TechFlow reported, citing The Block, that former Alameda Research CEO Caroline Ellison testified in court, revealing an incident related to a Chinese government anti-money laundering investigation. According to her testimony, in 2021, accounts held by Alameda on Huobi and OKX—valued at approximately $1 billion—were frozen due to the investigation, while SBF was serving as Alameda's CEO.
To unfreeze these accounts, Alameda first attempted to hire Chinese lawyers to negotiate with authorities, but this effort failed. Subsequently, the firm resorted to a series of unusual strategies, including creating several accounts using IDs from multiple Thai sex workers, attempting to manipulate imbalanced trades so that the main account would incur losses while enabling profits and fund withdrawals from other accounts. Employees also proposed bribing Chinese officials to unlock the accounts; initially, SBF objected but later agreed. Ellison stated that ultimately, the accounts were unfrozen through payments of bribes to Chinese government officials.
SBF currently faces seven fraud charges in his ongoing trial. Even if acquitted, he will face a second trial on five additional charges, scheduled for March next year. These include bank fraud and conspiracy to commit foreign bribery. Prosecutors allege that the alleged bribes paid to Chinese officials violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. SBF has pleaded not guilty.
