Sam Bankman-Fried Trial: Alameda Bribed Chinese Official, SBF Told Objector to ‘Shut the F*** Up’ – Recordings of Meeting of CEO Ellison With Team Is Played for the First Time
The testimony from Alameda Research former CEO Caroline Ellison in Sam Bankman-Fried’s trial was apparently just as consequential as it was expected.
In her three days of testimony, Ellison made several disclosures. One of the most explosive was that Alameda Research bribed a Chinese government official to unlock $1 billion of its frozen funds.
The money was on other crypto exchanges that were connected to money laundering. To try to regain access to funds, Alameda sent a $150 million payment to the unidentified official.
At first, they tried to solve things via a lawyer, but that was ‘unsuccessful’. They also tried to use the IDs of Thai prostitutes – yes, really – to create accounts on those exchanges in a bid to get those funds back.
