Sam Bankman-Fried, the previous CEO of FTX, has expressed profound remorse for filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last week, referring to it as his “greatest blunder.”
In a comprehensive interview with Vox, published on November 16, Bankman-Fried reportedly addressed various topics including the bankruptcy filing on November 11, his views on regulators, ethics, FTX and Alameda’s use of customer funds, and the FTX hack.
Screenshots of the Twitter conversation between Vox reporter Kelsey Piper and Sam Bankman-Fried reveal that the former FTX CEO admitted to making multiple mistakes but considered filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy as the biggest one. Bankman-Fried expressed, “I made significant mistakes multiple times. Do you know what was perhaps my biggest blunder?”
Bankman-Fried claimed that if he had not filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, “approximately 70% of the issues would have been resolved by now,” and “withdrawals would have resumed in a month with customers receiving their full funds.”
After acknowledging a “liquidity crunch” on November 8, Bankman-Fried reportedly sought emergency funding of $8 billion from investors to cover the shortfall and even offered his personal wealth to “compensate customers and investors in full.”
When asked about his future plans, Bankman-Fried mentioned that he still had two weeks to secure the $8 billion, which he deemed as “the most crucial aspect for the rest of my life.”
However, in a statement on November 16, FTX CEO and chief restructuring officer John Ray clarified that Bankman-Fried “has no ongoing role at FTX, FTX US, or Alameda Research Ltd., and does not speak on their behalf.”
Regarding other topics discussed in the interview, Bankman-Fried admitted that his advocacy for regulations was merely for public relations purposes before adding:
Hours later, Bankman-Fried seemed to retract those statements, stating in a tweet on November 16 that:
Bankman-Fried also confirmed that the funds withdrawn from FTX were indeed a result of a hack, suggesting it could have been an “ex-employee or malware on an ex-employee’s computer.”
The former CEO once again asserted his previous claim, which he later deleted, that FTX had never invested clients’ assets and stated that it was “factually accurate” as Alameda was the company responsible for investing the funds.
Cointelegraph has reached out to Sam Bankman-Fried for further comments but has not received a response at the time of publication.