One argument Bankman-Fried advanced was that the funds he misappropriated were in investments that would eventually grow.
“As the district court recognized, any contention that Bankman-Fried lacked an intent to defraud because he intended to eventually repay his customers was legally misleading and prejudicial because the wire fraud statute encompasses temporary misappropriation of money or property,” the ruling said.
The panel reiterated this argument later on: “Whether the assets purchased by Bankman-Fried appreciated in value is irrelevant as to whether he committed fraud,” the ruling said.
Bankman-Fried’s team tried to argue that FTX was a margin futures trading platform, and therefore customers should have expected that they might lose some access to their funds.
“We are unpersuaded,” the ruling said. “The fact that some FTX customers opted into margin trading, and thus temporary deprivation of their money, is beside the point. Some opted into margin trading, some did not. No one opted into having their money transferred under false pretenses to Alameda.”
The panel’s ruling similarly supported Judge Kaplan’s actions throughout the trial.
The ruling matches the reception Bankman-Fried’s team saw from the panel of judges during the hearing last November, when the three-judge panel repeatedly interrupted and questioned attorney Alexandra Shapiro, who is representing Bankman-Fried.