FTX co-founder Gary Wang was sentenced to no jail time by a decide Wednesday, following his cooperation with prosecutors. Wang helped the prosecution’s case in opposition to Sam Bankman-Fried, testifying in one of many greatest instances of fraud in US historical past. Wang served as FTX’s chief expertise officer throughout its peak.
Decide Lewis A. Kaplan, who’s overseeing the case, praised Wang’s cooperation. Wang was the primary particular person to cooperate after FTX collapsed in November 2022. Moreover, he offered key info to Assistant U.S. Lawyer Nicolas Roos that enabled prosecutors to shortly extradite Bankman-Fried from the Bahamas. Roos described Wang’s work because the fraud in heroic phrases, saying he was “the primary FTX cooperator to return within the door.” Wang’s position within the fraud was minimal in line with Roos, and he “didn’t” create the difficult laptop code that enabled the fraud.
Talking on the sentencing, Wang apologized to clients and buyers. “I’m deeply sorry to all of the folks damage by my actions,” Wang mentioned. “There have been so many issues I may have achieved otherwise.” The co-founder added that at FTX, he “took the cowardly path as a substitute of doing the appropriate factor. Nothing I do will ever have the ability to make up for it.”
Roos added that prosecutors wouldn’t have made as a lot progress within the case if it hadn’t been for Wang’s cooperation. Wang “deciphered principally half the case for us,” he mentioned, including that it might need taken the federal government months or years to determine the code. In line with Roos, Wang additionally created software program that’s enabling prosecutors to search out unrelated monetary frauds.
Sam Bankman-Fried, in the meantime, is serving a 25-year jail time period for a fraud case that misappropriated over $11 billion of funds that belonged to FTX clients, buyers, and lenders.