According to the official records, Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX, his parents, and senior executives of the good ols cryptocurrency exchange have bought at least 19 properties altogether worth nearly $121 million in the Bahamas over the past two years.
Most of FTX’s purchases registered in the documents were luxury beachfront homes, including seven condominiums in a fancy resort community called Albany, costing almost $72 million. The deeds show these properties, bought by a unit of FTX, were to be used as “residences for key personnel” of the company.
When it was inquired why did the couple buy a vacation home in the Bahamas and how it was paid for, a spokesman for the professors said only that Bankman and Fried had been trying to return the property to FTX.
“Since before the bankruptcy proceedings, Mr. Bankman and Ms. Fried have been seeking to return the deed to the company and are awaiting further instructions,” the spokesperson said, refusing to explain.
SBF or FTX did not comment on the ownership of the property when inquired.
Bankman-Fried told that he lived in a house with nine other colleagues. For his employees, he said FTX provided free meals and an “in-house Uber-like” service around the island.
In a U.S. court filing with the District of Delaware bankruptcy court this month, John Ray, FTX’s new chief executive, said that the corporate funds of the FTX Group were used to “purchase homes and other personal items for employees and advisors.”
The source of funds is still left to figure out.
FTX Property Holdings Ltd, an FTX unit, bought 15 properties worth nearly $100 million in 2021 and 2022.
Its most expensive purchase was a $30 million penthouse at the Albany, a resort where Tiger Woods hosts a golf tournament every year. The property records for the penthouse, dated March 17, were signed by Ryan Salame, the president of FTX Property, and it was supposed to be a “residence for key personnel.”
Records showed the condominiums cost between $950,000 and $2 million and were bought by Nishad Singh, the former head of engineering at FTX, Gary Wang, an FTX co-founder, and Bankman-Fried for residential use.
The FTX headquarters is now unoccupied, with the furniture pushed against some windows. The plot of land, which cost $4.5 million, is also sitting idle.
