Alameda Research Liquidates Ethereum-Based Token Holdings for Bitcoin

Several tokens held by Sam Bankman-Fried’s embattled trading business Alameda Research were sold late on Wednesday to the tune of millions of dollars, as the firm's founders face criminal charges related to the collapse of Alameda and FTX, the crypto exchange Bankman-Fried ran.

On-chain data cited by crypto research firm Arkham Intelligence suggested $1.7 million worth of tokens from Alameda-linked wallets was sold in the open market over a span of several hours on Wednesday. That sparked concerns on Crypto Twitter that the sales would trigger a steep fall in the prices of those tokens.

Bankman-Fried denied being the source of the sales in a tweet on Friday afternoon, saying "I'm not and couldn't be moving any of those funds; I don't have access to them anymore."

On-chain data showed Ethereum-based tokens such as USD coin (USDC), dai (DAI), curve (CRV), ether (ETH), convex (CVX) and others were consolidated from several wallets to just two wallets and later sold for tether (USDT) stablecoin.

The value of the transactions ranged from a fraction of an ether to over 15 ether, the on-chain data shows. The holdings were then converted into bitcoin (BTC) using swapping services like FixedFloat and ChangeNow, on-chain sleuth ZachXBT noted in a tweet.

According to Arkham Intelligence data, Alameda still holds over $112 million worth of various cryptocurrencies, down from $140 million held in mid-November, as CoinDesk previously reported.

FTX filed for bankruptcy in November after revelations that Alameda, a hedge fund that Bankman-Fried also owned, was largely backed by FTT tokens, digital assets that FTX created out of thin air.

UPDATE (Dec. 30, 19:49 UTC): Updated with tweet from Sam Bankman-Fried.