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The prosecution\u2019s case is starting to draw to a close in the criminal trial of Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder and former CEO of collapsed crypto exchange FTX. The government\u2019s remaining witnesses will take to the stand in six days time after a brief adjournment to the trial.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The defense, if they choose to do so, are expected to start presenting their case on the afternoon of Oct. 26, according to a live blog<\/a> of the trial from court reporting organization Inner City Press. The defense has been weighing up<\/a> whether to have Bankman-Fried testify based on, what they claim, is insufficient access to medication.<\/p>\n \u201cIf we put on a case, a week and a half max,\u201d said Mark Cohen, Bankman-Fried\u2019s defense lawyer, regarding scheduling<\/a> earlier this week.<\/p>\n A flurry of expert witnesses have taken to the stand since the testimony<\/a> of Nishad Singh, FTX\u2019s former director of engineering and a member of Bankman-Fried\u2019s inner circle, earlier this week. These witnesses include FBI agent Richard Busick, who gave expert testimony<\/a> on Bankman-Fried\u2019s cell phone records, and accounting professor Peter Easton, who examined<\/a> the money flows between various FTX entities. Easton confirmed that customer funds were used for political donations, real estate and venture capital investments.<\/p>\n FTX\u2019s former general counsel Can Sun took to the stand today testifying that he was \u201cshocked\u201d to learn there was a missing $7 billion in funds from the exchange, which he discovered as part of a call with investment firm Apollo<\/a> in November last year. During that call, FTX\u2019s former head of product Ramnik Arora tried to shore up an investment from Apollo prior to the exchange\u2019s collapse. During the process, Sun was sent a spreadsheet revealing the missing funds.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat did you conclude from the spreadsheet?\u201d asked the prosecution. \u201cThe funds had been misappropriated,\u201d Sun said.<\/p>\n Sun told the jury that FTX still provided Apollo with the spreadsheet and in turn they requested a legal justification for the missing funds. Bankman-Fried asked Sun to come up with a justification for why they were missing without providing one himself, Sun said.<\/p>\n One of the potential justifications was FTX\u2019s terms of services<\/a> containing an escheatment clause, which meant abandoned customer funds could be used, as well as a margin trading clause that stated investors could lose their collateral if the account is liquidated. However, traders had to opt-in to margin trading. There was also another area within the terms of service that said customer assets belonging to them were not to be loaned out.<\/p>\n Sun told Bankman-Fried that these clauses would not be enough to explain the missing billions in customer funds. Bankman-Fried acknowledged<\/a> this at the time, but later used the margin reasoning in a media interview with Good Morning America, which was played<\/a> to the jury in court.<\/p>\n Later that day, Singh revealed to Sun that he had known about the missing funds since late summer and that Bankman-Fried told<\/a> him \u201cIt is what it is.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhen did you leave FTX?\u201d the prosecution asked. \u201cThe next day. I resigned,\u201d Sun said.<\/p>\n