Prosecutors say they will not pursue second Sam Bankman-Fried trial
Indicted FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried arrives at the United States Courthouse in New York City, July 26, 2023.
Amr Alfiky | Reuters
Prosecutors have decided not to pursue a second trial against disgraced FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried.
In a note to Judge Lewis Kaplan on Friday, the U.S. government explained that the decision to forego a second set of proceedings had to do with the fact that much of the evidence that would have been presented in a second trial had already been submitted to the Court during Bankman-Fried’s first criminal trial.
In November, following a month’s worth of testimony from nearly 20 witnesses, a jury found the former FTX chief executive guilty of all seven criminal counts against him following a few hours of deliberation. Prosecutors added that the Court could consider the hundreds of exhibits already entered into evidence during these proceedings when he is sentenced next year.
“Given that practical reality, and the strong public interest in a prompt resolution of this matter, the Government intends to proceed to sentencing on the counts for which the defendant was convicted at trial,” continued the letter to Judge Kaplan.
Bankman-Fried, the 31-year old son of two Stanford legal scholars and graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was convicted of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud against FTX customers and against Alameda Research lenders, conspiracy to commit securities fraud and conspiracy to commit commodities fraud against FTX investors, and conspiracy to commit money laundering.
He had pleaded not guilty to the charges, which were all tied to the collapse of FTX and its sister hedge fund Alameda late last year.
The second trial, which had been slated to start in March, addressed an additional set of criminal counts, including conspiracy to bribe foreign officials, conspiracy to commit bank fraud, conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money transmitting business and substantive securities fraud and commodities fraud.
Damian Williams, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, wrote in the letter to the Court that “a second trial would not affect the United States Sentencing Guidelines range for the defendant, because the Court can already consider all of this conduct as relevant conduct when sentencing him for the counts that he was found guilty of at the initial trial.”
So now, the question of prison time goes to Judge Kaplan.
The sentencing date is March 28 at 9:30 a.m. ET. The FTX founder faces more than 100 years in prison.
Government exhibit in the case against former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried.
Source: SDNY
Decades behind bars
That the jury was able to reach a unanimous verdict in a just few hours suggests that they were truly convinced and that there were no holdouts that needed to be coaxed, Yesha Yadav, law professor and Associate Dean at Vanderbilt University, told CNBC in November.
“This overwhelming consensus should give the judge confidence to follow the jury’s decisiveness by imposing a more severe sentence than a lighter one,” continued Yadav.
In this case, the statutory maximum sentence is around 115 years, but there is a sliding scale for sentencing according to recommended guidelines given the scale of the crimes and the criminal history of the defendant.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if SBF spends the next 20 or 25 years of his life in prison,” Renato Mariotti, a former prosecutor in the U.S. Justice Department’s Securities and Commodities Fraud Section, told CNBC.
“The sheer scale of his fraud was immense, he was defiant and lied on the witness stand, and Judge Kaplan had very little patience for his antics while out on bond. He will have more sympathy for the victims than he has for Bankman-Fried,” added Mariotti.
Caroline Ellison, former chief executive officer of Alameda Research LLC, leaves Manhattan Federal Court after testifying during the trial of FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried, on October 10, 2023 in New York City.
Michael M. Santiago | Getty Images
In August, Judge Kaplan revoked Bankman-Fried’s bail and sent him back to jail for witness tampering.
“The federal sentencing guidelines will likely be sky high, but they are just that — guidelines — and the judge is required to consider all of the circumstances surrounding SBF and his offense,” said Mariotti.
Yadav added that the issue of sentencing is governed by guidelines that look to factors such as how many have been harmed and the overall dollar quantum, as well as the seriousness of the damage a defendant has inflicted.
“Here, there are some factors that could push the judge toward a very lengthy prison term, possibly close to the 110 years that the sentencing guidelines suggest,” said Yadav.
The sentence will come down to what the judge believes is sufficient to punish Bankman-Fried, deter others, and promote respect for the law, Yadav added.
Former Assistant U.S. Attorney Kevin J. O’Brien, who specializes in white-collar criminal defense in NYC, thinks Bankman-Fried has the chance at a shorter sentence, telling CNBC, “Since judges have discretion even under the Guidelines, I believe his sentence will be in the 15 to 20 year range.”
O’Brien added that given Bankman Fried’s age, he thinks the judge will be inclined to give him a chance to live a full life after his prison term.
Bankman-Fried’s case has been compared with that of Elizabeth Holmes, founder of medical device company Theranos, which ceased operations in 2018.
