FTX cofounders' Robinhood shares worth over $450 million seized

Quick Take

  • More than 55 million shares of Robinhood stock owned by FTX co-founders Sam Bankman-Fried and Gary Wang have been seized by the U.S. Department of Justice.

The U.S. Department of Justice seized more than $456 million in Robinhood shares owned by FTX co-founders Sam Bankman-Fried and Gary Wang.

A court filing dated Jan. 6 says the shares were seized because they constitute property involved in money laundering or wire fraud violations. 

A lawyer for the Justice Department last week said that the it was seizing hundreds of millions of dollars in Robinhood shares linked to FTX. Bankman-Fried responded by filing a court action to block debtors from taking control of his stake in Robinhood.

The disgraced former CEO owns 90% of Emergent Fidelity Technologies, an entity that owns more than 50 million shares in Robinhood stock. Bankman-Fried stepped down as FTX CEO when the firm filed for bankruptcy protection in November.


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.

About Author

Adam is the managing editor for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. He is based in central Europe and was a managing editor and podcast host at the crypto exchange OKX's former research arm, OKX Insights. Before that, he co-founded BeInCrypto.com, which he elevated into one of the leading crypto media brands at its peak as the editor-in-chief. Earlier, he served as the editor-in-chief at Bitcoinist.com. Before joining the blockchain and crypto industry, he worked for Looper.com, Grunge.com and SVG.com. He tweets via @XBT002 and can be emailed at [email protected].

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