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Sam Bankman-Fried Trial appears at Federal Court in New York on Oct. 4th, 2023.

Artist: Claudia Johnson

Marc-Antoine Julliard typically trades cocoa beans. But in the spring of 2021, the London-based commodities broker decided to diversify into cryptocurrency trading. His platform of choice was FTX.

Two years later, Julliard stood as the prosecution’s first witness in the criminal fraud trial against FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried, who’s accused of misusing billions of dollars in client money.

In testimony that lasted around 50 minutes on Wednesday, Julliard recounted his experience with FTX, including the “extremely anxious” feeling he had the day he unsuccessfully attempted to withdraw part of the $100,000 worth of crypto and cash he had stored on the site. He and thousands of other FTX customers were practically wiped out when the exchange went belly up late last year.

Like many others, Julliard said he he was under the impression that there were “strong financials behind the company.”

Julliard is the poster child for the case the prosecution laid out in its opening statement as it tries to prove to a jury that clients were led to believe the money they stored with FTX was safe. Prospective customers, Julliard said, were drawn in through savvy marketing, with no reason to believe that FTX would be repurposing their crypto funds.

In a trial that’s set to last six weeks, Bankman-Fried, a man once revered as the “white knight” of crypto, faces seven federal charges, including wire fraud, securities fraud and money laundering, that could put him in prison for the rest of his life.

A jury was seated shortly after 11:30 a.m. (though four of the 12 jurors were already looking to be dismissed). Opening statements began about an hour later. Julliard took the stand just before 2 p.m. to a packed courthouse in Manhattan.

As the lead witness, Julliard helped lay out the government’s narrative. Much of his decision to buy into FTX had to do with the celebrities and venture funds attached to the brand. He referenced an ad with supermodel Gisele Bündchen and Formula 1 marketing. He also pointed to prolific media coverage, which bolstered his trust in the company.

Julliard wasn’t an aggressive crypto trader. He said he never participated in margin trading, or borrowing money to make purchases, nor did he engage in a lending program offered by the company that allowed users to earn interest on idle crypto.

Sam Bankman-Fried sits with his defense team during his fraud trial over the collapse of FTX, the bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange, at Federal Court in New York City, U.S., October 4, 2023 in this courtroom sketch. 

Jane Rosenberg | Reuters

Defense wants customers to shoulder blame

The defense is trying to make clients accountable for what it says were their choices to buy and trade crypto.

“Sam didn’t defraud anyone,” said Mark Cohen, Bankman-Fried’s attorney, in his opening statement. Cohen called it a “hindsight case” brought by the government, and said that just because people lost money, doesn’t mean the 31-year-old Bankman-Fried committed fraud. 

Bankman-Fried donned a fresh suit with a purple tie and a clean haircut — a much different look than the beach shorts, sandals and wild curls that helped define his image during crypto’s heyday. The entrepreneur, who Cohen described as a “math nerd that didn’t drink or party,” diligently took notes on his air-gapped laptop as he conversed with both of his attorneys and, during breaks, sometimes stood while emphatically motioning with his hands as he spoke to his counsel.

Throughout both sides’ opening statements, Bankman-Fried kept his eyes trained on the jury box. His head was turned 90 degrees to his right to watch those who will ultimately decide his fate. Bankman-Fried was joined in court by his parents, who are both being sued by FTX’s new management for having allegedly “exploited their access and influence within the FTX enterprise to enrich themselves…by millions of dollars.”

Cohen is projecting Bankman-Fried as a startup founder and equated running FTX and Alameda Research, his sister hedge fund, to “building a plane while flying on it.” He told the jury that there was no risk management in place. Specifically, he said the firm didn’t have a chief risk officer.

Far from the “cartoon of a villain” that the government presented, Cohen gave different explanations for his client’s supposedly illegal actions. One example dealt with the secret backdoor baked into FTX’s code that prosecutors say gave Alameda a way to borrow much needed capital.

Cohen said there was nothing secretive about this backchannel in the code base and said the special access to FTX was there because Alameda was initially set up as a market maker for the crypto exchange, which needed the liquidity, especially in its early days.

Cohen reminded the jury that the three insiders who will take the stand against Bankman-Fried have all signed cooperation agreements with the government.

A $10 billion fraud

The prosecution’s opening statement was delivered by Assistant U.S. Attorney Thane Rehn. Over the course of about a half hour, Rehn drove home the point that everyday investors were the ones who fell victim to FTX’s scheme. By the summer of 2022, he said, more than $10 billion had been stolen from thousands of FTX customers who had trusted custody of their crypto and cash to the platform.

Rehn said the evidence would show jurors how Bankman-Fried lied to FTX users, investors and lenders, and how he spent a good amount of the money he stole for his own good. Rehn referenced campaign contributions, for example, as one way that Bankman-Fried looked to curry favor on Capitol Hill.

