Bankruptcy Reveals $1 Billion FTX-Tied Stake in Bitcoin Miner

investopedia.com:

Failed crypto tycoon Sam Bankman-Fried invested $1 billion into Genesis Digital Assets, a bitcoin miner in Kazakhstan, just months before the collapse of his FTX platform heralded a crypto winter that's looking more like an ice age. Bankman-Fried made the investment, the crypto exchange's biggest, through Alameda Research, the FTX-linked hedge fund that's at the center of his firm's bankruptcy, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Alameda invested $1 billion between August 2021 and April 2022 four times: $100 million in August 2021, $550 million in January, $250 million in February, and $250 million in April 2022.

Alameda shelled out half its investment on operations, spending the rest to buy shares held by two Genesis co-founders. Bankman-Fried joined the Genesis board in October 2021 and resigned on November 10, 2022—one day before FTX filed for bankruptcy.

Genesis didn't live up to its name. Bitcoin mining profits slid thanks to falling bitcoin prices, climbing electricity prices, and a high network hash rate. U.S. financier and short-lived Trump spokesmanAnthony Scaramucci’s SkyBridge Capital invested more than $60 million in Genesis and cut its stake by 59% between its June high point and September 2022, according to SkyBridge securities filings.

It didn't help that the Kazakhstan government restricted bitcoin mining, which led the company to move away from the country— and to the U.S.

Bankman-Fried, who is out on bail at his parents' home in California and awaiting trial on federal fraud charges, defended himself on social media this week.He wrote on the email newsletter platform Substack that he's innocent and gave his explanation of what caused FTX's collapse.

FTX and Alameda imploded due to a crypto market meltdown