FTT Slips to $0.21 After Senate Rejects SBF Pardon Bid

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The United States Senate has unanimously passed a resolution declaring that FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried should under no circumstances receive a presidential pardon or commutation, a symbolic rebuke that rippled through holders of the exchange's native altcoin, FTT. The measure, S. Res. 772, cleared the chamber Wednesday by unanimous consent — a procedure that advances a resolution only if no single senator objects. Beyond its stance on Bankman-Fried, the text affirmed the Senate's commitment to the rule of law and the integrity of the U.S. financial system. Though non-binding, the vote marks the clearest congressional signal yet against clemency for the disgraced FTX founder.

The resolution was steered by Senators Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming and Ruben Gallego of Arizona, the top Republican and Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee's digital-assets subcommittee. The pair introduced the measure on June 17, with Lummis — long regarded as the crypto industry's most committed advocate in Congress — stating that Bankman-Fried had already had his day in court. Gallego was blunter, closing his statement with four words: keep him locked up. The rare bipartisan alignment underscores how far the FTX collapse has soured lawmakers who otherwise clash on nearly every aspect of digital-asset policy.

A jury convicted Bankman-Fried in November 2023 on seven counts tied to the implosion of FTX, including wire fraud, securities fraud and money-laundering conspiracy. Prosecutors described the episode as one of the largest financial frauds in U.S. history, with American customers losing more than $8 billion. Under his 25-year sentence, he is not eligible to apply for release until around 2044. His legal options have narrowed sharply: a federal appeals court upheld the fraud conviction last month, closing off one of the few remaining avenues that could have shortened his time behind bars.

As a non-binding resolution, the vote carries no legal force and cannot curb the president's constitutional authority to grant clemency. President Donald Trump said in January that he had no plans to pardon Bankman-Fried, though his administration has extended clemency to other prominent figures, including Binance founder Changpeng Zhao and Silk Road creator Ross Ulbricht. That precedent had fueled speculation among traders that a pardon remained on the table — speculation the Senate's unanimous stance is plainly designed to counter. For now, Congress and the White House appear aligned against any softening of the founder's fate.

The FTT token sits at the heart of how FTX unravelled. Bankman-Fried simultaneously controlled FTX — a centralized crypto exchange that, unlike an automated market maker, held customer deposits directly — and Alameda Research, a trading firm that funneled billions of those deposits into venture bets, political donations and Bahamas real estate. In November 2022, disclosures revealed that much of Alameda's balance sheet rested on FTT, the exchange's own thinly traded token, raising alarm over the quality of its collateral. Binance's subsequent decision to offload its FTT holdings triggered the liquidity run that collapsed the exchange within days, obliterating the token's value far below its all-time high.

The Senate vote responded directly to a formal clemency petition Bankman-Fried submitted this month to the Justice Department's Office of the Pardon Attorney, seeking a post-sentence pardon. News of that filing had sent FTT sharply higher, with the speculative token spiking as much as 60% as traders wagered on a Trump reprieve that could theoretically revive the defunct exchange's brand. That optimism has since faded. With lawmakers now formally on record against any clemency, the rationale behind FTT's rally has weakened, leaving the token exposed to the broader bear market backdrop gripping smaller-cap assets.

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