Partnered With:

SBF trial scene: absent jury and the 'amnesiac' protagonist.

Joyceand others2Authors

Read this article in 9 Minutes

On Thursday earlier, FTX's SBF lawyer told the judge in court that SBF's testimony would take about four hours to address all the questions.

Yesterday, SBF appeared in court to testify. This is an important event in the FTX case over the past three weeks. BlockBeats has compiled and organized relevant information as follows:

Will be required to answer core questions

According to previous documents, Judge Lewis Kaplan, who is responsible for this case, allowed defense lawyers to ask SBF about the operation of FTX and how the company's lawyers participated in making these decisions. These questions include FTX's automatic deletion policy for Signal and Slack messages, the establishment of North Dimension and its bank accounts, loans provided by FTX and Alameda Research to its executives, and other issues.

SBF's defense team attempted to argue that SBF did not intend to deceive customers or investors, and that part of the company's efforts relied on the advice of lawyers. In this court appearance, SBF is expected to testify about whether he knew about the lawyer's involvement in certain aspects of FTX's operations, his understanding of industry practices, his intentions regarding FTX's funds in the event of a collapse, and his knowledge of the financial situation of FTX and Alameda.

Rare, no jury present

Due to the ongoing disagreement between the defense and prosecution over whether the interaction between SBF and the lawyer should be fairly discussed as a topic in the defense's cross-examination, the judge decided to question the witness in the absence of the jury. At around 2 pm Eastern Time, SBF appeared in court in Manhattan to testify, but the jurors were subsequently sent home.

Judge Lewis Kaplan told the jurors, "This may come as a surprise, but you have the rest of the day off." Kaplan also explained that this may be the first time in a long time, and possibly even during his tenure as a judge.

4 Hours of Testimony and Incomprehensible Explanations

Earlier on Thursday, SBF's lawyer in the FTX case told the judge that SBF's testimony would take about four hours to address all the questions. When facing questions from his own lawyer, SBF performed clearly and fluently.

During the lawyer's direct inquiry, SBF repeatedly cited the role of Daniel Friedberg, FTX's general counsel, in key business decisions. According to him, Friedberg was responsible for merging Alameda subsidiary North Dimension, whose bank account was once used to receive deposits from FTX users. He also prepared the application for the North Dimension bank account.

However, when answering questions from the prosecution later on, SBF made it "difficult to understand".

SBF denies having specific knowledge of the creation reasons of North Dimension, and even does not know the origin of its name. He claims that all he did was to sign some documents provided by his lawyer: "I have a lot of things passing through my desk every day, and I believe they are in the correct form."

The judge, in commenting on the particularly controversial dialogue between the defense and prosecution regarding the scope of questioning, said, "Witnesses have an interesting way of answering questions."

During the pursuit and questioning by Assistant Prosecutor Danielle Sassoon, SBF was asked to directly answer whether the payment agency agreement between FTX and Alameda Research stipulated that Alameda could use client funds.

Faced with this core issue, SBF said "unable to determine its own explanation".

Related reading: "Sam Bankman-Fried's Jurors Were Sent Home for the Day, but His Debut on the Stand Was Significant Anyway"

Although SBF was able to answer his lawyer's questions without hesitation, he spent nearly two minutes reviewing the documents. When he did come up with an answer - pointing hesitantly to a passage in the middle of the page - he admitted that he was "not a lawyer" and could not be certain of his interpretation.

When answering other questions, SBF will pause and speak to himself, often expressing his answers in a lengthy and convoluted manner using phrases such as "possibly," "I believe," and "to the best of my knowledge."

SBF says "I don't remember" the most. According to WSJ, SBF testified in court that he doesn't remember discussing the closure of Alameda Research with his senior deputy via the Signal messaging application in 2022. When asked if he remembers the conversation about how the company lost $13 billion, he said "I don't remember."