FTX Takes Legal Action to Retrieve $700M from "Super-Networker" Investment Firm

Alameda Research, the hedge fund arm of bankrupt FTX, is seeking the return of $700 million paid to "super networkers" Michael Kives and Bryan Baum for access to celebrities and politicians. Lawyers for FTX's new management allege that Kives and Baum acted with dishonest minds by accepting money that personally benefited founder Sam Bankman-Fried without providing Alameda with any equivalent payoff. Transfers of $700 million made from Bankman-Fried's companies to Kives' and Baum's had the badges of fraud under bankruptcy law, being concealed, having inflated value, and being made when FTX was about to become insolvent, the filing said.