the collapse of FTX:

“Clearly, I made a lot of mistakes or things I would give anything to be able to do over again.”

An apology came moments later when Sorkin confronted him with a letter written by an FTX customer who lost $2 million in life savings after the exchange collapsed.

“I'm deeply sorry about what happened,” said Bankman-Fried in response to the customer's story.

Former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried during the hour-long live-video appearance. Source: New York Times' DealBook Summit.

Later, when discussing the allegations that Alameda used FTX client funds to cover loans, Bankman-Fried said that while he “didn't know exactly what was going on” at Alameda,” he concedes it was still his duty as FTX CEO to “make sure I was doing diligence.”

“A lot of these are things that I've learned over the last month that I learned [...] I mark that as a pretty big oversight that I wasn't more aware of,” he said.

Bankman-Fried admitted failure again when quizzed about FTXs former standing in the industry and the loss of trust in crypto now that the exchange has collapsed, stating: “I mean, like, look, I screwed up.”

“I was CEO, I was the CEO of FTX. And I mean I say this again and again, that that means I had a responsibility that means that I was responsible ultimately for doing the right things and I mean, we didn't. Like, we messed up big.”

He continued to concede FTX’s failings, stating “there absolutely were management failures” oversight failures, and transparency failures.

Toward the end of the interview, Sorkin directly asked Bankman-Fried whether he had been truthful with the audience and whether he agreed that there had been times that he had lied.

Bankman-Fried said he wasn’t aware of any times that he lied, but explained that there were times when asking as a representative or “marketer” for FTX, that he would paint FTX “as compelling [...] as possible.”

“I wasn’t talking about what are the risks involved with FTX […] I obviously wish that I spent more time dwelling on the downsides and less time thinking about the upsides.

Bankman Fried was asked what his lawyers are telling him at the moment, and whether it was a good idea for him to be speaking publicly. He answered “very much not.”

“I mean, you know, the classic advice, don’t say anything [...] recede into a hole.”

Bankman-Fried said he believes he has a duty to talk to people and explain what happened and to “try and do what’s right.”

"I don't see what good is accomplished by me just sitting locked in a room pretending the outside world doesn't exist," he explained.

'Soft-balled it,' says community

While the interview appeared to cover a number of confronting issues for Bankman-Fried, some in the community still believe that the questions were not challenging enough, nor was there an adequate follow-up to some of the hard-hitting questions.

A Twitter poll launched by a self-proclaimed crypto trader “Cantering Clark” found that more than half of the 1,119 respondents believed Sorkin “Soft-balled” the interview with Bankman-Fried.

FTX CEO