Rehn called Alameda a “second, smaller and more secretive company” founded and controlled by Bankman-Fried that was integral to the defendant’s alleged scheme.

The government also teed up its star witness, ex-girlfriend and Alameda’s ex-CEO, Caroline Ellison. She pleaded guilty in December to multiple charges and has been cooperating with the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan for months.

Rehn plans to show that Bankman-Fried installed his girlfriend at the top of his hedge fund, though he remained the one calling the shots behind the scenes.

Allan Joseph Bankman, father of FTX Co-Founder Sam Bankman-Fried, and Barbara Fried, mother of FTX Co-Founder Sam Bankman-Fried, arrive at court in New York, US, on Wednesday, Oct. 4, 2023.

Stephanie Keith | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Noticeably absent was the mention of Ellison’s co-CEO Sam Trabucco, who was a classmate of Bankman-Fried at MIT. Trabucco left FTX in Aug. 2022, and has stayed relatively under the radar.

Also central to the government’s case is the alleged coverup to hide Bankman-Fried’s crimes. Those tactics include backdating contracts and using encrypted messaging apps set to auto-delete to avoid a paper trail.

“This man stole billions of dollars from thousands of people,” Rein said, as he closed his statement.  

The prosecution’s second witness was Adam Yedidia, who met Bankman-Fried in college at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The pair remained good friends.

Yedida detailed his experience working first as a trader at Alameda for two months in 2017, and later as a software engineer for FTX beginning in January 2021. He said he resigned from FTX the day before the exchange filed for bankruptcy after a fellow developer told him that Alameda had used FTX customer deposits to pay back creditors.

Speaking quickly and deliberately with an air of practiced nonchalance, Yedida testified that he hadn’t talked to Bankman-Fried or seen him in person since Nov. 2022.

When asked why he was appearing under an immunity order, Yedida said he was concerned that as an FTX developer, he “may have unwittingly written code that contributed to a crime.”

Prosecutors got through a half hour of testimony before breaking for the day. The government will continue its questioning of Yedida at 9:30 A.M. on Thursday.

 FTX co-founder Gary Wang will also be taking the stand this week for the government.

WATCH: Sam Bankman-Fried criminal trial begins in New York

Sam Bankman-Fried criminal trial begins in New York

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Terawatt opens its first electric charging truck stop in California

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April 17, 2025

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Terawatt opens its first electric charging truck stop in California

Terawatt charging truck stop
Photo: Terawatt

Terawatt Infrastructure‘s first medium- and heavy-duty electric charging truck stop in California is now online, in Rancho Dominguez.

Located 12 miles north of the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, the private Rancho Dominguez site, which is shared among multiple fleets, will support electric trucking fleet operations in and out of the largest container ports in the US.

First customers include Dreaded Trucking, Hight Logistics, PepsiCo, Quick Container Drayage, Southern Counties Express, Tradelink Transport, and WestCoast Trucking & Warehousing.

Terawatt’s electric charging truck stop features 20 pull-through and bobtail DC fast charging stalls with a capacity of 7 megawatts (MW), enabling charging for up to 125 trucks per day using a simple reservations system. Terawatt’s site features a proprietary charge management system, in-house technicians, 24/7 customer service, and onsite parts management.

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“This launch underscores growing collaboration between enterprises, shippers, carriers, and charging infrastructure providers to advance sustainable technologies across logistics and transportation operations, especially in the medium and heavy-duty sectors,” said Neha Palmer, CEO and cofounder of Terawatt. Palmer added that the company will bring another charging site online in Rialto, California, in June.

Terawatt joined some of the world’s largest shippers and carriers in September 2024 to launch the I-10 Consortium heavy-duty EV operations pilot, the “first-ever US over-the-road electrified corridor.” Terawatt is providing charging infrastructure, including software, operations, and maintenance support at six of its owned charging hubs along the I-10 corridor.

If you live in an area that has frequent natural disaster events, and are interested in making your home more resilient to power outages, consider going solar and adding a battery storage system. To make sure you find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. They have hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and share your phone number with them.

Your personalized solar quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisers to help you every step of the way. Get started here. –trusted affiliate link*

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Environment

Trump admin halts $5 billion NY offshore wind project mid-build

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April 17, 2025

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Trump admin halts billion NY offshore wind project mid-build

Equinor Empire Wind
Photo: Equinor

In its most aggressive attack against offshore wind yet, the Trump administration halted the $5 billion Empire Wind 1, already under construction off New York’s coast.

