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Convicted FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried said in a new 15-page letter that FTX “was never insolvent” and blamed lawyers for destroying what he called a $136 billion enterprise.
SBF Says FTX Could Have Repaid Users
In the document dated Sept. 30, Bankman-Fried claimed FTX and Alameda Research entered the November 2022 liquidity crunch with $25 billion in assets and $16 billion in equity, enough to meet the $8 billion in withdrawal requests that triggered the collapse.
He wrote that the issue was a “liquidity crisis,” not insolvency, and that funds could have been restored within weeks “until external counsel seized control.”
The letter accuses FTX’s bankruptcy team of misrepresenting the company’s finances and filing for Chapter 11 protection despite having sufficient assets to pay creditors.
Bankman-Fried alleged that lawyers “decimated the company” through mismanagement and excessive fees.
Bankruptcy Team Faces Fresh Allegations
The document singles out FTX’s new management and legal advisors, including CEO John J. Ray III, accusing them of liquidating assets below market value and discarding roughly $7 billion in FTT, the exchange’s native token.
“Today, those assets together with the FTX equity held by Alameda would be worth approximately $136 billion — if the Debtors hadn’t decimated the company,” Bankman-Fried wrote.
The letter also claims that nearly $1 billion in fees were paid to consultants and lawyers, further reducing the recovery value available to customers and stakeholders.
Push For Clemency And Political Undertones
Bankman-Fried’s statement forms part of a broader campaign by his family and supporters to seek clemency from President Donald Trump.
The former FTX CEO, who is serving a 25-year prison sentence for fraud and conspiracy, argues that his conviction was politically driven.
Earlier this month, he wrote on GETTR that his prosecution under the Biden administration was “politically motivated” after he shifted campaign donations to Republicans.
His plea follows Trump’s high-profile pardons of Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht and Binance co-founder Changpeng Zhao earlier this year.
Polymarket odds put the probability of a pardon by year-end at 7%.
FTX’s Collapse Still Haunts Crypto Markets
FTX’s 2022 downfall remains one of the largest scandals in cryptocurrency history, erasing about $200 billion in market value.
Court filings revealed Alameda Research used a secret backdoor in FTX’s risk engine to borrow customer funds without collateral, a revelation that triggered mass withdrawals and insolvency.
While Bankman-Fried maintains FTX was solvent, court evidence has shown otherwise. The FTX bankruptcy estate has not yet publicly responded to the latest claims.
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