Singapore's state investment fund preps to write off nearly $300M FTX stake

Temasek International, Singapore's state investment fund, is preparing to write off the full value of its $275M stake in FTX, the cryptocurrency exchange that filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection last week, according to a release dated Wednesday. Prior to FTX's implosion, Temasek said it invested $210M for a minority stake of ~1% in FTX International, and invested $65M for a minority stake of ~1.5% in FTX US. That represented a 0.09% cost of investment of its net portfolio value of $403B as of March 31. Singapore's state-owned investor conducted an eight-month due diligence process on FTX, from February to October 2021, Temasek said. At the time, FTX's audited financial statement was seen as profitable, it added. But Sam Bankman-Fried's once-prominent FTX rapidly fell apart last week following a recently discovered $8B balance sheet shortfall, as well as regulatory issues concerning fund mishandling, that had traders withdrawing funds en masse. Since then, the broader crypto ecosystem has been suffering from FTX's financial contagion. Last week, (Nov. 11) SoftBank was expected to write down almost $100M investment in FTX.com .