After a bout of will-he-won’t-he, Sam Bankman-Fried, the former head of collapsed cryptocurrency exchange FTX, looks set to testify before the US House Committee on Financial Services in a virtual hearing on Tuesday.
SBF had initially snubbed House Representative Maxine Waters’ request to join the hearing, titled ‘Investigating the Collapse of FTX, Part I’, after failing to meet the deadline, but has since changed tack, stating on Twitter that “as the committee still thinks it would be useful, I am willing to testify on the 13th”.
1) I still do not have access to much of my data -- professional or personal. So there is a limit to what I will be able to say, and I won't be as helpful as I'd like.He has now been added to the official witness list, alongside restructuring expect John J. Ray III, who took over as FTX chief following its dramatic collapse.But as the committee still thinks it would be useful, I am willing to testify on the 13th. https://t.co/KR34BsNaG1
— SBF (@SBF_FTX) December 9, 2022
A senate committee hearing titled ‘Crypto Crash: Why the FTX Bubble Burst and the Harm to Consumers’ is scheduled for December 14, with law professor Hilary Allen and Ben McKenzie, former star of The O.C. and Gotham, set to appear.
McKenzie has since transitioned into an outspoken cryptocurrency critic and co-author of Easy Money due for release in July 2023.
Shark Tank star Kevin O'Leary, who was one of the foremost proponents of FTX and SBF has been asked to appear at the senate hearing, following news that he was paid US$15mln to promote the exchange.
Sam Bankman-Fried’s new company?
Sam Bankman-Fried has had an unconventionally busy press tour following the death spiral of his crypto empire.
In a recent interview with the BBC’s cyber reporter Joe Tidy, SBF contended that he doesn’t believe he’ll be arrested for fraud.
But one of the more eyebrow-raising comments, he also raised the possibility of launching a new venture as a means of paying back scorned FTX users.
“If I were to be involved in (a new company) I would want to have a really high standard of transparency. I think at the very least I have a duty to FTX’s users,” said SBF.
He wouldn’t be the first disgraced CEO to make a surprising comeback.
Just this year, WeWork founder and former CEO Adam Neumann, who was forced out of the company after the co-working company’s botched IPO, netted US$350mln from venture fund Andreessen Horowitz for his new real estate company Flow.
Perhaps an SBF/Neumann business partnership is in the works.