Holmes, 39, was convicted in early 2022 on four counts of defrauding investors in Theranos after testifying in her own defense. She was sentenced to more than 11 years in prison, and began serving her punishment in May at a minimum-security facility in Bryan, Texas.
But former federal prosecutor Paul Tuchmann tells CNBC that he expects harsher terms for the former FTX CEO, because “the amount of losses that were suffered is simply staggering.”
Tuchmann compared Bankman-Fried’s case to that of Bernie Madoff, who was sentenced to 150 years in prison.
“Like Madoff, a lot of the losses in this case were small investors. They weren’t all large institutions, which really tends to create a greater pressure for a significant sentence,” said Tuchmann.
“Certainly, there may be some mitigation here. Sam Bankman-Fried is very young. The judge may take that into consideration. Bernie Madoff went to jail for 150 years when he was obviously much older – with limited productive years left,” Yadav said of the Madoff comparison.
“Sam Bankman-Fried still has an opportunity to make some kind of positive contribution during his lifetime. His crimes are also not violent in nature,” continued Yadav.
Jensen Huang, co-founder and chief executive officer of Nvidia, at the London Tech Week exposition in London, UK, on Monday, June 9, 2025.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Nvidia and OpenAI are in discussions about backing a major investment in Britain focused on boosting artificial intelligence infrastructure in the country.
The two tech firms are discussing a sizable deal to support data center development in the country which could ultimately be worth billions of dollars, a person familiar with the matter told CNBC, confirming earlier reporting from the Financial Times.
The companies are still working through various processes at the moment with Nvidia and cloud computing firm Nscale, said the person, who did not want to be named due to the sensitivity of the issue.
They added that an investment agreement has not yet been finalized. It is expected to be unveiled next week during U.S. President Donald Trump’s state visit to the U.K.
Nvidia and Nscale did did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment. OpenAI declined to comment on the discussions.
Countries around the world have been courting major U.S. AI players in a bid to boost their own national infrastructure and technological ambitions.
The topic of so-called “sovereign” AI — the idea of onshoring the data processing infrastructure behind advanced artificial intelligence systems — has been top of mind for officials as governments look to reduce their dependency on foreign countries for critical technologies.
The U.K. government declined to comment when asked by CNBC about the investment discussions with OpenAI, Nvidia and Nscale. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is set to join Trump on his state visit to Britain next week.
Earlier this year, the Nvidia boss called the U.K. an “incredible place to invest” and said his multitrillion-dollar chipmaker would boost investment in the country. “The U.K. is in a Goldilocks circumstance,” Huang said at the time in a panel discussion with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
Technology
Apple, Google and Meta are trying to perfect a science-fiction gadget: The universal translator
Apple AirPods Pro 3 models are displayed during Apple’s “Awe-Dropping” event at the Steve Jobs Theater on the Apple Park campus in Cupertino, California, on Sept. 9, 2025.
Nic Coury | AFP | Getty Images
For decades, shows like “Star Trek” and novels like “The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy” have showcased fictional universal translators, capable of seamlessly converting any language into English and vice versa.
Now, those gadgets once limited to works of science fiction are inching close to reality.
During its iPhone unveiling event on Tuesday, Apple included a video of many travelers’ dream scenario. It showed an English-speaking tourist buying flowers in an unnamed Spanish-speaking country. The florist addressed the tourist in Spanish, but what the tourist heard was in clear, coherent English.
“Today all the red carnations are 50% off,” the tourist heard in English in her headphones, at essentially the same time that the clerk was speaking.
The video was marketing material for Apple’s latest AirPods Pro 3, but the feature is one of many of its kind coming from tech companies that also include Google parent Alphabet and Meta, which makes Facebook and Instagram.
Apple introduces live translation to airpods.
Courtesy: Apple
Technological advancements spurred by the arrival of OpenAI’s ChatGPT in late 2022 have ushered in an era of generative artificial intelligence. Almost three years later, those advancements are resulting in real-time language translators.
For Apple, Live Translation is a key selling point for the AirPods Pro 3, which the company unveiled on Tuesday. The new $250 earbuds go on sale next week, and with Live Translation, users will be able to immediately hear French, German, Portuguese and Spanish translated to English. Live Translation will also arrive as an update to AirPods 4 and AirPods Pro 2 on Monday.
And when two people are speaking to each other wearing AirPods, the conversation can be translated both ways simultaneously inside each user’s headphones. In Apple’s video demo, it looked like two people talking to each other in different languages.
