Welcome to our live coverage of the trial of FTX founder Sam-Bankman-Fried. Check out our explainer for everything you need to know about the trial. And follow along here each day as we report on the drama inside and outside the courtroom.
Happy “New Michael Lewis Book Day” to all who celebrate. Lewis, the author of Big Short and Flash Boys, embedded with Sam Bankman-Fried, or SBF for short, in the Bahamas for months before FTX’s spectacular collapse last fall.
While the trial gets started, we’ll be sharing some of the revelations from Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon, which is out today.
- Donald Trump’s team told SBF that for $5 billion the former US president might be convinced not to run again.
- FTX lawyers, worried that SBF and fellow executive Gary Wang would be arrested by the Chinese government, created a secret escape plan called the “007 plan” involving “two large men guarding the front door of the office, a way out the back, and a fueled-up jet ready to take the two to safety at any moment.”
- SBF had considered whether to “simply pay off the $9 billion Bahamas national debt himself” to make the country a more appealing place for his then-Hong Kong-based employees to move to.
The Scene Outside the Courthouse
It’s a beautiful, clear morning in Foley Square outside the county and federal courthouses. NYPD has set up a broad array of steel barricades to manage traffic, keep pedestrians from walking near the courthouses, and create zones for the media.
There’s a special pen directly in front of the courthouses that employees can walk through to enter and where the day’s potential jurors are lined up. Police are walking the line reminding them that they need to have their summons out and available for inspection. Media are densely packed in an adjacent area and broadcast news have trucks parked around Foley Square.
Lily Hay Newman
A court filing from September 30 offers an indication of the types of witnesses the government has prepared.
The prosecution will call on a selection of FTX customers to testify, the court filing suggests, from regular people to professional investors. The objective, legal experts say, will be to appeal to the sympathies of the jury, by demonstrating the toll the alleged fraud has taken on those whose money was lost.
To speak to the mechanics of the alleged fraud and climate inside FTX, meanwhile, a series of “coconspirator witnesses” will be questioned. To date, at least three members of Bankman-Fried’s inner circle have pleaded guilty to related crimes and are expected to testify as part of their cooperation agreements.
Want to know more about the trial, the key players, and what to expect over the coming weeks? Check out our detailed explainer.
Welcome to WIRED’s Live Coverage of the FTX Trial
Good morning, everyone. Welcome to our live coverage of the trial of FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried. We’ll be covering the trial throughout—both inside and outside the courtroom. WIRED’s Angela Chen and Andy Greenberg will be reporting from New York, with Joel Khalili reporting on the trial’s fallout and wider implications from London.