FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried’s former girlfriend Caroline Ellison is taking the stand this week in a trial against the cryptocurrency fraudster.
Ellison is the CEO of FTX’s sister firm Alameda, who allegedly had access to billions in stolen customer dollars.
Ellison is also expected to provide additional information as to whether FTX’s collapse came because of fraudulent activity, or if it was simply poor business leadership.
Sam Bankman Fried’s dad allegedly had advisory role at top Democratic ‘dark money network’ https://t.co/ibypTvghPj pic.twitter.com/oTmisPpqLk
— New York Post (@nypost) September 21, 2023
When Bankman-Fried left Jane Street in 2017 to found his own hedge fund known as Alameda Research, Ellison joined him shortly thereafter in what she called “a blind leap into the unknown.” She became one of the lead traders at the new firm, and said on an FTX-related podcast that joining Alameda was “too cool of an opportunity to pass up” but dealing with capital was “kind of daunting” when she first started at the firm in 2018.
“Mostly, sort of, it was something I wasn’t used to thinking about,” Ellison said of her position as a lead trader at Alameda.
“So it was sort of — I don’t know, I guess I was like a trader for, I mean, not that long at Jane Street but a year and a half, which was kind of more trading experience than a lot of Alameda traders had at the time. I kind of wanted to come in and be like an expert on everything, but there was still lots of stuff in the crypto world that I knew nothing about.”
This Sunday, author Michael Lewis shares his first-hand account of crypto wunderkind Sam Bankman-Fried with @jon_wertheim. 60 Minutes goes inside the FTX founder's childhood home and learns about his state of mind before and after the collapse of his crypto empire. pic.twitter.com/x2wKlNZIGz
— 60 Minutes (@60Minutes) September 28, 2023
“Nothing like regular amphetamine use to make you appreciate how dumb a lot of normal, non-medicated human experience is,” Ellison said last year in a post online referencing FTX executives’ use of stimulants at the height of the company.
Ellison became CEO of Alameda in the summer of last year.
“I am truly sorry for what I did. I knew that it was wrong,” stated Ellison regarding the financial connection between Alameda and FTX.
