Biden | Crypto

Alan Lane said a “coordinated attack” by the Biden administration made Silvergate’s continued operation untenable and prompted its liquidation. Former Silvergate Bank CEO Alan Lane said political and regulatory pressure from the Biden administration drove the crypto-focused lender’s voluntary wind-down in 2023, arguing that the bank remained solvent after weathering a deposit run. In an inaugural Substack post on Tuesday, Lane said Silvergate could have continued operating after satisfying withdrawals equivalent to 70% of its demand deposits during the fourth quarter of 2022. He argued that a “coordinated attack by the Biden Administration” ultimately led to the wind-down, saying the bank chose liquidation “in the face of political pressure.” Lane said Silvergate had held liquid assets that could be sold or pledged as collateral during periods of heavy withdrawals. In a January 2023 business update, the bank reported that digital asset deposits fell 68% from $11.9 billion to $3.8 billion during the quarter. S...

Sam Bankman-Fried seeks a new FTX trial, alleging DOJ witness pressure and citing a declaration disputing the prosecution’s insolvency claims, according to a new filing. Sam “SBF” Bankman-Fried claims to have “new evidence“ that the US Department of Justice (DOJ) under former President Joe Biden silenced key witnesses in his fraud case, as he pushes for a new trial. “New evidence shows that Biden’s DOJ threatened multiple witnesses into silence or into changing their testimony. My conviction should be thrown out,“ said SBF in his latest X post from prison on Wednesday. He linked to a court filing seeking a new trial under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 33. The motion, submitted Thursday, references a declaration from a former FTX employee and follows earlier reporting that SBF is attempting to challenge his fraud conviction through previously unavailable witness testimony. Read more

The following is a guest post and analysis from Shane Neagle, Editor In Chief from The Tokenist. Although the Terra (LUNA) collapse pricked the crypto bubble in May 2022, it took the FTX exchange catastrophe to firmly pop it at the year’s end. Ever since, the blockchain narrative has been supplanted by the AI hype. […] The post DeFi resurgence 2025: Layer-1 leaders poised for a post-Biden comeback appeared first on CryptoSlate.