Last Updated on November 26, 2022 by Bitfinsider

Authorities in Turkey are attempting to recover “suspicious assets” connected to the defunct cryptocurrency exchange FTX and are looking into Sam Bankman-Fried, the platform’s founder.

The Financial Crimes Investigation Board of the nation, or MASAK, announced on Wednesday that it had requested permission from the Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office to launch “an investigation for various antecedent crimes and laundering the property values arising from the crime” and to “confiscate the suspicious assets” in accordance with local law.

Regulators in the several nations where the platform had a local presence have reacted after an article questioning Sam Bankman-Fried’s crypto empire financial soundness kicked off a chain of events that concluded in a bankruptcy case in the U.S., especially in The Bahamas, where FTX was based.

MASAK has also been looking into FTX Turkey, the exchange’s regional affiliate, since November 14. The ongoing investigations have revealed that the defunct company “not duly preserved” the customers’ trust, and the authorities have “a strong suspicion of crime,” particularly in relation to Bankman-Fried, who “directly or indirectly” controls the entities and individuals through which FTX operates in Turkey, according to the notice.

The notice said in Turkish: “As a result of our aforementioned application, a judicial investigation was opened against the suspects and a confiscation measure was applied to the assets of the suspects.”