Prediction market traders trimmed the odds of a presidential pardon for former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried after his parents renewed their public defense of him in a CNN interview. 

Polymarket placed the chance of a pardon this year at 11%, while Kalshi showed 9%, both lower than before the March 21 interview. The move was small, but it followed fresh public efforts by Joseph Bankman and Barbara Fried to challenge the fraud case and appeal for a different view of their son’s conduct.

Prediction markets in the United States showed a slight decline in the odds of a pardon for Bankman-Fried after the CNN appearance by his parents. Polymarket fell by 2 percentage points and Kalshi dropped by 1 point, leaving the chances in single digits to low teens.

The decline came as the interview brought the case back into public discussion. Traders appeared to respond to the renewed attention, even though neither market showed a major shift. The figures still suggested that a pardon remained unlikely in 2026.

In the interview with Michael Smerconish, Bankman and Fried said they believed the judgment against their son was wrong. Bankman said, “There’s an appeal on the case, but we don’t think it’s fraud.” Both also accepted that Alameda Research borrowed customer funds from FTX, but they argued that those funds were not misused.

Bankman said Alameda “acted like everybody else, putting in money and borrowing money.” He also said “the money was always there” and claimed Alameda had enough backing to cover its positions. Fried said, “All the money, it was there, every penny of it,” while arguing that the assets ended up in the FTX estate during the bankruptcy process.

The parents’ defense has also renewed attention on their own links to FTX. Bankman worked as a paid adviser to the exchange, while Fried was described as a political consultant. During FTX’s bankruptcy process in 2023, the estate sued them in Delaware, seeking to recover funds and property it said were improperly transferred.

The complaint alleged that they discussed receiving a $10 million cash gift and a $16.4 million luxury property in the Bahamas. It also said Bankman helped sustain a culture of misstatements and poor management inside the company. That case was dismissed without prejudice in February 2025, which means the claims were not permanently closed.

Appeal and pardon effort face political barriers

In February 2026, Fried filed an appeal on behalf of her son. The filing argued that new testimony would challenge three key government claims: that FTX was insolvent on Nov. 11, 2022, that customers had no real prospect of repayment, and that Alameda regularly carried a multi-billion-dollar deficit on FTX.

The family has also tried to frame the case in political terms. Fried said, “Sam’s prosecution was essentially political,” and argued that parts of the Biden administration targeted the crypto industry. Still, public support for a pardon appears limited. Senator Cynthia Lummis told Politico, “I hope the president doesn’t fall for that. […] He hurt a lot of people.” 

Trump has also reportedly indicated that he would not pardon Bankman-Fried, leaving betting market traders with little reason to raise the odds.

The European Central Bank (ECB) has published a working paper arguing that governance in flagship DeFi protocols like Aave, MakerDAO, Ampleforth and Uniswap is far more centralized than their “decentralized autonomous organization” branding suggests, a conclusion that could strip them of regulatory safe harbor under the EU’s MiCA regime. The staff study, titled “Who to regulate? Identifying actors within DeFi’s governance,” finds that the top 100 holders in each of the four protocols collectively control more than 80% of governance token supply, with “around half or more holdings linked” to the protocols themselves or exchanges.

According to the ECB researchers, voting power is even more concentrated than token ownership, with top voters “mostly delegates, who, in many cases, could not be identified nor linked to token holders.” In Ampleforth, the paper highlights that the top 20 voters account for roughly 96% of proxy voting rights, a structure that leaves real control in the hands of a small, opaque elite. That concentration, the authors warn, turns many DAOs into what prior academic work has called “minority rule,” where a few large token holders or delegates can effectively dictate protocol outcomes.

Under the EU’s Markets in Crypto-Assets regulation, crypto-asset services that are “provided in a fully decentralised manner without any intermediary” can fall outside the core licensing perimeter. The ECB paper directly questions whether Aave, MakerDAO’s Sky ecosystem, Uniswap and Ampleforth can plausibly claim that status when more than half of governance tokens in some cases are linked to founding teams or centralized exchanges such as Binance. “The concentration of governance power remains stable over time,” the authors write, arguing that decentralization here is “form over substance.”

