January 12, 2023
According to the lawyer for bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange FTX, the company has recovered more than $5 billion in cash and other liquid assets, significantly increasing the amount recognized by new executives as it works to repay creditors. It also hopes to sell hundreds of additional investment holdings worth more than $4.6 billion.
As lawyers and regulators try to pick up the pieces of Sam Bankman-once-vast Fried’s crypto empire, FTX’s lawyer said in a Delaware bankruptcy court that it is a far smaller sum than what it owes to its creditors.
“We have located over $5 billion of cash, liquid cryptocurrency and liquid investment securities,” Andy Dietderich, an attorney for FTX, told U.S. Bankruptcy Judge John Dorsey in Delaware at the start of Wednesday’s hearing. Dietderich also said the company plans to sell nonstrategic investments that had a book value of $4.6 billion.
Dietderich also stated that the legal team is still working to create accurate internal records, and the actual customer shortfall is unknown. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission estimates that missing customer funds total more than $8 billion.
According to the lawyer, the new amount assigns no value to holdings of dozens of illiquid cryptocurrency tokens. Such holdings “are so large relative to total supply that our positions cannot be sold without significantly affecting the token market,” he explained.
The sources for this piece include an article in Reuters.
