Sam Bankman-Fried says FTX always had enough assets to repay customers, claiming the exchange faced a liquidity crunch rather than a true balance sheet gap, and that current recoveries prove his point.
In a document dated Sept. 30, 2025, Bankman-Fried and his team contend the $8b owed to customers at the time of FTX’s Nov. 2022 bankruptcy “never left.”
He writes that customers will get between 119% and 143% of what they were owed at the time of FTX’s bankruptcy, with about 98% already repaid 120%. After covering $8b in claims and $1b in legal fees, the estate still holds around $8b. The document states, “In fact, FTX was never insolvent.”
“There have always been enough assets to repay all customers—in full, in kind—both in November 2022, and today,” Bankman-Fried wrote.
The authors claim deals were in motion to bridge the shortfall by late Nov. 2022 and that customer withdrawals were resuming. The narrative disputes the bankruptcy team’s early statements about shortfalls. It argues FTX and Alameda assets exceeded liabilities in 2021 and through mid-2022, and that the estate’s own Jan. 2023 materials showed assets roughly equal to or above customer claims as of the filing date.
He frames the collapse as a classic run on the bank. Withdrawals spiked to billions in days, the paper says, while the company sought asset sales and financing and continued to generate trading fees.