Autor Cointelegraph By Jesse Coghlan

A Manhattan federal judge has denied FTX CEO and co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried’s motion for a new trial, rejecting his claim that there is new evidence.Judge Lewis Kaplan, who oversaw Bankman-Fried’s trial in 2023 and sentenced him to 25 years in prison in early 2024, wrote in an order on Tuesday that Bankman-Fried’s claim of new evidence and witnesses was baseless.“This motion appears to be one part of a plan to rescue his reputation that Bankman-Fried hatched and even committed to writing after FTX declared bankruptcy but before he was indicted,” Judge Kaplan wrote.Bankman-Fried in February had requested a new trial to be overseen by a different judge, making the rare move of filing a motion without consulting his lawyers and while an appeals court was considering his conviction and sentence.On Wednesday, Bankman-Fried asked to withdraw his request, telling Judge Kaplan he didn’t believe he would “get a fair hearing on this topic in front of you,” which the judge denied.Sam Bankman-Fried appeared on a podcast in March 2025 while being held at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. Source: YouTubeIn his order, Judge Kaplan wrote that Bankman-Fried’s claim that three former FTX executives could counter the government’s arguments that FTX was insolvent was “baseless on multiple independently sufficient levels.”“None of the witnesses, for example, is ‘newly discovered.’ Bankman-Fried well before trial knew all three of them and purportedly knew also what he hoped they would say were they to testify,” Kaplan wrote.Bankman-Fried argued that two former FTX executives who didn’t testify — Ryan Salame, the former CEO of FTX’s Bahamian arm and Daniel Chapsky, FTX’s former head of data science — could counter the government’s claims about the exchange’s financial health.Salame separately pleaded guilty to violating campaign finance laws and operating an illegal money-transmitting business. He was sentenced to seven and a half years in prison in May 2024.Related: Sam Bankman-Fried ramps up Trump support following Ellison’s releaseHe also argued that Nishad Singh, FTX’s former engineering lead, who cut a plea deal with prosecutors to avoid jail and testified against Bankman-Fried at trial, changed his testimony “following threats from the government.”Judge Kaplan said Bankman-Fried could have sought to compel testimony from the trio but didn’t, and his claim that their absence or decision to testify against him was a result of government threats “is wildly conspiratorial and entirely contradicted by the record.”Bankman-Fried was found guilty on seven criminal charges related to fraud and money laundering, with a jury finding he illegally transferred billions of dollars of FTX customer money to the trading firm Alameda Research to make risky trades that contributed to the exchange’s collapse.Bankman-Fried is being held in a federal prison in Lompoc, California.Magazine: How crypto laws changed in 2025 — and how they’ll change in 2026Cointelegraph is committed to independent, transparent journalism. This news article is produced in accordance with Cointelegraph’s Editorial Policy and aims to provide accurate and timely information. Readers are encouraged to verify information independently.

US President Donald Trump has softened his stance on prediction markets just days after he bemoaned the surging interest and popularity of the betting platforms.“I don’t know. I know some people who are very smart. They like it,” Trump told reporters in Florida on Saturday after he was asked about his earlier comments, in which he said he didn’t support prediction markets. “They disagree, but they like it.”“A lot of other countries are doing it, and when the other countries do it, we get left out in the cold if we don’t do it,” he said.Donald Trump speaking to reporters in Florida before departing for Washington, DC. Source: YouTubeTrump’s latest comments came after he told reporters at the White House on Thursday that he was “not happy” with prediction markets in response to a question about well-timed bets on events linked to the Iran war.“Well, you know, the whole world, unfortunately, has become somewhat of a casino,” Trump said on Thursday. “And you look at what’s going on all over the world and Europe, and every place they’re doing these betting things. I was never much in favor of it. I don’t like it conceptually, but it is what it is.”“I think that I’m not happy with any of that stuff, but they have all these different sites of predictive markets. It’s a crazy world. It’s a much different world than it was,” he added.Prediction markets such as the popular Polymarket and Kalshi have surged in use over the past year, with the two platforms together seeing a record $23.6 billion in trading volumes in March, according to Token Terminal.Related: CFTC sues New York over bid to apply gambling laws to prediction marketsTrump’s son Donald Trump Jr. invested in Polymarket in August and joined the company’s advisory board. He is also an adviser to rival Kalshi, taking on the role in January 2025.President Trump could also soon have an interest in prediction markets. His company, Trump Media, said in October that it would roll out prediction markets in partnership with Crypto.com on its flagship social media site, Truth Social.Trump divested his stake in Trump Media upon entering office, transferring his shares to a trust for which Trump Jr. is the sole trustee.Magazine: Should users be allowed to bet on war and death in prediction markets?Cointelegraph is committed to independent, transparent journalism. This news article is produced in accordance with Cointelegraph’s Editorial Policy and aims to provide accurate and timely information. Readers are encouraged to verify information independently.

