Three news to start your week: July 3
Trump SPAC investors charged in $22 million scheme
(Bloomberg)
Indictments against three investors in the special purpose acquisition company that has agreed to take Trump Media & Technology Group Corp. public allege that they made $22 million in unauthorized trades using inside knowledge of the deal.
A SPAC called Digital World Acquisition Corp. has agreed to merge with Trump Media, which manages Donald Trump's "Truth Social" network, and become public.
A federal indictment released in federal court in Manhattan identified Michael Shvartsman, the CEO of Rocket One Capital LLC, and his brother Gerald Shvartsman. Bruce Garelick, Rocket's chief investment officer and a director of DWAC, was also mentioned.
In this case, Trump is neither accused nor mentioned in any accusations.
Bankman-Fried loses bid to toss criminal charges over FTX's collapse
(Reuters)
Last week, a federal court denied Sam Bankman-Fried's request to overturn the majority of the U.S. government's criminal case against him for allegedly organizing a multibillion-dollar fraud.
The 31-year-old former billionaire Bankman-Fried will be tried on October 2 due to the ruling by U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan in Manhattan.
According to the prosecution, Bankman-Fried was charged with the theft of billions of dollars in FTX customer funds to cover losses at his Alameda Research hedge fund.
Additionally, they charged Bankman-Fried with deceiving lenders and investors and making unauthorized contributions to political campaigns in the United States in the name of associates.
Farewell to the Petro, Nicolás Maduro's failed cryptocurrency
(El País)
The end of the Petro, the state cryptocurrency that offered guaranteed backing with national oil and gold, based on blockchain technology and launched with an enormous promotional effort by the government of Nicolás Maduro, is near. Among the economic and financial sources consulted, it is assumed that the instrument will gradually die, on the way to its definitive liquidation, after presumably taking debts and closing commitments with creditors, linked above all to the commercial sector.
Since the end of May, as reported by users, the Petro blockchain began to behave irregularly, and the #PetroApp platform started to show failures. The PDVSA corruption scheme, Crypto, structured by a network of high-ranking officials linked to Tarek El Aissami, until last February, president of Petróleos de Venezuela and vice-president of the Economic Area of the government of Nicolás Maduro, is one of the fundamental reasons for this umpteenth failed experiment in public policy that chavismo is trying out.
