Users of the decentralized prediction market platform Polymarket have bet that Sam Bankman-Fried, former CEO of the bankrupt crypto exchange FTX, will receive a pardon from U.S. President Donald Trump.
The prediction market, which amassed over $10 million in total volume, contains a nearly $227,000 bet that Trump will pardon Bankman-Fried within the president's first 100 days in office. In November 2023, Bankman-Fried was charged on seven criminal counts, including wire fraud, and was later sentenced to nearly 25 years in prison for his role in the collapse of crypto exchange FTX. His odds of achieving a presidential pardon sit at 4% on Polymarket.
The same prediction market contained $6 million in trading volume for the bet that Trump would pardon Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht, which indeed occurred one day after Trump's inauguration.
Ross Ulbricht owned and operated the dark web marketplace Silk Road, which facilitated illicit drug sales and accepted bitcoin as payment, from 2011 until the platform's closure in 2013. In 2015, a New York court sentenced Ulbricht to serve life in prison and ordered him to forfeit nearly $184 million connected to his convictions regarding distributing narcotics, conspiring to distribute narcotics, conspiring to commit money laundering and four other charges.
On his campaign trail for the 2024 U.S. presidential election, Trump promised that, if elected, he would make strides for the crypto industry and key players within it. These promises not only included creating a strategic bitcoin reserve and appointing the first-ever crypto-specific White House position, but also pardoning Ulbricht.
Trump signed a "full and unconditional" pardon for Ulbricht on Tuesday, The Block previously reported.
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