Republican US Senator Thom Tillis said he won’t support the Senate’s crypto market structure bill unless it includes ethics provisions limiting how White House officials can use crypto.“There has to be ethics language in the bill before it leaves the Senate, or I’ll go from one of the people working on negotiating it to voting against it,” Tillis told Politico on Monday.Democratic Senator Ruben Gallego said that there is “no final bill — there is no final movement — unless there is a bipartisan agreement when it comes to the ethics provision.”Tillis, who is retiring early next year, is a senior member of the Senate Banking Committee, which is key to advancing the Senate bill. The House passed a version of it, called the CLARITY Act, in July.Thom Tillis, pictured at a meeting in 2024, says he won’t support a crypto bill without an ethics provision. Source: City of Greenville, North CarolinaThe bill carves up crypto regulation between the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and the Securities and Exchange Commission and has been plagued by delays as lawmakers and lobbyists seek to add provisions on ethics and stablecoin yield payments.Democratic lawmakers have heavily criticized the Trump family’s expanding crypto businesses and have sought to use the bill to crack down on a perceived conflict of interest.Related: Canada advances bill to ban crypto political donationsNow, lawmakers are reportedly saying talks on the ethics provisions are moving forward, but it’s not clear what the language will be.“We’re making progress,” Democratic Senator Adam Schiff told Politico. “We have been talking for a long time without making much progress, and now that other parts of the bill are starting to come together, we’re narrowing our differences.”Schiff said earlier this year that Democrats want “a ban on sponsoring, endorsing or issuing digital assets that applies to all federal employees,” including the president, who has backed a memecoin and non-fungible tokens bearing his name and likeness.Magazine: Will the CLARITY Act be good — or bad — for DeFi?Cointelegraph is committed to independent, transparent journalism. This news article is produced in accordance with Cointelegraph’s Editorial Policy and aims to provide accurate and timely information. Readers are encouraged to verify information independently.

The White House has reportedly confirmed that US President Donald Trump will attend the exclusive event for top TRUMP memecoin holders at his Florida residence on Saturday, after questions were raised earlier this month over whether he would attend.Reuters reported on Friday that the White House confirmed Trump would deliver a keynote address at the gala luncheon organized by the company behind his Official Trump (TRUMP) memecoin.The gala is set to take place at Mar-a-Lago. It will be open to the top 297 holders of the TRUMP token, and the top 29 holders will also qualify for a private reception with the president.When the event was announced in March, a White House official told Politico that it was not locked into Trump’s schedule and that it was taking place the same day Trump said he would attend the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner in Washington, DC, the first time he would do so as president.Donald Trump, pictured at a Turning Point USA event on April 17, is confirmed to be addressing an event for holders of his memecoin on April 25. Source: The White HouseThe event’s terms also state that Trump may not be able to attend the event, and it “may be canceled for any reason.”Trump’s potential attendance at the event has been a sticking point for some lawmakers, who have criticized the event as a conflict of interest for the president.Earlier this month, Democratic Senators Elizabeth Warren, Richard Blumenthal and Adam Schiff reportedly sent a letter to Bill Zanker, the individual behind the TRUMP memecoin, questioning whether Trump intends to “dangle access” to himself at the upcoming event.Related: Trump-linked American Bitcoin energizes 11,298 new ASICs“[O]rganizers are promoting a conference by dangling access to President Trump to potential attendees (and in doing so, are encouraging purchases of his meme coin that will generate transaction fees for the President and his family) on a day he may not actually be able to attend,” the letter said.It is the second event for holders of the TRUMP token. The first took place at a Trump golf club in May 2025 and drew criticism from those who said Trump was using his position as president for personal financial gain.Magazine: Quitting Trump’s top crypto job wasn’t easy: Bo HinesCointelegraph is committed to independent, transparent journalism. This news article is produced in accordance with Cointelegraph’s Editorial Policy and aims to provide accurate and timely information. Readers are encouraged to verify information independently.

Trading firm Jane Street has asked a US court to toss a lawsuit brought by the administrator of the bankrupt Terraform Labs, accusing the company of insider trading that worsened the collapse of the Terra ecosystem.In a motion to dismiss filed in a Manhattan federal court on Thursday, Jane Street argued Terraform’s suit was an attempt “to extract cash from Jane Street to foot the bill for a fraud that Terraform itself perpetrated on the market.”“Terraform now claims it was victimized by Jane Street’s trading,” it added. “The problem with this theory is that Terraform’s fraud scheme — in which Jane Street had no involvement — has already been prosecuted, adjudicated, and punished.”Terraform’s court-appointed administrator, Todd Snyder, sued Jane Street, co-founder Robert Granieri, and employees Bryce Pratt and Michael Huang in February, accusing them of trading Terra tokens after receiving nonpublic information from “Terraform insiders.”A highlighted excerpt of Jane Street’s motion argues it traded Terra-linked tokens based on market signals, not insider information. Source: CourtListenerTerraform collapsed in May 2022 after its algorithmic stablecoin, TerraUSD, rapidly lost its peg to the US dollar, sending the price of the highly interconnected LUNA token tumbling and wiping out $40 billion in value.Jane Street argued in its motion that investors “saw the public signs of that collapse,” and it moved to “sell a deteriorating investment as the market was visibly collapsing.”The firm claimed that the reasons for Terraform’s collapse had already been decided by a court, noting that its founder, Do Kwon, pleaded guilty to conspiracy and wire fraud charges, for which he was sentenced to 15 years in prison.Jane Street claimed that Terraform’s complaint was also “self-defeating,” as it had stated that Jane Street’s largest TerraUSD sale took place 10 minutes after “supposed material nonpublic information was visible to the market.”Related: Sam Bankman-Fried withdraws motion for a new trial, asks for new judgeIt said Terraform also didn’t identify any material, nonpublic information Jane Street received when it alleged the trading firm sold more tokens in early May 2022 as Terraform transitioned to a new liquidity pool.“Plaintiff pleads ‘on information and belief’ that Jane Street learned the timing of Terraform’s transition to a new liquidity pool through ‘back-channel communications,’ yet cannot identify a single communication disclosing that timing — despite extensive pre-suit discovery,” the motion said.Jane Street asked the court to dismiss the suit with prejudice, meaning Terraform cannot bring the same lawsuit against it again.Magazine: How to fix suspected insider trading on Polymarket and KalshiCointelegraph is committed to independent, transparent journalism. This news article is produced in accordance with Cointelegraph’s Editorial Policy and aims to provide accurate and timely information. Readers are encouraged to verify information independently.