FTX filed a lawsuit against Anthony Scaramucci and his hedge fund SkyBridge Capital as part of a broader effort to recover money for the bankrupt company’s creditors.
The lawsuit against the former White House communications director is one of 23 filed Friday in Delaware bankruptcy court. The plaintiffs also include political groups such as Crypto.com and FWD.US, founded by Mark Zuckerberg, according to court documents.
FTX claims that during the crypto winter of 2022, founder Sam Bankman-Fried “engaged in a year-long influence buying campaign and making lavish and impressive ‘investments’.”
“One connection into which Bankman-Fried poured significant time and money” was Scaramucci because of his “financial, political and social” network, according to the filing.
FTX is now chasing those investments, which it says “did little good” and “instead only served to protect Bankman-Fried’s position in the world of politics and traditional finance.”
The failed crypto firm says Bankman-Fried invested $67 million in various SkyBridge endeavors in 2022 as Scaramucci “looked for a bailout.” SkyBridge’s assets under management fell from $9 billion in 2015 to $2.2 billion, according to the filing.
A representative for Scaramucci declined to comment.
In September 2022, Bankman-Fried and Scaramucci announced that FTX’s venture arm would acquire a 30% stake in SkyBridge. Financial terms were not disclosed at the time. Scaramucci said at the time that the investment reflected his “thinking about the next decade of SkyBridge.”
Read more: Scaramucci’s SkyBridge Capital was Spiraling, and then came FTX
Within months, FTX filed for bankruptcy and Bankman-Fried was arrested in the Bahamas on fraud charges.
Case in point is FTX Trad. Ltd., Bankr. D. Del., No. 22-11068, 8/24/11 lawsuit.
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