Present FTX CEO John J. Ray III is pushing again towards his disgraced predecessor Sam Bankman-Fried’s claims that prospects misplaced “zero” cash within the alternate’s 2022 collapse, calling them “categorically, callously, and demonstrably false.”In a sufferer affect assertion penned by Ray on behalf of FTX and its subsidiaries, Ray informed New York District Court docket Choose Lewis Kaplan that Bankman-Fried’s “delusional” claims that his alternate was solvent are a “mischaracterization” of the property’s January assertion that they anticipate to pay prospects again in full.Bankman-Fried and his authorized workforce have leaned closely on the property’s restoration, arguing in his February sentencing submission that the “hurt to prospects, lenders, and buyers is zero” and, as such, Choose Kaplan ought to take into account a most sentence of 6.5 years in jail – far lower than the 40-50 yr sentence beneficial by prosecutors or the 100 yr sentence prompt by the probation division.However simply because the FTX property was in a position to scrape collectively sufficient cash to pay again the alternate’s prospects – massively aided by the run-up in bitcoin’s worth in addition to the “tens of 1000’s of hours…spent digging by means of the rubble of Mr. Bankman-Fried’s sprawling legal enterprise to unearth each potential greenback, token, or different asset” – doesn’t imply that Bankman-Fried’s habits was not legal, Ray argued.Ray informed the court docket that, when he took over, the alternate’s coffers have been almost empty – a mere 105 bitcoins remained on the platform, in contrast with the almost 100,000 bitcoins prospects have been entitled to.A few of the misplaced belongings have been recovered, Ray stated, whereas others, together with bribes to Chinese language officers and the “lots of of hundreds of thousands of {dollars}” Bankman-Fried spent on numerous investments or shopping for entry to celebrities and politicians are gone for good.“The hurt was huge. The regret is nonexistent,” Ray wrote within the Wednesday court docket submitting. “Efficient altruism, at the least as lived by Sam Bankman-Fried, was a lie.”Ray informed the court docket that, regardless of the present plan to get their a refund, a lot of FTX’s prospects stay “extraordinarily sad” with the valuation of their funds.As a result of prospects can be refunded primarily based on the worth of their portfolios on the time of the chapter – not at this time’s a lot larger worth – they may “by no means be returned to the identical financial place they might have been in at this time absent [Bankman-Fried’s] colossal fraud,” Ray argued.In their very own sufferer affect statements filed earlier this week, dozens of FTX prospects detailed the emotional and monetary toll the alternate’s collapse had on their private lives.“There ought to be no delusion that as a result of belongings have elevated in worth or that the professionals have been in a position to recuperate funds and belongings taken or stolen from the property, that there was no want [to file for bankruptcy],” Ray wrote. “Make no mistake; prospects, non-governmental collectors, governmental collectors, and non-insider stockholders have suffered and proceed to endure.”Bankman-Fried is scheduled to be sentenced on March 28.