Norwegian developer Equinor announced yesterday that it received notice from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) ordering Empire Wind 1 to halt all activities on the outer continental shelf until BOEM has completed its review. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum posted this tweet yesterday:

Burgum gave no indication of what insufficiencies there were in the approval process for the fully permitted offshore wind project, despite Trump’s recent declaration of a national energy emergency that speeds up permitting processes.

The commercial lease for the 810-megawatt (MW) Empire Wind 1’s federal offshore wind area was signed in March 2017 during the first Trump administration. It was approved by the Biden administration in November 2023 and began construction in 2024.

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The project is being developed under contract with the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA). Empire Wind 1, which was due to come online in 2027, has the potential to power 500,000 New York homes.

“Halting construction of fully permitted energy projects is the literal opposite of an energy abundance agenda,” said American Clean Power Association CEO Jason Grumet in a statement. “We encourage the administration to quickly address perceived inadequacies in the prior permit approvals so that this project can complete construction and bring much-needed power to the grid.”

As Electrek reported, Equinor secured $3 billion to finance Empire Wind 1 in January. The total amount drawn under the project finance term loan facility as of March 31 was around $1.5 billion. 

As of March 31, Empire Wind has a gross book value of around $2.5 billion, including South Brooklyn Marine Terminal (pictured above), which was expected to become the US’s largest dedicated port facility for offshore wind.

In response to BOEM’s stop work order, New York Governor Kathy Hochul issued the following statement:

Every single day, I’m working to make energy more affordable, reliable and abundant in New York and the federal government should be supporting those efforts rather than undermining them. Empire Wind 1 is already employing hundreds of New Yorkers, including 1,000 good-paying union jobs as part of a growing sector that has already spurred significant economic development and private investment throughout the state and beyond.

As Governor, I will not allow this federal overreach to stand. I will fight this every step of the way to protect union jobs, affordable energy and New York’s economic future.

Equinor says it’s considering appealing BOEM’s order.

To limit power outages and make your home more resilient, consider going solar with a battery storage system. In order to find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. They have hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high-quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and you share your phone number with them.

Your personalized solar quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisers to help you every step of the way. Get started here. –trusted affiliate link*

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Jackery Earth Day Sale takes up to 50% off units with bonus savings, G-Force moto-style ZM e-bike at $800 off, Greenworks, more

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April 17, 2025

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Jackery Earth Day Sale takes up to 50% off units with bonus savings, G-Force moto-style ZM e-bike at 0 off, Greenworks, more

Leading today’s Green Deals is Jackery’s Earth Day Sale that is taking up to 50% off power stations, with many of them being marked down from the brand’s short-term Easter savings, complete with bonus savings. Among the lineup, we spotted the expandable Explorer 2000 Plus Portable Power Station bundled with a 500W solar panel at its $1,614 low. Coming up right behind it is G-Force Bikes’ Spring Sale with up to $800 in e-bike savings, the largest of which is on the moto-styled ZM All-Terrain Fat Tire e-bike that starts at $1,199 for an 80-mile trekking single-battery setup, with a double battery option not much higher. Lastly, we have a one-day-only new low price on the Greenworks 1,900 PSI Steel-Framed Electric Pressure Washer at $118, as well as a bonus cleaner attachment deal. Plus, all the other hangover Green Deals are in the links at the bottom of the page, like yesterday’s Earth Day savings on both Bluetti power stations and Lectric’s e-bike bundles, and more.

Head below for other New Green Deals we’ve found today and, of course, Electrek’s best EV buying and leasing deals. Also, check out the new Electrek Tesla Shop for the best deals on Tesla accessories.

Invest in sustainable power for on-the-go and home backup at up to 50% off with Jackery’s Earth Day Sale from $90

Jackery has officially launched its Earth Day Sale through April 25 which is lowering many of its previous Easter offers with up to 50% off a collection of power stations, solar generators, and some accessories – and we’re also seeing on-page promo codes for extra savings. One such bundle gives you the brand’s Explorer 2000 Plus Portable Power Station with a 500W solar panel for $1,614.05 shipped, after using the promo code EXTRA5 at checkout for an additional 5% off. It’s already coming down from its usual $2,949 price tag, with the bonus savings dipping that price further, back to the best we’ve seen from some of this year’s previous events. You’re looking at a combined 45% markdown here, putting $1,335 back in your pocket and equipping you with an expandable means for on-the-go and at-home backup power at the lowest price we have tracked. Like most of the deals in this sale, you’ll find this package beating out its Amazon pricing too, where it’s currently sitting $307 higher.

Grabbing this Jackery Explorer 2000 Plus bundle starts you off with a 2,042Wh LiFePO4 capacity that can support up to five extra batteries that increase things to 12,000Wh – plus, there’s the option to continue expansion with two of these setups being linked together to reach 24,000Wh. Power output here provides a steady 3,000W through the 10 ports, surging to 6,000W for larger needs, which becomes its regular output levels within expanded setups. It also has a 1,200W maximum solar input, which recharges the battery to full in two hours with six 200W panels (so around 5+ hours with the bundle here). You can also have the battery recharged via a wall outlet in two hours as well, though this doesn’t account for expandable setups.

