FTX brass and staff have wasted a lot of time and money on Margaritaville — reportedly buying a Jimmy Buffett-themed resort in the Bahamas for more than $50,000.
The cryptocurrency crew racked up $55,319 in unpaid fees this year after they found their missing salt in Margaritaville after being trapped for “months.” Bloomberg said.
FTX employees reportedly stayed “for weeks or months” in about 20 rooms at One Particular Harbor, a luxury tower attached to the main Margaritaville resort.
According to resort officials, employees of the defunct firm will gather on the route in the morning and return to Margaritaville after a day of work at the company’s headquarters in the Bahamas.
Employees of the cryptocurrency firm were reportedly around so often that one hotel employee told the store that they “almost cried” when FTX exploded.
“They were great,” said one Margaritaville employee, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “I’ve never had a problem with any of them.”
In bankruptcy court documents, the debt belonged to Alameda Research, a now-defunct FTX partner cryptocurrency trading firm owned by Sam Bankman-Fried and run by his ex-girlfriend, CEO Caroline Ellison. The Margaritaville suites were booked under the Alameda name, the report said.
It is unclear whether Bankman-Fried or Ellison were among those who visited the resort. The last FTX employees left Margaritaville about a month ago, just as the stock market crash began, employees told Bloomberg.
The resort is about 10 miles from the company’s now-defunct campus and about 15 miles from the luxury resort community of Albany — where Bankman-Fried and other FTX executives worked in a luxury penthouse.
The Post has reached out to Margaritaville for comment.
FTX owes $3 billion to its top 50 creditors. So far, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge John Dorsey has granted FTX’s request to redact the names of creditors — a rare move in cases like this — because of privacy concerns.
The Margaritaville debt is one of the most famous debts made public in court filings. FTX also owes $4.7 million to Amazon Web Services, $120,000 to law firm Herbert Smith Freehills and $80,000 to Bloomberg Finance LP, according to the filings.
FTX’s new CEO, John Ray, and the lawyers overseeing the company’s bankruptcy, condemned the large and uncontrolled spending by top executives in the days leading up to the crisis. According to court documents, Bankman-Fried effectively plundered the company’s resources to buy $300 million in prime Bahamian real estate.
According to a report in the Financial Times, FTX executives provided employees with perks such as free meals, on-site massages, all-expenses-paid trips to the company’s various offices and a fleet of cars.
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