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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.

Read more on FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried

“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.

Prosecution in Sam Bankman-Fried trial wrapping up in coming days

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Trump to host Jensen Huang at White House as Nvidia tops $4 trillion market cap

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Trump to host Jensen Huang at White House as Nvidia tops  trillion market cap

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang delivers remarks next to U.S. President Donald Trump at an ‘Investing in America’ event in Washington, D.C., on April 30, 2025.

Leah Millis | Reuters

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang will meet with President Donald Trump at the White House on Thursday, CNBC’s Megan Cassella reported.

The meeting comes as Nvidia rose slightly on Thursday, becoming the first company to close a trading day with a market cap over $4 trillion, beating Apple and Microsoft to the symbolic milestone. Nvidia touched the mark briefly on Wednesday during trading.

Trump praised Nvidia stock in a social media post Thursday morning.

“NVIDIA IS UP 47% SINCE TRUMP TARIFFS. USA is taking in Hundreds of Billions of Dollars in Tariffs,” Trump posted on Truth Social. “COUNTRY IS NOW ‘BACK.'”

An Nvidia representative declined to comment, and it was unclear what the meeting is about, but Nvidia has been grappling with export controls on its artificial intelligence chips implemented by the Trump administration in April for national security reasons.

At the time, the U.S. government told Nvidia that its previously-approved H20 processor — intended exclusively for the Chinese market — would require an export license. Huang previously told investors that requirement effectively cut off Nvidia’s sales to China with “no grace period.” The AI chipmaker said that it would miss $8 billion in planned orders for the chip in the company’s July quarter.

“The $50 billion China market is effectively closed to U.S. industry,” Huang told investors on an earnings call in May.

Nvidia also faces another potential restriction on AI chip exports after the Trump administration cancelled a planned rule by former President Joe Biden called the “AI diffusion rule.” The Trump administration promised newer, simpler restrictions later this year on which countries could receive Nvidia’s technology.

WATCH: Fundstrat’s Tom Lee: Nvidia being the most valuable company in the S&P makes a lot of sense

Fundstrat's Tom Lee: Nvidia being the most valuable company in the S&P makes a lot of sense

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Musk, X to face trial in Don Lemon lawsuit alleging breach of contract

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Musk, X to face trial in Don Lemon lawsuit alleging breach of contract

Elon Musk (L) & Don Lemon

Reuters (L) | Getty Images (R)

Ex-CNN anchor Don Lemon‘s lawsuit against tech billionaire Elon Musk and his social network X over the cancellation of their partnership can proceed to trial, a San Francisco judge ruled this week.

Musk’s team had tried to get the case moved to a Texas court and tried to convince the judge to strike the complaint altogether.

Attorneys for Musk and X didn’t respond to a request for comment.

In an order Tuesday, Judge Harold Kahn said Lemon and his attorneys plausibly alleged, among other claims, that X and Musk had committed “fraud by false promise” and that there was “an implied contract” between them.

Lemon filed the suit in August 2024 after X canceled a partnership with the broadcast journalist a few hours after he taped a tense interview with Musk, who owns X. The interview preceded a planned premiere of Lemon’s new show on Musk’s social network.

During the interview, Lemon pressed Musk on several contentious topics he had posted about or amplified on X. Musk had boosted the so-called “great replacement theory,” and other bigoted tropes and falsehoods, including posts that claimed there was a “Hispanic invasion” of immigrants to the U.S.

Read more CNBC tech news

Lemon also pressed Musk about content moderation on X, and a reported surge in antisemitic content on the platform that occurred after Musk acquired it as Twitter in a $44 billion leveraged buyout in late 2022.

Musk made sweeping changes after taking over the site, firing huge numbers of personnel and reversing account bans for users who had been booted from the platform after posting hate speech or inciting violence.

Musk, who characterized himself as a free speech “absolutist” also restored the account of President Donald Trump. The site had permanently banned Trump from the platform in January 2021 following the attack by his supporters on the U.S. Capitol.

Lemon’s case against Musk and X Corp. is in San Francisco Superior Court. A date has not been set for the trial.

Musk and X have faced a litany of other lawsuits over non-payment to vendors and over failure to provide severance as promised to laid-off employees from Twitter.

Lemon was fired from CNN in 2023 following reports that he mistreated coworkers and made sexist remarks on-air, including about politician Nikki Haley. Lemon later apologized for the Haley comments.

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Bitcoin sets another record above $113,000 as investors jump into risk assets, liquidate shorts

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Bitcoin sets another record above 3,000 as investors jump into risk assets, liquidate shorts

Nurphoto | Getty Images

Bitcoin climbed to new all-time high on Thursday, building on its previous record reached just a day earlier, as investors jumped into risk assets and liquidated short positions.

The price of the flagship cryptocurrency was last higher by about 2% at $113,459.16. Earlier, it rose as high as $113,863.18.

On Thursday afternoon, bitcoin saw about $318 million in short liquidations across centralized exchanges in a 24 hour period, according to CoinGlass. When traders use leverage to short bitcoin and the cryptocurrency’s price rises, they buy bitcoin back from the market to close their positions, which pushes the price up and causes more positions to be liquidated.

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