Analysts are excited that the feature could mark a step forward for Apple’s AI strategy. The translation feature needs to be paired with a new-enough iPhone to run Apple Intelligence, Apple’s AI software suite.
“If we can actually use the AirPods for live translations, that’s a feature that would actually get people to upgrade,” DA Davidson analyst Gil Luria told CNBC on Wednesday.
Translation is emerging as a key battleground in the technology industry as AI gets good enough to translate languages as quickly as people speak.
But Apple is not alone.
Host Jimmy Fallon holds Pixel 10 Pro Fold mobile phone during the ‘Made by Google’ event, organised to introduce the latest additions to Google’s Pixel portfolio of devices, in Brooklyn, New York, U.S., August 20, 2025.
Brendan McDermid | Reuters
A crowded market
In the past year, Google and Meta have also released hardware products featuring real-time translation capabilities.
Google’s Pixel 10 phone has a capability that can translate what a speaker is saying to the listener’s language during phone calls. That feature, called Voice Translate is designed to also preserve the speaker’s voice inflections. Voice Translate will start showing up on people’s phones through a software update on Monday.
In Google’s live demo in August, Voice Translate was able to translate a sentence from entertainer Jimmy Fallon into Spanish, and it actually sounded like the comedian. Apple’s feature does not try to imitate the user’s voice.
Meanwhile, Meta in May announced that its Ray-Ban Meta glasses would be able to translate what a person is saying in another language using the device’s speakers, and the other party in the conversations would be able to see translated responses transcribed on the user’s phone.
Meta will hold its own product keynote on Wednesday, where the company is expected to announce the next generation of its smart glasses, which will feature a small display in one of the lenses, CNBC reported in August. It’s unclear if Meta will announce more translation features.
Meta employee Sara Nicholson poses with the Ray-Ban sunglasses at the Meta Connect annual event at the company’s headquarters in Menlo Park, California, U.S., September 24, 2024.
Manuel Orbegozo | Reuters
And OpenAI in June showcased an intelligent voice assistant mode for ChatGPT that has fluid translation built-in as one of many features. ChatGPT is integrated with Apple’s Siri, but not in voice mode. OpenAI is planning to release new hardware products with Apple’s former design guru Jony Ive in the coming years.
The rise of live translation could also reshape entire industries. Translators and interpreters are the number one type of job threatened by AI, and 98% of translators’ work activities overlap with what AI can do, a Microsoft Research study published in August found.
Purpose built translators
In the past several years, a number of purpose-built translation gadgets have entered the market, taking advantage of global high-speed cellular service and improving online translation services to produce puck-like devices or headphones with translation built-in for a couple hundred dollars.
“What I love about what Apple is doing is it really just illuminates the fact that how pressing of an issue this is,” said Joe Miller, U.S. general manager of Japan-based Pocketalk, which makes a $299 translation device that goes between two people conversing in different languages and translates their conversation in audio and text.
Given Apple’s massive scale and the fact that the Apple shipped about 18 million sets of wireless headphones in the first quarter alone, according to Canalys, the company’s entry into the market will expose a wider subset of customers to improvements translation tech has made in recent years.
Despite Apple’s entry into the market, makers of purpose-built devices say their focus on accuracy and knowledge of linguistics will provide better translations than what’s available for free with a new phone.
“We actually hired linguists,” said Aleksander Alski, head of U.S. and Canada for Poland-based Vasco Electronics, which is releasing translation headphones that can imitate the user’s voice, like Google’s feature. “We combined the AI with with human input, and thanks to that, we were able to secure much higher accuracy throughout all the languages we offer.”
There’s also home-field advantage. Vasco Electronics’ largest market is Europe, and Apple’s Live Translation isn’t available for EU users, Apple said on its website.
Some of the products being introduced by tech companies are less than universal, and are limited to a small number of languages for now. Apple’s feature is only available in 5 languages, versus Pocketalk’s 95.
Pocketalk’s Miller believes that the potential of the technology goes far beyond a tourist ordering a glass of wine in France. He says that it’s most powerful when its used in workplaces like schools and hospitals, which require privacy and security features that go beyond what Apple and Google provide.
“This isn’t about luxury tourism and travel,” Miller said. “This is about the intersection of language and friction, when a discussion needs to be had.”
Apple didn’t respond to a request for comment.
WATCH: If the AirPods live translation features work, it’s a breakthrough in AI, says DA Davidson’s Luria
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