In his first interview after taking over the exchange’s reconstruction, the new FTX CEO John J. Ray III talked about the company in light of the recent news that FTX debtors and bankruptcy administrators discovered $5.5 billion in liquid assets. Ray said in the interview that he is open to the idea of bringing the long-since-shuttered digital currency trading site back to life.
FTX CEO John J. Ray III Explores Reviving the Fallen Crypto Exchange
John J. Ray III, the new FTX CEO and chief restructuring officer (CRO), conducted his first interview following the company’s filing for bankruptcy on November 11, 2022. The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) was informed by Ray that reopening the cryptocurrency exchange might be worthwhile and that “everything is on the table.” Ray’s interview came after the bankruptcy team and FTX debtors recently issued a press release and made a presentation to the committee of unsecured creditors.
According to Ray, if there is a way to go with [rebooting FTX], “we will not only explore that, we’ll do it.”
According to the presentation made to the committee of unsecured creditors, $5.5 billion in so-called “liquid assets” have been found. However, it is questionable if the stockpile of locked SOL and cache of FTX token (FTT) fall under the concept of “liquid.” The bankruptcy team explained that in addition to the $5.5 billion already known, another $4.5 billion may be recovered by selling subsidiaries and promoting FTX’s property in The Bahamas. There are stakeholders with whom the debtors are collaborating, according to Ray, and they “have recognised what they regard as a viable business.”
Sam Bankman-Fried, the former CEO of FTX, and the new CEO discuss their differences and criticise Inner Circle’s “spending spree.”
Since it has been reported that the new CEO of FTX has avoided contact with the discredited co-founder of FTX, Ray also discussed the former CEO, Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF). Ray told the WSJ, “We don’t need to be conversing with him. He has not revealed anything to us that I am not previously aware of. SBF, who responded to The WSJ, described Ray’s commentary as “shocking.”
SBF informed the WSJ that the statement was “shocking and devastating from someone purporting to care about customers.” Ray has a different perspective than SBF, and the co-Excel founder’s balance sheet idea was even questioned by the chief restructuring officer. Ray informed the WSJ interviewer that “this is the issue.” He believes that everything is a giant honey pot.
Ray admitted that throughout his whole career of restructuring businesses, he had never encountered anything like FTX. Ray emphasised, “They went on a spending binge. The FTX CEO said, “Occasionally there were no purchase agreements or the agreements weren’t signed. SBF again refuted Ray’s allegations that the co-founder believed everything was similar to a giant honey pot.
SBF texted the WSJ, “Mr. Ray continues to make fraudulent statements based on nonexistent computations.” If Mr. Ray had tried to consider FTX US carefully, he would have likely concluded that his interpretation is completely at odds with bankruptcy law and that even if $250 million were to be subtracted from my balance sheet, FTX US would *still* have been insolvent.