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***Note: The extra 5% off discount has not been factored into the prices below – be sure to use the code EXTRA5 at checkout for the maximum savings!

Jackery Earth Day flash offers (through April 18):

Jackery’s Earth Day Sale home backup deals:

Jackery’s Earth Day Sale appliance backup deals:

Jackery’s Earth Day Sale outdoor backup deals:

Jackery’s accessory deals:

You can shop through Jackery’s entire Earth Day Sale on the landing page here.

G-Force ZM All-Terrain e-bike

G-Force Spring Sale drops moto-styled ZM all-terrain e-bike with 80-mile range to $1,199

G-Force Bikes is having a Spring Sale running through the rest of the month that is also being billed as a “last-chance sale” before prices increase due to tariffs, with the brand providing a countdown clock on its site. Among the up to $800 we’re seeing across the brand’s lineup of e-bikes, we spotted the ZM All-Terrain Fat Tire e-bike down at $1,199 shipped. Normally fetching $1,999 direct from the brand, with third-party sites pricing it as high as $2,499, the discounts we have tracked over the last year have mainly been seen dropping costs between $1,299 and $1,499. It’s getting the maximum savings during this sale at $800 off, dropping it to the lowest price we can find while also giving you a pair of HD wide-angle rearview mirrors free of charge, valued at $49.

The G-Force ZM e-bike borrows heavily from motorcycle styling while still retaining a street-legal class 3 status, equipped with a 750W brushless gear hub motor that can peak as high as 1,300W to deliver up to 86Nm of torque power, topping out at 28 MPH speeds. What’s more, for such an affordable price, it also provides some extensive traveling range, with the standard 20Ah single-battery option carrying you 60 to 80 miles with its five PAS levels or you can double that to 120 to 160 for just $200 more with the 40Ah dual-battery setup.

For such a low price, there’s a nice array of quality features that it brings along, like the full suspension, with an adjustable front fork and rear system for smoother riding, along with hydraulic disc brakes for guaranteed stopping power, and 20-inch puncture-resistant tires with fenders over each for those off-road ventures. That’s not all, as you’ll also find it has a 400-pound payload, a 48V LED headlight, an integrated rear light with braking functionality, a 7-speed Shimano derailleur, a wear-resistant padded bench seat with room for a passenger, a half-twist throttle for electric cruising, and a large color LCD with a USB port for charging up devices as you ride, particularly nice if you use your phone as a GPS.

G-Force’s other Spring Sale e-bike deals:

Greenworks 1,900 PSI electric pressure washer

Get rid of muck with this steel-framed Greenworks 1,900 PSI electric pressure washer at new $118 low (Today only)

As part of its Deals of the Day, Best Buy is offering the best rate yet on the Greenworks 1,900 PSI Steel-Framed Cold Water Electric Pressure Washer for $117.99 shipped. This model usually goes for $200 in full, with the discounts we’ve seen taking things as low as $120 over the past year. That rate is getting beaten out here by $2 for the rest of the day only, providing you a total of $82 in savings and marking a new all-time low. You won’t find this model currently available at Amazon, nor is it getting any discounts direct from Greenworks either. Below, you’ll also find a secondary one-day-only deal on a cleaning attachment that amplifies its capabilities.

Sporting a durable open steel frame design, the 13A motor on this Greenworks pressure washer provides you with up to 1,900 PSI at a 1.2 GPM flow rate to tackle the muck and grime along driveways, walkways, and the like. You won’t need to wrestle with pull strings, as it starts up with the press of a button, not to mention its electrical functionality, getting rid of the fumes and costs from gas – plus, it even has a waterproof plug at the end of its 35-foot power cord to ensure extra protection. You’ll have on-board storage for the included nozzles, the hose, and the metal spray gun, as well as an integrated soap tank for detergent when you need some extra cleaning power.

A secondary deal lasting the rest of the day that compliments the above or any of the brand’s pressure washers, is the 12-inch Surface Cleaner Attachment for $20.99 shipped, down from $40. It has a quick-connect feature for a faster and more effortless setup, with dual cleaning nozzles on its underside to level up the pressure washer’s cleaning power and coverage area.

Best Spring EV deals!

Best new Green Deals landing this week

The savings this week are also continuing to a collection of other markdowns. To the same tune as the offers above, these all help you take a more energy-conscious approach to your routine. Winter means you can lock in even better off-season price cuts on electric tools for the lawn while saving on EVs and tons of other gear.

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