FTX Halts Sale of $500M Stake in AI Startup amid Recovery Efforts

<p>FTX has halted the sale of its stake in Anthropic, an
artificial intelligence company, that is valued at $500 million. It is one of the largest investments by the bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange,
besides an investment of $1.5 billion in Genesis Digital. </p><p>According to people
familiar with the matter who shared information with Bloomberg on the condition
of anonymity, the investment firm Parella Weinberg Partners, which acts as an advisor to FTX, has informed bidders about the pause.</p><p>FTX’s Most-Valuable
Asset</p><p>Prior to the pause, several companies had reportedly
expressed interest in buying the stake thanks to the current <a href="https://www.financemagnates.com/terms/a/artificial-intelligence-ai/" target="_blank" rel="follow">boom
in AI</a>. According to an earlier report by Semafor, Perella
Weinberg was planning to dispose of hundreds of millions of dollars worth of
shares in Anthropic on behalf of FTX.</p><p>Founded in 2021 by
former OpenAI employees, Anthropic has surged in popularity due to the current AI boom, and the initial investment by FTX is believed to be more.
Anthropic raised $450 million in a Series C <a href="https://www.financemagnates.com/terms/f/funding-round/">funding round</a> in May at a
reported valuation of $4.6 million.</p><p>The company features an AI
assistant that it claims can be used as a customer service agent or a sales
representative. The AI chatbot rivals OpenAI’s ChatGPT and can reportedly be instructed to perform various tasks, including
answering questions. </p><p>FTX Asset Recovery
Report </p><p>The postponement of the sale further delays efforts to recover an estimated
$2 billion owed to FTX investors. In a <a href="https://www.financemagnates.com/cryptocurrency/ftx-bankruptcy-team-releases-second-investigative-report-7b-recovered/" target="_blank" rel="follow">report</a> by <a href="https://www.financemagnates.com/" target="_blank" rel="follow">Finance Magnates</a>, FTX’s bankruptcy team
tasked with recoveries said it had since recovered $7 billion out of the $8.7
billion owed to customers.</p><p>According to the investigative report by John Ray, the CEO of FTX leading the recovery of users' funds, $6.4 billion of the money FTX owes to its customers was identified to be in fiat currency
and <a href="https://www.financemagnates.com/terms/s/stablecoin/" target="_blank" rel="follow">stablecoins</a>,
which were reportedly misappropriated.</p><p>Also
detailed in the report were alleged investments in luxurious real estate in the Bahamas, political and charitable donations, speculative
trading, venture investments, and acquisitions by the former FTX executives. FTX is undergoing bankruptcy
proceedings in Delaware, while its Founder Sam Bankman-Fried is <a href="https://www.financemagnates.com/cryptocurrency/ftxs-bankman-fried-pleads-not-guilty-to-40m-chinese-bribery-charge/" target="_blank" rel="follow">facing
criminal charges</a>.</p>

This article was written by Jared Kirui at www.financemagnates.com.