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Caroline Ellison Former Alameda CEO Released from Prison After 440 Days

https://www.sec.gov/enforcement-litigation/litigation-releases/lr-26450
56•sizzle•1h ago

Comments

leshokunin•1h ago
Good luck finding a friend group after this. It’s gonna be right wing crypto bros only from now on.
olalonde•52m ago
She's probably one of the most hated person in crypto...
arwt•42m ago
There are hundreds of shady crypto projects in the world right now, each one shadier than the last.

World order is out of the door, and has been for a while -- they are all probably fighting amongst themselves to get her onto their board ASAP.

SilverElfin•1h ago
> Without denying the Commission’s allegations, Ellison, Wang, and Singh consented to the entry of final judgments, subject to court approval, in which they agreed to be permanently enjoined from violating the antifraud provisions of Section 10(b) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and Rule 10b-5 thereunder and Section 17(a) of the Securities Act of 1933, and to 5-year conduct-based injunctions. Ellison also consented to a 10-year officer-and-director bar, and Wang and Singh consented to 8-year officer-and-director bars.

That’s a really light sentence for someone who defrauded people out of billions. Meanwhile many languish in prison for a lot less. It’s a two tier justice system, and the wealthy can get out of consequences with the right connections or donations.

Next up, Elizabeth Holmes - once her family donates enough to the MAGA PAC.

moralestapia•1h ago
100%

Even if you "cooperate", that shouldn't be an 80-90% sentence reduction. She was part of the fraud, consciously, for years!

cortesoft•34m ago
Even if we all agree this is true, you still have to think practically. If we don't give a big incentive to turn on your co-conspirators, no one will turn and you might not be able to convict any of them.
moralestapia•29m ago
>Can someone think of the criminals?

SBF was screwed with or without Ellison's testimony.

It should be the other way around. You get 10 years. You don't want to cooperate? Great! You get another 10.

xnx•44m ago
> That’s a really light sentence for someone who defrauded people out of billions

I don't excuse anything that she did, but didn't 98% of investors get everything back with interest?

cosmicgadget•28m ago
I wanna say that was the FTX story, not Alameda.
kingofmen•28m ago
They did, but not through any virtue or skill on her part. That was just the plain luck of Bitcoin happening to go way way up before the bankruptcy estate paid out using what it had, and the court that sentenced her couldn't know that would happen and if it somehow had, should not have taken it into account. You wouldn't advocate a lighter sentence for murder if the bullet had miraculously been struck by lightning on its way to the target's skull and thereby missed.
decimalenough•26m ago
Well, actually you would, because that would change it from murder to attempted murder.
moralestapia•27m ago
Criminal law deals with intents not with outcomes.

Hence why "attempted murder" is a thing.

decimalenough•27m ago
Maybe, on paper, some day in the indeterminate future, and likely without interest.

For comparison, MtGox went tits up twelve years ago in 2014 and they're still figuring out repayments for its BTC holders, which is both a hell of a lot simpler than FTX's grab bag of own tokens etc and has gone up a zillion percent since 2014.

estearum•27m ago
Only by accident of BTC's appreciation while the fraud+bankruptcy were underway. Not sure that should be a mitigating factor.
bz_bz_bz•23m ago
Investors? No. Customers? They were paid the cash value of their crypto holdings at the time of bankruptcy. Thanks to a massive bull run in crypto between bankruptcy and payout, customers were able to be paid back in “full” even with the fraud. However, when BTC is sitting at $60k and your missing BTC is being paid back at $17k, you’re not exactly going to be feeling giddy.
treetalker•59m ago
Mismatch of title; linked article is not about her release. For that, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46728538

But it's true: master has given Dobby a sock

olalonde•52m ago
Yes she cooperated and pleaded early, but damn, she got off easy compared to SBF.
akerl_•33m ago
It turns out sentencing cares whether you’re cooperative and contrite or you stand by having done nothing wrong.
uejfiweun•30m ago
Eh, I am pretty sure Trump is gonna end up pardoning SBF. It just seems like the sort of thing that is going to happen.
dboreham•18m ago
Does SBF still have money?
olalonde•16m ago
Not sure what he would gain from that. The crypto community largely backed him in the last election, and pardoning SBF would seriously piss them off.
unfunco•10m ago
> Not sure what he would gain from that.

What? It's a bribe, he gains money. He doesn't care about pissing anyone off, he's (probably) not running for reelection, he cares about money, it's really that simple.

cosmicgadget•21m ago
Well running an investment firm into the ground is more legal than using deposited funds in an exchange to bail out an investment firm that is being run into the ground.
olalonde•11m ago
She didn't just run Alameda to the ground. She knew Alameda was using FTX customer funds, which makes her directly complicit. She got off easy because of her cooperation and guilty plea.
cosmicgadget•26m ago
Future federal reserve chair Caroline Ellison.
ripped_britches•26m ago
comma in the title would be nice!
decimalenough•23m ago
Link does not actually say anything about Ellison being released? Try this instead:

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/jan/22/ftx-crypt...

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Caroline Ellison Former Alameda CEO Released from Prison After 440 Days

https://www.sec.gov/enforcement-litigation/litigation-releases/lr-26450
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