US Lawmakers Take a Swipe at FTX’s Practices

The FTX drama is nowhere close to an end, with the US lawmakers holding a second hearing, during which they lambasted the former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried and the business practices of the firm.

The current FTX CEO John Ray, who took over the company on Nov. 11th, had to answer many questions regarding the crypto exchange’s activities when Sam Bankman-Fried, now arrested in the Bahamas, was still in charge of the company. 

According to the new CEO, Alameda Research,  the international arm of the FTX group, had “no internal controls and no separateness whatsoever” meaning that it was fully financially dependent on FTX and that owners of both Alameda and FTX “could run free reign” across most of the FTX group’s firm.

He also revealed that FTX's financial difficulties were unusual as the company had no record-keeping whatsoever, with invoices and expenses receipts being sent through Slack and using QuickBooks, which is geared mainly toward small and medium-sized businesses.

FTX used Quickbooks. A multi-billion-dollar company using Quickbooks,

said Ray.

Nothing against Quickbooks, a very nice tool, just not for a multi-billion-dollar company.

Ray also commented on whether he believes in Bankman-Fried recent “apology tour”, during which he said that he made a lot of mistakes in passing FTX users to Alameda, saying that he doesn't find such statements to be credible.

It also became known that Bankman-Fried had a written testimony leaked following his arrest, with Missouri representative Emanuel Cleaver calling Bankman-Fried’s use of profanity in his opening statement as “disrespectful” and “absolutely insulting” to Congress. 

He did not however specify which profanity it was. 

Another lawmaker floated the idea of introducing the resolution to change the name of cryptocurrency to “creepy dough currency”.

Ranking member Patrick McHenry said the Committee planned to hold a second hearing on the collapse of FTX in 2023. The date is yet to be specified.

The Coinomist delved into detail as to what happened following the FTX's meltdown, and also drew up several fun facts about some Bankman-Fried that you should check out.