Sam Bankman-Fried, who founded and headed FTX until a liquidity crunch compelled the cryptocurrency exchange to declare bankruptcy, was arrested on Monday, December 11th, in The Bahamas after being criminally charged by US prosecutors. The office of the attorney general for The Bahamas said it went ahead with the arrest after they received formal confirmation of charges against Bankman-Fried, adding that they expect that he will be extradited to the United States.
The arrest comes on the eve of his scheduled appearance at a US Congress hearing, where he was to testify under oath about the crypto exchange’s overnight collapse. In addition, multiple federal agencies have also begun investigating how the exchange handled customer funds while he was CEO. It is noteworthy to point out that the 30-year-old entrepreneur had amassed billions in personal wealth running the leading crypto exchange, which was once the gold standard in the industry, and his net worth was reported at $26.5 billion, as per Forbes a year ago.
“He was arrested in reference to various Financial Offences against laws of the United States, which are also offenses against laws of the Commonwealth of The Bahamas,” said The Bahamas Police. He was taken into custody without incident and is scheduled to appear in Nassau’s Magistrate Court.
