Bankman-Fried: Rescue market is drying up, and we’re all to blame for its existence

The crypto billionaire said he would look at Celsius, but he saw little left to rescue otherwise; the mess is the price of inaction on the part of regulators and the industry.

FTX head Sam Bankman-Fried said that he will take a look at Celsius, but he does not see a lot more to do on the “rescue market.” He hoped FTX will be able to start returning the money left in Voyager to investors soon. FTX bought Voyager assets at auction after the company spurned his buyout bid.

“I’m sure there’s something we haven’t seen yet, but there isn’t a whole lot out there that we’re aware of. There aren’t big things,” Bankman-Fried said of the so-called rescue market, speaking at DC FinTech Week on Oct. 11. “There are larger bankruptcies getting started that we may or may not end up playing a role in, but I think we’ve made most of the moves we anticipated making for now.”

FTX will remain engaged with the market in any case. The company will “look at if it is efficient in terms of the amount we can parts of the industry relative to the amount of balance sheet that we would spend on it,” Bankman-Fried said.

Tune in at 2:30 as CNBC’s Kate Rooney and Sam Bankman-Fried about liquidity in distressed markets. https://t.co/MnAn9uQO7A @SBF_FTX @GtownLawIIEL #DCFintechWeek #derivatives pic.twitter.com/vjDhfye455

— The IFM (@The_IFM) October 11, 2022

Bankman-Fried was noncommittal about the bankrupt crypto lending company Celsius. “As in most of those cases, we’ll almost certainly take a look. […] I don’t know if that will ultimately mean that we’ll do something there or not.” He was more upbeat when talking about Voyager, however, saying he hopes to start returning money to investors soon.

Bankman-Fried said there was sufficient blame for the crypto winter to spread around:

“My biggest takeaway from the regulatory side is there’s a price of inaction. It was a collective inaction. […] Everyone, including our industry, has some role to play and blame in not being more productive and constructive on regulatory matters earlier.”

“At the very least there should have been more transparency,” he added, as many investors were blindsided by the string of bankruptcies in crypto.

Bankman-Fried said, “People ask if it makes sense for FTX to be such a large fraction of this, and I think my answer is no. I would much rather that it was more distributed,” but “you have to sort of take what you’re given.”