Sam Bankman-Fried watches as Assistant U.S. Attorney Thane Rehn makes his opening remark in Bankman-Fried's fraud trial of FTX, the bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange, at Federal Court in New York City, U.S., October 4, 2023 in this courtroom sketch. Sam Bankman-Fried's fraud trial began this week, nearly a year after the FTX cryptocurrency exchange he founded declared bankruptcy in a collapse that stunned markets and left the 31-year-old wunderkind's reputation in tatters.
In his opening statement, Thane Rehn, Prosecutor of Manhattan U.S. Attorney's office, said Bankman-Fried had been stealing FTX customer funds ever since the exchange was founded in 2019.
Bankman-Fried's lawyer, Mark Cohen, described the FTX founder as an ambitious and sometimes Careless entrepreneur who overlooked risk management but never intended to defraud anyone.
Cohen said in his opening statement that he made the decision not to pursue any legal action against the U.S. government.
Adam Yedidia, a college friend of Bankman-Fried's who later worked for him at FTX, said Bankman-Fried told him in the summer of 2022 that he was worried Alameda's debts to FTX were too big.
Matt Huang, head of Paradigm's venture capital firm, testified Thursday that Bankman-Fried did not tell him that FTX commingled its funds with Alameda before Paradigm decided to invest $278 million in the exchange.
The firm has now written down the value of this investment to zero, Huang said.
Gary Huang, a former member of Bankman-Fried's inner circle who has pleaded guilty and agreed to testify against him, took the stand on Thursday and claimed he committed financial crimes with Bankman-Fried, who he said told him to tweak FTX's software code to allow Alameda to withdraw unlimited funds.
In his speech, Wang said that: ''I'm not afraid of losing money,'' he said.