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Former FTX Chief Executive Sam Bankman-Fried, who faces fraud charges over the collapse of the bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange, walks outside the Manhattan federal court in New York City, U.S. March 30, 2023. 

Amanda Perobelli | Reuters

FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried told jurors in his criminal trial on Friday that he didn’t commit fraud, and that he thought the crypto exchange’s outside expenditures, like paying for the naming rights at a sports arena, came out of company profits.

Bankman-Fried addressed the New York courtroom a day after U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan sent jurors home early to consider whether some aspects of the defendant’s planned testimony, related to legal advice he got while running FTX, would be admissible in court.

On Friday morning, defense attorney Mark Cohen asked Bankman-Fried if he defrauded anyone.

“No, I did not,” Bankman-Fried responded.

Cohen followed by asking if he took customer funds, to which Bankman-Fried said “no.”

Bankman-Fried, 31, faces seven criminal counts, including wire fraud, securities fraud and money laundering, that could land him in prison for life if he’s convicted. Bankman-Fried, the son of two Stanford legal scholars, has pleaded not guilty in the case.

Prior to the defendant’s appearance on the stand, the four-week trial was highlighted by the testimony of multiple members of FTX’s top leadership team as well as the people who ran sister hedge fund Alameda Research. They all singled out Bankman-Fried as the mastermind of a scheme to use FTX customer money to fund everything from venture investments and a high-priced condo in the Bahamas to covering Alameda’s crypto losses.

Courtroom sketch showing Sam Bankman Fried questioned by his attorney Mark Cohen. Judge Lewis Kaplan on the bench

Artist: Elizabeth Williams

Prosecutors walked former leaders of Bankman-Fried’s businesses through specific actions taken by their boss that resulted in clients losing billions of dollars last year. Several of the witnesses, including Bankman-Fried’s ex-girlfriend Caroline Ellison, who ran Alameda, have pleaded guilty to multiple charges and are cooperating with the government.

The judge’s decision to send the jury home on Thursday allowed Bankman-Fried and his defense team to audition their best legal material for Judge Kaplan.

‘Significant oversights’

On Friday, Bankman-Fried acknowledged that one of his biggest mistakes was not having a risk management team or chief regulatory officer. That led to “significant oversights,” he said.

Cohen walked Bankman-Fried through his background and how he got into crypto. The defendant said he studied physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and graduated in 2014. He then worked as a trader on the international desk at Jane Street for over three years, managing tens of billions of dollars a day in trading. That’s where he learned the fundamentals of things like arbitrage trading.

In the fall of 2017, Bankman-Fried founded Alameda Research.

“This was when crypto was starting to become publicly visible for the first time,” Bankman-Fried testified.

He said people were excited about it, watching bitcoin, which had jumped from $1,000 to $10,000 in a two-month period. Banks and brokers weren’t involved yet and it seemed like there would probably be big demand for an arbitrage provider, he said.

“I had absolutely no idea” how cryptocurrencies worked, Bankman-Fried said. “I just knew they were things you could trade.”

The first Alameda office was in an Airbnb in Berkeley, California, he said. It was listed as a two bedroom but they used the couch in the living room as a third bed and also used the attic.

He started FTX in 2019. Trading volume grew substantially on FTX from a few million dollars a day to tens of millions of dollars that year to hundreds of millions of dollars in 2020. By 2022, that number was up to $10 billion to $15 billion of dollars per day in trading volume, he said.

Bankman-Fried said Alameda was permitted to borrow from FTX, but his understanding was that the money was coming from margin trades, collateral from other margin trades or assets earning interest on the platform.

At FTX, there were no general restrictions on what could be done with funds that were borrowed as long as the company believed assets were greater than liabilities, Bankman-Fried testified.

Sam Bankman-Fried takes the stand

In 2020, a routine liquidation gone wrong led to some of the special borrowing permissions at Alameda, he said. The risk engine was sagging under the weight of growth. A liquidation that should have been in the thousands of dollars was in the trillions of dollars. Alameda was suddenly underwater because of closing the position.

The incident exposed a larger concern, that the potential of an erroneous liquidation of Alameda could be disastrous for users.

