Executives at a major lender to Sam Bankman-Fried’s defunct hedge fund had privileged early access to issuances of new tokens backed by the disgraced entrepreneur’s crypto exchange FTX, the Financial Times has learned.
Genesis, a leading crypto lender that collapsed in January, was long a key source of funding for Alameda Research, the trading firm at the heart of Bankman-Fried’s alleged theft of customer assets from FTX.
The close relationship included opportunities for some Genesis executives to invest in cryptocurrencies Bankman-Fried helped launch, at a discounted rate before the tokens were issued to the public, according to people familiar with the matter.