Former FTX leadership accused of $40m spending on luxury hotels and meals

In the nine months before collapse of the FTX cryptocurrency exchange, its top management spent $40 million on hotels, air travel and meals. This is reported citing court documents by Business Insider.

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$15 million of this amount went to accommodations, including $5.8 million for lodging in the Albany area (New Providence, Bahamas). At this resort, the founder of the exchange, Sam Bankman-Fried lived in a $30 million penthouse until his arrest.

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$3.6 million FTX allocated for accommodation at the four-star Grand Hyatt, $800,000 at the five-star Rosewood.

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$7 million went to meals and entertainment, $4 million to air travel and $500,000 to courier services. The latter amount was due to an arrangement with a private aviation operator to organise flights from Miami to the Bahamas, according to Financial Times.

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According to the publication, the platform also provided employees with “a full fleet of cars and fuel for all staff [and] unlimited trips with full expense coverage to any office worldwide.”

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FTX also made numerous charitable donations to Bahamian charities.

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Parents of Bankman-Fried, he himself, and top executives of the organisations became owners of at least 19 premium properties worth $121 million, according to the media.

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In November, sources from the New York Times reported that the former CEO of FTX and his inner circle, consisting of former Jane Street colleagues and MIT, ten in total, lived in a luxurious penthouse in the Bahamas. One insider described the exchange’s teams and Alameda Research ‘band of kids’. The organisation itself — a place full of conflicts of interest, cronyism and lack of oversight.

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In November, the new CEO John Ray said that the company absolutely lacked control over cash flow and reliable financial information.

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During congressional hearings, the executive accused Bankman-Fried and his team of storing private keys unencrypted. In their actions he saw ‘an old-fashioned wasteful spending’, rather than sophisticated, meticulously planned crimes.

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The U.S. Department of Justice has charged Bankman-Fried with eight criminal counts, including conspiracy and wire fraud. He has not pleaded guilty.

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