Bankman-Fried said he talked to FTX’s engineering director Nishad Singh and co-founder Gary Wang, both of whom testified earlier on behalf of the prosecution. They suggested creating an alert, which would prompt the user to deposit more collateral, or a delay, Bankman-Fried said. They later implemented a feature like that, he said, adding that he learned it was the “allow negative” feature.

Bankman-Fried testified that he wasn’t aware of the amount Alameda was borrowing or its theoretical max. As long as the net asset value was positive on the exchange and the scale of borrowing was reasonable, increasing the line of credit so Alameda could keep filling orders was fine, he said. Bankman-Fried added that he now believes what Singh and Wang did was increase the line of credit.

Tough sell

Convincing the jury will be a tall order for Bankman-Fried after a mountain of damning evidence was presented by the government.

Prosecutors entered corroborating materials, including encrypted Signal messages and other internal documents that appear to show Bankman-Fried orchestrating the spending of FTX customer money.

The defense’s case, which consists of Bankman-Fried’s testimony along with that of two witnesses who took the stand Thursday morning, hinges largely on whether the jury believes the defendant didn’t intend to commit fraud.

On Thursday, under questioning led by Cohen, Bankman-Fried appeared to place much of the criminal blame on FTX’s chief regulatory officer, Dan Friedberg, as well as outside counsel Fenwick & West, which advised the crypto exchange. Bankman-Fried spoke about Friedberg’s active involvement in everything from the companywide auto-deletion policy on messaging apps like Signal, to the creation of Alameda’s North Dimension bank account, where billions of dollars worth of FTX customer money was funneled.

The former FTX chief also said that the hundreds of millions of dollars in personal loans to himself and other founders of the platform were structured through promissory notes drafted by his in-house legal team and discussed in concert with his general counsel and Friedberg. Having the blessing of his legal counsel was something that Bankman-Fried said he “took comfort in.”

The logo of FTX is seen on a flag at the entrance of the FTX Arena in Miami, Florida, November 12, 2022.

Marco Bello | Reuters

In afternoon testimony, Bankman-Fried was asked about FTX’s marketing and promotions.

He said there were 15 people on the marketing team, and noted that he got more involved with it as time progressed. In particular, he discussed the naming rights in 2021 for the basketball arena in Miami, which was to be a 19-year deal for $135 million.

Bankman-Fried said the sponsorship of FTX Arena would deliver returns for the company and create wide brand awareness because even he, as an “average level sports fan,” could name dozens of stadiums. He said the investment would be about $10 million a year, or 1% of revenue. The company had been deciding among a few different stadiums, including the homes to the NFL’s New Orleans Saints and Kansas City Chiefs, Bankman-Fried said.

A crucial part of his testimony came when Bankman-Fried said he thought the stadium deal funding was coming from revenue from the exchange and returns from venture investments, as opposed to customer money.

Similarly, Bankman-Fried testified that he believed the lavish Bahamas properties were being paid for with FTX operating cash that came from revenue and venture investments. He said having available property to rent was a necessary incentive if the company wanted to poach developers from Facebook and Google.

As for the venture investments, Bankman-Fried said he thought that money was coming from Alameda’s operating profits and third-party lending desks. Alameda’s venture arm was renamed Clifton Bay Investments, which Bankman-Fried said was a first step in building a dedicated venture brand.

When asked about loans he took from the business, Bankman-Fried said they were to pay for venture investments and political donations. He said that, as the primary owner of Alameda, he thought he had a few billion dollars in arbitrage profit from the past few years and there was no reason he couldn’t borrow from it. He said the loans, except for the most recent one prior to the firm’s bankruptcy filing, were all documented through promissory notes.

Bankman-Fried said he never directed Singh or former FTX executive Ryan Salame to make political donations. Salame pleaded guilty in September to federal campaign finance and money-transmitting crimes, admitting that from fall 2021 to November 2022, he steered tens of millions of dollars of political contributions to both Democrats and Republicans in his own name when the money actually came from Alameda.

Bankman-Fried, who allegedly used FTX customer funds to help finance over $100 million in political giving during the 2022 midterms, testified that he talked to politicians about pandemic prevention and crypto regulation. He said he had a vested interested in crypto policy even though FTX’s U.S. operation was relatively small, because the company was seeking to offer crypto futures products in the U.S.

