News organizations seek to unmask anonymous FTX creditors

Quick Take

  • Several news outlets, including the Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times, have filed to unveil the creditors of collapsed crypto exchange FTX.
  • FTX has more than 100,000 creditors, and the news organizations want their names, at least. 

The Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and Bloomberg have filed a suit seeking to unseal who the creditors of the collapsed crypto exchange FTX are. The news organizations want at least the creditors' names.

On Nov. 22, a federal judge moved to keep the FTX creditors anonymous in bankruptcy case. The lawsuit seeks to reveal the more than 100,000 creditors, and potentially who of the top 50 are owed $3.1 billion from FTX. 

"The news media acts as the eyes and ears of the public, informing the public of issues of the day," the lawsuit states. "This valuable social function is hampered by sealing of judicial records."

The news organizations argue that while the redaction of contact information for the creditors may be necessary for safety reasons, the names of these creditors poses no risk to identity theft or personal danger.

FTX filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Nov. 11, after a "serious liquidity crisis" spurred by its leaked balance sheet revealed the firm to be insolvent. 


Disclaimer: The former CEO and majority shareholder of The Block has disclosed a series of loans from former FTX and Alameda founder Sam Bankman-Fried.

© 2024 The Block. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

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About Author

MK Manoylov has been a reporter for The Block since 2020 — joining just before bitcoin surpassed $20,000 for the first time. Since then, MK has written nearly 1,000 articles for the publication, covering any and all crypto news but with a penchant toward NFT, metaverse, web3 gaming, funding, crime, hack and crypto ecosystem stories. MK holds a graduate degree from New York University's Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Program (SHERP) and has also covered health topics for WebMD and Insider. You can follow MK on X @MManoylov and on LinkedIn.

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