NEW YORK: The liquidators of the defunct cryptocurrency exchange FTX have sued to try to claw back $1.8 billion paid by the company to competitor Binance the year before its bankruptcy, according to court documents filed Sunday.

Binance owned a 20-percent stake in FTX, which FTX’s disgraced CEO Sam Bankman-Fried bought back on behalf of his company for $1.76 billion in July 2021.

According to court papers seen by AFP, FTX’s liquidators claim the transaction was fraudulent because FTX should have been considered insolvent at the time.

The company imploded after it was revealed that nearly $9 billion in customer deposits were missing after being spent by FTX’s sister company, Alameda Research, without customers’ knowledge.

After FTX filed for bankruptcy in November 2022, a liquidation plan for the company’s assets was approved in early October by federal judge John Dorsey.

The lawsuit alleges Bankman-Fried – who was sentenced in March to 25 years in prison for fraud and conspiracy – wanted to buy back Binance’s 20-percent stake “to project confidence and strength to the market, concealing both the underlying insolvency and the fraudulent use of customer deposits.”

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Bankman-Fried’s ex-girlfriend Caroline Ellison, an executive at Alameda Research, testified in court that the buy back move was carried out with nearly $1 billion in customer deposits – without their authorization.

“The claims are meritless, and we will vigorously defend ourselves,” a spokesperson for Binance told AFP.

The lawsuit also claims former Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao sought to destroy FTX, including in a series of tweets in November 2022 that contributed to the company’s collapse soon thereafter.

Zhao pleaded guilty to violating US money laundering laws in November 2023. He began a four-month prison sentence in April and was released from custody in September.

As part of an agreement with the US government, Zhao resigned from his post.