FTX co-founder Gary Wang avoids prison time in crypto fraud case

• Gary Wang is now the fifth former executive of collapsed crypto exchange FTX to be sentenced for their role in the company’s implosion.
• Wang received a sentence of time served and three years of supervised release and will forfeit $11 billion.
• Sam Bankman-Fried, Caroline Ellison, Nishad Singh and Ryan Salame are the other ex-FTX officials charged and sentenced.

Gary Wang, co-founder of collapsed crypto exchange FTX, has avoided a prison sentence after US Judge Lewis Kaplan of the Southern District of New York sentenced him to time served.

Wang also got a three-year supervised release sentence in a judgment rendered on Wednesday November 20, 2024, CNBC reported.

The ex-FTX exec, the fifth person criminally-charged in relation to FTX’s collapse amid fraud indictments, will also forfeit $11 billion – an order also handed to other defendants in the case.

Wang spared prison time

Judge Kaplan’s judgment comes a few weeks after another former FTX official Nishad Singh also avoided prison time. Wang cooperated with the prosecution against FTX founder and former CEO Sam Bankman-Fried, who received a 25-year prison sentence for his role in the implosion of the once top cryptocurrency exchange.

In his defense, Wang’s attorneys argued that the co-founder and former FTX chief technical officer did not have full visibility of the crimes that were unfolding at the exchange. He also had no knowledge of the events that engulfed FTX’s subsidiary and hedge fund Alameda Research.

Caroline Ellison, the head of Alameda Research and a star witness against Bankman-Fried, received a two-year sentence and recently reported to prison to begin her jail term.

The other former FTX employee/official to get sentenced to time in prison is Ryan Salame, who was jailed for seven and a half years in May.

Wang and Singh are the only ones to avoid prison time having been sentenced to time served. Judge Kaplan sentenced Singh to time served in October 2024.

For Wang, it’s his testimony against SBF and the overall agreement that he didn’t take a leading role in the crimes that helped him.

Also helping his case is the argument that the FTX co-founder has built an interface already helping the government in effort to detect potential fraud across the markets.

FTX collapsed in November 2022.