Amidst the liquidity crisis at FTX, the firm’s CEO, Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF), has assured the community in a lengthy apology thread that FTX US is a separate entity and its operations are not impacted.
“Because at the end of the day, I was CEO, which means that *I* was responsible for making sure that things went well. *I*, ultimately, should have been on top of everything. I clearly failed in that. I’m sorry,” he added.
However, not everyone is convinced with SBF’s statements as a pinned statement on the FTX US trading portal said, “Trading may be halted on FTX US in a few days. Please close down any positions you want to close down. Withdrawals are and will remain open.”
In another tweet, the official handle of FTX said that US withdrawals are operational as usual, although no confirmation was provided on any impending halt.
SBF’s earlier rescue plan for FTX with the Binance deal that couldn’t materialize was also for the non-US operations, but there seems to be a thin line separating the two entities.
Industry observers noted that some of the recent sponsorship deals signed in the United States for the core FTX branding involved both FTX International and FTX US.
SEC lockdown
Earlier today, Bloomberg reported that the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) had initiated investigations for potential violations against FTX and how it managed customer funds across the US and non-US units.
According to some reports, on a Nov. 9 call, SBF was seeking to raise $8 billion in emergency funding to cover withdrawal requests that have flooded the platform in the past few days.
