WSJ: Sam Bankman-Fried sells $300m worth of FTX shares during 2021 fundraising
FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried has sold a $300m stake in the company to buy back shares held by Binance. The Wall Street Journal reported this, citing the exchange's financial documents. FTX raised $420m in a funding round in October 2021. The capital will reportedly be used for business development, strategic investment and licence list expansion. According to the WSJ, three-quarters of the funds raised were received personally by Bankman-Fried, who sold part of his stake in the company. The publication's interlocutors noted that the FTX founder then described the transaction as a partial reimbursement of his costs for the buyback of Binance's shares.
The relaunch deal took place in July 2021. In November 2022, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao reported that the agreement resulted in his company receiving ~$2.1bn in utility tokens FTX (FTT) and Binance USD Stablecoins (BUSD). According to documents filed with the court by FTX's new CEO John Ray, Binance's previously owned stake in the company was transferred to Paper Bird Inc, which is 100% owned by Bankman-Fried. Ray's statement also indicated that Paper Bird received a $2.3bn loan from Alameda Research-controlled firm Euclid Way Ltd.
As a reminder, one of Canada's largest pension funds will "write off" its investment in the cryptocurrency exchange FTX and the US arm of the FTX US platform.