Bankman-Fried then discussed his public persona. He said he hadn’t intended to be the public face of the company because he’s “naturally introverted.” But a few interviews went well, and it snowballed from there. He said he was the only person at the company that the press sought.

He wore T-shirts and shorts because they were comfortable and said he let his hair grow out because he was busy and lazy.

Bankman-Fried was photographed at the 2022 Super Bowl in Los Angeles with Katy Perry. He told the jury, which was previously presented with the photo by the prosecution, that he thought it was natural to go to the game because he was in town for meetings and the company had a commercial running.

“I thought maybe it would be interesting,” he said.

— CNBC’s Dawn Giel contributed to this report

WATCH: Sam Bankman-Fried testifying in his criminal case

Sam Bankman-Fried set to testify at fraud trial in what experts deem a major gamble for the case

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How TikTok’s rise sparked a short-form video race

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How TikTok’s rise sparked a short-form video race

TikTok’s grip on the short-form video market is tightening, and the world’s biggest tech platforms are racing to catch up.

Since launching globally in 2016, ByteDance-owned TikTok has amassed over 1.12 billion monthly active users worldwide, according to Backlinko. American users spend an average of 108 minutes per day on the app, according to Apptoptia.

TikTok’s success has reshaped the social media landscape, forcing competitors like Meta and Google to pivot their strategies around short-form video. But so far, experts say that none have matched TikTok’s algorithmic precision.

“It is the center of the internet for young people,” said Jasmine Enberg, vice president and principal analyst at Emarketer. “It’s where they go for entertainment, news, trends, even shopping. TikTok sets the tone for everyone else.”

Platforms like Meta‘s Instagram Reels and Google’s YouTube Shorts have expanded aggressively, launching new features, creator tools and even considering separate apps just to compete. Microsoft-owned LinkedIn, traditionally a professional networking site, is the latest to experiment with TikTok-style feeds. But with TikTok continuing to evolve, adding features like e-commerce integrations and longer videos, the question remains whether rivals can keep up.

“I’m scrolling every single day. I doom scroll all the time,” said TikTok content creator Alyssa McKay.

But there may a dark side to this growth.

As short-form content consumption soars, experts warn about shrinking attention spans and rising mental-health concerns, particularly among younger users. Researchers like Dr. Yann Poncin, associate professor at the Child Study Center at Yale University, point to disrupted sleep patterns and increased anxiety levels tied to endless scrolling habits.

“Infinite scrolling and short-form video are designed to capture your attention in short bursts,” Dr. Poncin said. “In the past, entertainment was about taking you on a journey through a show or story. Now, it’s about locking you in for just a few seconds, just enough to feed you the next thing the algorithm knows you’ll like.”

Despite sky-high engagement, monetizing short videos remains an uphill battle. Unlike long-form YouTube content, where ads can be inserted throughout, short clips offer limited space for advertisers. Creators, too, are feeling the squeeze.

“It’s never been easier to go viral,” said Enberg. “But it’s never been harder to turn that virality into a sustainable business.”

Last year, TikTok generated an estimated $23.6 billion in ad revenues, according to Oberlo, but even with this growth, many creators still make just a few dollars per million views. YouTube Shorts pays roughly four cents per 1,000 views, which is less than its long-form counterpart. Meanwhile, Instagram has leaned into brand partnerships and emerging tools like “Trial Reels,” which allow creators to experiment with content by initially sharing videos only with non-followers, giving them a low-risk way to test new formats or ideas before deciding whether to share with their full audience. But Meta told CNBC that monetizing Reels remains a work in progress.

While lawmakers scrutinize TikTok’s Chinese ownership and explore potential bans, competitors see a window of opportunity. Meta and YouTube are poised to capture up to 50% of reallocated ad dollars if TikTok faces restrictions in the U.S., according to eMarketer.

Watch the video to understand how TikTok’s rise sparked a short form video race.

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Elon Musk’s xAI Holdings in talks to raise $20 billion, Bloomberg News reports

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Elon Musk's xAI Holdings in talks to raise  billion, Bloomberg News reports

The X logo appears on a phone, and the xAI logo is displayed on a laptop in Krakow, Poland, on April 1, 2025. (Photo by Klaudia Radecka/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

Nurphoto | Nurphoto | Getty Images

Elon Musk‘s xAI Holdings is in discussions with investors to raise about $20 billion, Bloomberg News reported Friday, citing people familiar with the matter.