For policymakers, the study’s aim is explicit: identify “regulatory anchor points” in systems that were designed to avoid having a traditional issuer, board or CEO. The authors stress that limited on-chain transparency about the real-world identities behind key delegates “complicates efforts to assess accountability and reinforces concerns about the concentration of power.” That, in turn, bolsters arguments from EU agencies and legal commentators that MiCA’s decentralization exemption must be interpreted narrowly, with regulators focusing on where effective decision-making and operational control actually sit, rather than on marketing language about DAOs.

In practice, the ECB’s approach signals that supervisors are ready to treat DeFi governance structures with the same forensic scrutiny applied to large banks’ shareholder registers and control chains. If Aave, Uniswap or MakerDAO cannot demonstrate materially dispersed and accountable governance, their DAOs may be forced into the same kind of licensing, capital, and compliance obligations now facing centralized crypto-asset service providers across the bloc.

Anthropic, the artificial intelligence company behind Claude, has begun testing a new AI model more capable than any it has released previously, Fortune reported.

The company said the model represents “a step change” in performance and is “the most capable we’ve built to date.” It is currently being tested with a small group of early access customers as Anthropic evaluates its behavior and risks.

Among the names moving sharply lower on the news: Palo Alto Networks (PANW), Crowdstrike (CRWD) and Fortinet (FTNT) are all down 4%-6%. The broader iShares Expanded Tech-Software Sector ETF (IGV) is off 2.5%.

The overnight leak likely contributed to bitcoin’s BTC$66,084.15 tumble back to $66,000 after flirting with $70,000 hours earlier.

Details about the model surfaced after internal materials were accidentally exposed in a publicly accessible data store, according to Fortune. Around 3,000 assets linked to Anthropic’s blog were available online, including draft announcements and internal content that had not yet been released.

Among the files was a draft blog post referring to the model as “Claude Mythos.” The document warned that the system could pose serious cybersecurity risks, pointing to its ability to identify and exploit software vulnerabilities.

Anthropic currently offers three tiers of models — Opus, Sonnet and Haiku — which vary in size, cost and capability. The leaked materials suggest the company is developing a new tier called “Capybara,” which would be even larger and more intelligent than Opus, the company’s most advanced model to date.

TLDR

• Intercontinental Exchange invested $600 million in Polymarket as part of its funding agreement.
• ICE plans to purchase up to $40 million in Polymarket securities from existing holders.
• The new investment completes ICE’s previously announced $2 billion commitment.
• ICE made its initial $1 billion investment in Polymarket in October 2025.
• The October 2025 deal valued Polymarket at about $8 billion before the investment.

Intercontinental Exchange confirmed a new $600 million direct cash investment into Polymarket on Friday morning. The company also plans to acquire up to $40 million in securities from existing holders. With these steps, ICE completes its previously announced investment arrangement with the platform.

ICE Expands Financial Commitment to Polymarket

ICE disclosed that the $600 million payment forms part of Polymarket’s ongoing equity capital raise. The company also expects to purchase up to $40 million in securities from certain current shareholders. Together, these transactions fulfill ICE’s structured commitment of up to $2 billion.

ICE made its first direct investment in October 2025 with a $1 billion tranche. That transaction valued Polymarket at about $8 billion before the investment. The post-money valuation ranged between $9 billion and $10 billion. However, ICE has not yet disclosed the valuation attached to the new $600 million tranche.

The company stated that it will release specific terms after Polymarket completes its fundraising. ICE confirmed that these investments will not materially affect its financial results. It also said the transactions will not alter expected capital return plans.

ICE owns and operates the New York Stock Exchange. The company ranks among the largest providers of financial market technology and data worldwide. Therefore, the transaction adds Polymarket to its portfolio of strategic investments.

