Sam Bankman-Fried apologises to FTX staff for his 'irrational decisions'. Read full letter

moneycontrol.com:

Former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried sent an apology letter to his employees in which he blamed his “irrational decisions” on “shi**y” circumstances.

In the letter obtained by CNBC, Bankman-Fried said he “froze up in the face of pressure and leaks”. He also listed out the events that led to the massive liquidity crunch his crypto empire lost investor confidence and customers rapidly withdrew billions of dollars from FTX.

Here's the full letter by Sam Bankman-Fried:

“Hi all—

I feel deeply sorry about what happened. I regret what happened to all of you. And I regret what happened to customers. You gave everything you could for FTX, and stood by the company—and me.

I didn’t mean for any of this to happen, and I would give anything to be able to go back and do things over again. You were my family. I’ve lost that, and our old home is an empty warehouse of monitors. When I turn around, there’s no one left to talk to. I disappointed all of you, and when things broke down I failed to communicate. I froze up in the face of pressure and leaks and the Binance LOI and said nothing. I lost track of the most important things in the commotion of company growth. I care deeply about you all, and you were my family, and I’m sorry.

I was CEO, and so it was my duty to make sure that, ultimately, the right things happened at FTX. I wish that I had been more careful.

I want to give you a better description of what happened—one I should have written out as best I understood it much earlier.

Piecing things together recently, making approximations—I don’t have full data access right now to get precise answers—and marking everything to market, regardless of liquidity, I believe that the events that led to the breakdown this month included:

1) A crash in