Sam Bankment Freed's Fraud Trial starts today in New York and is likely to cast a spotlight not only on the former crypto golden boy, but also on the broader crypto industry.

Hi everyone, I'm Rose Marie Miller here with Stephen Ehrlich, the director of Forbes Digital Assets. Thank you so much for joining me today, Steve.

Thanks, Rosemary.

Absolutely.

So Steve, remind us what is Sam Bakeman Freed on trial for?

To put it bluntly, Sam Bankman Freed is on trial for running one of the biggest financial frauds in history.

In a 13-count indictment, he's going to be defending himself against charges that he did everything from stealing customer funds to using

those illicit proceeds to engage in illegal campaign, finally, excuse me, illegal campaign campaign finance donations.

donations.

And the world is kind of waiting with bade of breath to see what will happen here for a couple reasons.

One, this trial has garnered worldwide attention.

His stratospheric rise, which we've chronicled in Forbes,

and then the sudden dissent and collapse of his empire.

The fact that when this happened in November of last year,

his picture was plastered across newspapers and news stations and TV outlets and late-night comedy shows all

across the world and people want to see what's going to happen to him.

Is he going to spend the rest of his life in jail?

He's looking at more than 100 years in prison time if he's convicted on all accounts

and he's not allowed to serve concurrent sentences.

But at the same point, too, I know that some folks,

myself included, are looking at the trial

as a way of perhaps trying to find out

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