SBF legal fees, BTC market cap flips Meta and USDC climbs back to $1: Hodler’s Digest, March 12-18

By Cointelegraph | Cryptocurrency | 8 day ago (18 Mar, 2023, 15:30 PM (UTC+04:00))

Sam Bankman-Fried petitions court to prioritize reimbursing his legal fees

Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) is seeking to use FTX’s corporate insurance policies to cover his legal expenses, according to a court filing on March 15. As per the filing, the policies provide priority of payment to insured individuals such as Bankman-Fried. The move would put the former CEO on top of the FTX payout list. Another headline shows that Bankman-Fried’s inner circle received $3.2 billion in payments and loans from FTX-linked entities. The amounts exclude over $240 million used for the purchases of luxury properties in the Bahamas, political and charity donations, as well as substantial transfers to non-FTX subsidiaries. In another headline, FTX debtors reported $11.6 billion in claims and $4.8 billion in assets, meaning theres a $6.8 billion hole in the exchange’s balance sheet.

Signature Bank (NASDAQ:SBNY) closed by New York regulators for not providing data

Crypto-friendly Signature Bank was officially closed down and taken over by the New York Department of Financial Services on March 12 for failing to provide consistent and reliable data. The bank has been investigated by two United States government bodies over whether it took adequate measures to monitor and detect potential money laundering by its clients. Former member of the U.S. House of Representatives Barney Frank suggested that New York regulators closed Signature as part of a seeming show of force against the crypto market.