Sam Bankman-Fried, FTX’s Founder and former chief executive, has been hit with additional criminal charges such.
United States authorities have filed further charges in addition to the eight looming ones the disgraced exec is set to face in October. Along with bank fraud, he will face charges for conspiracy to make unlawful political contributions.
According to the filing, Bankman-Fried and several other executives “falsely represented to a financial institution that the account would be used for trading and market making” to open a bank account. They would later use the account to receive and transfer customer funds for its business operations.
Bankman-Fried also opened North Dimension to defraud banks that had previously failed to authorise an account.
The filing added the charged also “agreed to and did make corporate contributions to candidates and committees in the Southern District of New York that were reported in the name of another person.”
According to the document, the former chief executive aimed to contribute roughly $1 million USD to a political action committee for the LGBTQ community but could not find a person “trusted at FTX [who was] bi/gay” at his firm.
The named executive urged Nishad Singh to donate funds and a further exec donated to causes linked to the Republican Party, the document added.
Singh contributed $1.1 million USD to the LGBTQ Victory Fund Federal Political Action Committee (PAC), records from the Federal Election Commission show.
The massive donation funded unofficial campaign contributions, namely advertising for Rep Becca Balint (D-VT).
It added: “an internal Alameda spreadsheet noted over $100 million in political contributions, even though FEC records reflect no political contributions by Alameda for the 2022 midterm elections to candidates or PACs.”
Concluding, it stated: “Bankman-Fried’s use of straw donors allowed him to evade contribution limits on individual donations to candidates to whom he had already donated.”
