Andrew Kelly/Reuters
Sam Bankman-Fried repeated his assertion that he didn't "steal funds" in what appeared to be an outline of his legal defense as he resurfaced on Substack on Thursday.
The co-founder of collapsed cryptocurrency exchange FTX wrote in Substack post that "I didn't steal funds, and I certainly didn't stash billions away."
Bankman-Fried pleaded not guilty on January 3 to eight charges, including fraud for allegedly using FTX funds to support his hedge fund Alameda Research, buy property, and make political donations worth millions of dollars.
In his Substack post, Bankman-Fried said that the collapse of Alameda was due to "large crypto market crashes," and said he hadn't run the hedge fund for the past few years.
He also said FTX could have reimbursed customers and raised fresh investor cash if it hadn't been forced into bankruptcy: "It's ridiculous that FTX US users haven't been made whole and gotten their funds back yet."
"Alameda's contagion spread to FTX," Bankman-Fried continued. "FTX US remains fully solvent and should be able to return all customers' funds. FTX International has many billions of dollars of assets, and I am dedicating nearly all of my personal assets to customers."
Near the end of his post, Bankman-Fried added: "All of which is to say: no funds were stolen. Alameda lost money due to a market crash it was not adequately hedged for – as Three Arrows and others have this year. And FTX was impacted, as Voyager and others were earlier."
The former FTX CEO was released on a $250 million bond and remains under house arrest at his parents' home in Palo Alto, California.
FTX filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on November 11 after it imploded, wiping out customer deposits worth billions. Bankman-Fried resigned as CEO the same day.
Bankman-Fried didn't immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider.