The funding would value the company at over $120 billion, according to the report.

Musk was looking to assign “proper value” to xAI, sources told CNBC’s David Faber earlier this month. The remarks were made during a call with xAI investors, sources familiar with the matter told Faber. The Tesla CEO at that time didn’t explicitly mention any upcoming funding round, but the sources suggested xAI was preparing for a substantial capital raise in the near future.

The funding amount could be more than $20 billion as the exact figure had not been decided, the Bloomberg report added.

Artificial intelligence startup xAI didn’t immediately respond to a CNBC request for comment outside of U.S. business hours.

Faber Report: Elon Musk held call with current xAI investors, sources say

The AI firm last month acquired X in an all-stock deal that valued xAI at $80 billion and the social media platform at $33 billion.

“xAI and X’s futures are intertwined. Today, we officially take the step to combine the data, models, compute, distribution and talent,” Musk said on X, announcing the deal. “This combination will unlock immense potential by blending xAI’s advanced AI capability and expertise with X’s massive reach.”

Read the full Bloomberg story here.

— CNBC’s Samantha Subin contributed to this report.

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Alphabet jumps 3% as search, advertising units show resilient growth

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Alphabet jumps 3% as search, advertising units show resilient growth

Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai during the Google I/O developers conference in Mountain View, California, on May 10, 2023.

David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Alphabet‘s stock gained 3% Friday after signaling strong growth in its search and advertising businesses amid a competitive artificial intelligence environment and uncertain macro backdrop.

GOOGL‘s pace of GenAI product roll-out is accelerating with multiple encouraging signals,” wrote Morgan Stanley‘s Brian Nowak. “Macro uncertainty still exists but we remain [overweight] given GOOGL’s still strong relative position and improving pace of GenAI enabled product roll-out.”

The search giant posted earnings of $2.81 per share on $90.23 billion in revenues. That topped the $89.12 billion in sales and $2.01 in EPS expected by LSEG analysts. Revenues grew 12% year-over-year and ahead of the 10% anticipated by Wall Street.

Net income rose 46% to $34.54 billion, or $2.81 per share. That’s up from $23.66 billion, or $1.89 per share, in the year-ago period. Alphabet said the figure included $8 billion in unrealized gains on its nonmarketable equity securities connected to its investment in a private company.

Adjusted earnings, excluding that gain, were $2.27 per share, according to LSEG, and topped analyst expectations.

Read more CNBC tech news

Alphabet shares have pulled back about 16% this year as it battles volatility spurred by mounting trade war fears and worries that President Donald Trump‘s tariffs could crush the global economy. That would make it more difficult for Alphabet to potentially acquire infrastructure for data centers powering AI models as it faces off against competitors such as OpenAI and Anthropic to develop largely language models.

During Thursday’s call with investors, Alphabet suggested that it’s too soon to tally the total impact of tariffs. However, Google’s business chief Philipp Schindler said that ending the de minimis trade exemption in May, which created a loophole benefitting many Chinese e-commerce retailers, could create a “slight headwind” for the company’s ads business, specifically in the Asia-Pacific region. The loophole allows shipments under $800 to come into the U.S. duty-free.

Despite this backdrop, Alphabet showed steady growth in its advertising and search business, reporting $66.89 billion in revenues for its advertising unit. That reflected 8.5% growth from the year-ago period. The company reported $8.93 billion in advertising revenue for its YouTube business, shy of an $8.97 billion estimate from StreetAccount.

Alphabet’s “Search and other” unit rose 9.8% to $50.7 billion, up from $46.16 billion last year. The company said that its AI Overviews tool used in its Google search results page has accumulated 1.5 billion monthly users from a billion in October.

Bank of America analyst Justin Post said that Wall Street is underestimating the upside potential and “monetization ramp” from this tool and cloud demand fueled by AI.

“The strong 1Q search performance, along with constructive comments on Gemini [large language model] performance and [AI Overviews] adoption could help alleviate some investor concerns on AI competition,” Post wrote in a note.

WATCH: Gemini delivering well for Google, says Check Capital’s Chris Ballard

Gemini delivering well for Google, says Check Capital's Chris Ballard

CNBC’s Jennifer Elias contributed to this report.

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