FBI agents searched the residence of Ryan Salame, a former executive at the now-defunct FTX exchange, as part of their investigation into its collapse.
In a report on Thursday, Bloomberg noted that the agency is possibly looking into claims of political donations.
How FTX Execs Lead Political Donations?
According to the report, the purpose of the FBI visit to Salame’s Maryland home isn’t clear.
Since the former co-CEO has not faced any charges of criminal activity in the FTX collapse. On the contrary, Sam Bankman-Fried faced 12 charges. It included eight counts of fraud, money laundering, and other charges related to the collapse of FTX.
Bankman-Fried pleaded not guilty to the previous charges of fraud, money laundering, and other charges related to the exchange’s collapse.
Sources to the paper revealed that Salame’s lawyer had provided information related to campaign finance activity to the prosecutors. This was before the search was conducted on Thursday.
Meanwhile, three other high-ranking executives at FTX and its affiliated hedge fund, Alameda Research, pleaded guilty to fraud.
Salame’s contributions of $24 million to support candidates have made him a significant political donor. His donations were primarily made to the Republican party, claims the report. SBF was said to be one of the biggest political donors in the United States. His considerable financial contributions were mostly directed toward Democratic candidates.
FTX engineering chief Nishad Singh was another prominent political donor associated with the exchange. Bloomberg underlined that Singh pleaded guilty to fraud and campaign finance charges in February.
Collapse Impacted Monetary Backing
BeInCrypto previously cited reports by Open Secrets that Sam Bankman-Fried and other FTX executives contributed over $70 million to political campaigns. During the 2021-2022 U.S. elections, SBF accounted for nearly $40 million of that sum.
Before joining Alameda in 2019 and FTX Digital Markets in 2021, Salame was employed at Ernst and Young, the report noted. As FTX began to crumble in November, Salame informed regulators in the Bahamas that funds may have been co-mingled with Alameda Research to hide financial losses, shifting the onus to Bankman-Fried, Singh, and FTX co-founder Gary Wang.
Meanwhile, FTX remains in the headlines months after its demise. According to reports, creditors of Celsius Network LLC are requesting a bankruptcy judge’s assistance in revealing the identities of some FTX users. This week, bankruptcy attorneys also consented to the sale of LedgerX. The derivatives trading platform owned by FTX will be sold to M7 Holdings.
Meanwhile, reports specify that Tribe Capital is considering leading a $250 million funding round to revive the bankrupt exchange. However, SkyBridge Capital’s Anthony Scaramucci, a former FTX supporter, has claimed that it is impossible to reboot the collapsed exchange.
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