Leaked SBF's Testimony To Congress Blames Everyone But Himself

The surprising arrest of Sam Bankman-Fried, the once-recognized White Knight of crypto who founded and led the crypto derivatives exchange FTX, prevented him from testifying under oath before the U.S. Congress. While it would be interesting to see the disgraced CEO appear and incriminate himself before lawmakers, his full testimony leaked online. In it, he blamed everyone else except himself for the meltdown of his crypto empire.

Bankman-Fried, in the leaked testimony shared by Forbes, said that Ryne Miller, the general counsel and former Sullivan & Cromwell partner of his U.S. arm FTX.US, pressured him and other executives to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

"I have 19 pages of screenshots of Sullivan & Cromwell, Mr. Miller, and others I believe were influenced by them, all sent over a two-day period, pressuring me to quickly file for Chapter 11. They range from adamant to mentally unbalanced. They also called many of my friends, coworkers, and family members, pressuring them to pressure me to file, some of whom were emotionally damaged by the pressure. Some of them came to me, crying," the testimony read.

Bankman-Fried also claimed John Ray II, the court-appointed CEO of FTX, ghosted him, noting "I have sent five emails to Mr. Ray. Mr. Ray has never responded, nor has he reached out to me to communicate in any other way."

The crypto entrepreneur further claimed that the Chapter 11 team is not working with foreign regulators.

"I have heard complaints that the Chapter 11 team is refusing to respond to regulatory inquiries from foreign regulators, sometimes at the risk of employees going to jail. I have also heard complaints of the Chapter 11 team freezing or otherwise interfering with funds duly belonging to various operating entities of FTX International," Bankman-Fried said in his testimony.

Moreover, Bankman-Fried believed that U.S. regulators may have been fed with misleading information about FTX US, including claims that the business is insolvent.

Despite the spectacular collapse of FTX, Bankman-Fried still believes that prospective investors who have submitted Letters of Intent (LOIs) could recapitalize his crashed empire.

"As of today, I am still aware of billions of dollars of serious offers for financing, including signed LOIs: billions of dollars that could potentially make customers substantially whole. However, I believe that all of those are conditional on FTX being restarted as an exchange. I sincerely hope that all of the global teams working on FTX are seriously considering such a possibility, because I believe it would drive a large amount of value to customers and creditors," the testimony read.

To top it all, Bankman-Fried claimed that the tweet of Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao (CZ), started the chain of events leading to the fall of FTX.

"That tweet followed what I believe to be a month of sustained negative PR on FTX largely being driven by Binance," the crypto entrepreneur said.

"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," Bankman-Fried added.

Bankman-Fried was arrested Monday by the Royal Bahamas Police Force.

His legal team filed for petition to release him on bail but Bahamas Chief Magistrate JoyAnn Ferguson-Pratt denied it citing that the crypto entrepreneur is a "great" risk of flight.

Bankman-Fried is ordered to be kept on remand at a correctional facility in the country until February 8.