Crypto wunderkind Sam Bankman-Fried made groveling $4BN plea to investors as FTX faces bankruptcy

One-time crypto golden boy Sam Bankman-Fried begged investors for $4 billion to rescue FTX as he admitted: ‘I f***** up.’

The embattled tech mogul, whose $16 billion fortune has been eviscerated by the crisis at FTX.com crypto exchange, made the plea on Wednesday – hours before rival Binance pulled out of a takeover deal.

Bankman-Fried, 30, said on the call with investors that FTX.com needed $4billion to stay solvent, a source told Bloomberg.

He told them that he ‘f***** up’ and would be ‘incredibly, unbelievably grateful’ for a bailout.

The crisis at FTX is linked to a ‘liquidity crunch’ after users withdrew $6 billion in 72 hours up to Tuesday morning.

Bankman Fried, 30, was worth an estimate $16bn before the crisis but his fortune is down 94%

He also tweeted ‘I f***** up’ and ‘should have done better’ amid the ongoing crisis at FTX.com

The crisis has sent crypto markets in freefall, with Bitcoin tumbling 17 percent over the turmoil

The firm hoped to avoid collapse after a shock proposal by Binance to takeover the company – but Binance pulled out after reportedly finding a ‘black hole’ in FTX’s books.

Big names including Tom Brady and his ex-wife, Gisele Bundchen, reportedly face losses after they took an equity stake in the company last year.

Sports stars Steph Curry and Naomi Osaka are also among those who had investments with the company.

FTX now faces bankruptcy and one of its early backers, Sequoia, has essentially declared the firm worthless after it marked its own investment down to $0.

In the call on Wednesday, Bankman-Fried reportedly insisted Binance was not going to pull out of the takeover – but the deal collapsed just an hour later.

Binance’s billionaire boss Changpeng ‘CZ’ Zhao said in a statement: ‘Our hope was to be able to support FTX’s customers to provide liquidity, but the issues are beyond our control or ability to help.’

Bankman-Fried issued another groveling apology on Thursday, this time to customers.

In a lengthy Twitter thread, he said: ‘I’m sorry. That’s the biggest thing. I f***** up, and should have done better.

‘I also should have been communicating more very recently.

‘Transparently–my hands were tied during the duration of the possible Binance deal; I wasn’t particularly allowed to say much publicly. But of course it’s on me that we ended up there in the first place.’   

He goes on to say he ‘f***** up twice’ and that his mistakes ‘tells me a lot of things, both specifically and generally, that I was s*** at’.

Bankman-Fried said ‘this is all about FTX international’ and ‘FTX US users are fine’ – but the claim drew skepticism from some customers who claim they’ve been unable to make withdrawals.

He revealed that around $5 billion in withdrawals were requested on Sunday alone, but the company only had around 80% of that in liquidity.

He also said the priority is now ‘doing right by users’ and the company is trying to raise liquidity.

Financial regulators in the US have launched an investigation into FTX over concerns about handling of customer funds.

Binance’s billionaire boss Changpeng ‘CZ’ Zhao (left) shocked the $1trillion crypto industry with a now-abandoned proposal to take over troubled exchange FTX, which is led by his chief rival and onetime disciple Sam Bankman-Fried (right)

Tom Brady and now ex-wife Gisele Bundchen struck an equity deal with FTX last year but could lose their investment. The market value of the exchange crashed by 70 percent this week

Steph Curry inked a partnership with FTX in September 2021, though details were undisclosed

Naomi Osaka took an equity stake with the popular crypto exchange in March of this year

The crisis has caused cryptocurrency values to plunge.  

Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency, fell 17 percent on Wednesday to a two-year low of $15,969.04 and was at around $17,700 at midday ET on Thursday – 16.5 percent lower than five days ago.

The disaster at FTX marks a momentous downfall for Bankman-Fried, who said last year that his crypto company would grow large enough to buy Goldman Sachs, which is currently valued at nearly $130 billion.

The CEO lost 94 percent of his fortune on Tuesday – the biggest one-day collapse ever among billionaires.

His 53% stake in FTX was previously worth $6.2 billion and another $7.4 billion of his fortune came from, Alameda Research, his crypto trading firm.

The crisis at FTX has shaken the crypto markets and caused coins like Ethereum and Bitcoin to plunge in value. Charts show they suffered rapid dips as details of FTX’s problems emerged

The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday that FTX lended billions of dollars of client assets to Alameda to fund risky trades.

A source told the WSJ that Bankman-Friend informed investors that Alameda owes FTX about $10 billion.

Experts called the shock collapse of FTX another ‘alarm warning’ for the battered cryptocurrency market and said investors should be cautious for a while.

‘This is another black eye for the industry,’ said David Holt, a cryptocurrency industry expert at CFRA.

Adding to its regulatory concerns, most of FTX’s legal and compliance staff quit Tuesday evening, according to a report from news outlet Semafor citing people familiar with the matter.