Sam Bankman-Fried’s sentence of 25 years in prison remains in place for the time being. (archive image)Image: keystone
June 14, 2026, 9:25 a.mJune 14, 2026, 9:25 a.m
Former digital money entrepreneur Sam Bankman-Fried has failed in his first attempt to appeal against his conviction as a fraudster. Three appeals court judges refused to overturn the verdict, which resulted in a 25-year prison sentence. Bankman-Fried, 34, can still seek review by the full court or go to the U.S. Supreme Court.
FTX, one of the largest trading venues for cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, collapsed spectacularly at the end of 2022. Bankman-Fried was arrested in the Bahamas and extradited to the United States. He was sentenced in 2024. An appeal process is currently underway.
Billion dollar hole or liquidity crisis?
While the cryptocurrency business can be complicated, Bankman-Fried ended up being accused of classic fraud: Misappropriation of customer assets. Bankman-Fried was also behind a hedge fund called Alameda Research that made risky trades and borrowed funds from FTX.
Actually, collateral should have been deposited. There were also computer systems that were supposed to take care of this. But this software made a secret exception for Alameda. This allowed the hedge fund to go as deep as it wanted on FTX. According to the indictment, when Alameda transactions went wrong, there was a billion-dollar hole in FTX’s coffers. Bankman-Fried, on the other hand, claims that FTX was in a liquidity crisis, but was fundamentally solvent.
This position was also the basis for Bankman-Fried’s appointment. The judge in the district court case had banned lawyers from telling the jury that FTX was able to repay investors despite bankruptcy. That was a mistake, the appeal said. But the appeals court judges found this was irrelevant because the fraud had already occurred during the transfer to Alameda.
Pardon only after prison sentence?
Bankman-Fried has already requested one pardon. However, the information in the US Department of Justice system shows that the 34-year-old, at least currently only after his 25-year prison sentence had expired wants to be pardoned. According to US law, this allows you to regain the right to vote. US President Donald Trump said in an interview with the New York Times at the beginning of the year that he had no plans to pardon Bankman-Fried. (sda/apa/dpa)