ICE structured the funding as a multi-part program. The latest payment and planned secondary purchases complete that program. No executive statements accompanied the March 2026 disclosure.

Polymarket Partnership and Market Position

Polymarket operates a prediction market platform focused on real-world event outcomes. Users place wagers based on aggregated probabilities of future events. During the 2024 U.S. presidential election, the platform recorded elevated activity from retail and institutional participants.

The October 2025 agreement included plans for ICE to distribute Polymarket’s event-driven data globally. ICE aimed to provide that data to institutional clients through its existing channels. The companies also referenced collaboration on tokenization initiatives at that time.

However, the latest announcement did not revisit distribution or tokenization plans. ICE focused solely on confirming the completion of its capital commitment. The company described the investment as part of its existing arrangement.

Polymarket’s primary competitor remains Kalshi, which operates under CFTC regulation. Both platforms offer contracts tied to event outcomes and probabilities. ICE did not comment on competitive positioning in its statement.

ICE reiterated that its total commitment now reaches the upper limit of the original agreement. The combined primary and secondary investments account for the full planned allocation. Specific valuation details will follow once Polymarket finalizes its equity raise.

GameStop said it did not sell the 4,709 Bitcoin tied to its January balance sheet change. 

Instead, the company used the holdings in a covered-call arrangement with Coinbase Credit, according to its latest annual filing.

GameStop’s latest 10-K filing showed that the company still kept exposure to the Bitcoin it bought in 2025. The filing said the retailer pledged 4,709 BTC as collateral with Coinbase Credit instead of selling the assets outright.

That disclosure addressed earlier market speculation that GameStop had exited the position in January. The value of the pledged Bitcoin was about $324 million at the time, based on market pricing referenced in the report.

The filing said GameStop entered an agreement with Coinbase Credit during the fourth quarter of fiscal 2025. Under that arrangement, the company sold covered call options on part of the Bitcoin it owned. GameStop said, 

“In the fourth quarter of fiscal 2025, we entered into an agreement with Coinbase Credit, Inc., under which we sold covered call options on a portion of the bitcoin we own.” 

The strategy allows the company to collect premium income while keeping overall exposure to Bitcoin price moves.

The strike prices on the options ranged from $105,000 to $110,000. That means the company would limit its upside if Bitcoin rises above those levels, but it would still earn income from the options premiums.

The agreement is set to expire on Friday, according to the filing. As of Jan. 31, the call option contracts created a $700,000 liability and an unrealized gain of about $2.3 million.

Coinbase control changed accounting treatment

GameStop also said Coinbase Credit had the right to “rehypothecate, commingle, or unilaterally sell” the pledged Bitcoin. Because of that, the company said control of the assets had moved to the counterparty under the agreement.

The filing stated,

“Accordingly, we derecognized the Pledged Bitcoin as an intangible asset and recognized digital assets receivable of $368.3 million within ‘Digital assets and related receivables’ on our Consolidated Balance Sheets as of January 31, 2026.” 

The company added that its economic exposure remained consistent with direct Bitcoin ownership.

GameStop also reported an unrealized loss of $59.7 million tied to digital asset receivables during fiscal 2025. The filing added that some of the covered-call contracts expired unexercised after the fiscal year ended on Jan. 31.

Intercontinental Exchange has expanded its bet on prediction markets with a new $600 million investment in Polymarket. 

The deal adds to an earlier commitment and comes as the sector attracts more capital and more attention from large financial firms.

ICE, the parent company of the New York Stock Exchange, said on Friday that it invested another $600 million in Polymarket. The company said the new funding is part of its previously announced plan to invest up to $2 billion in the crypto-based prediction market platform.

The company first announced its Polymarket investment plan in October 2025. With the latest round, ICE’s total committed investment has reached about $2 billion, according to the company and related reporting.

ICE said the investment forms part of Polymarket’s latest fundraising round. It also said Polymarket’s valuation will be disclosed after the fundraising process is completed. ICE added that the investment is not expected to have a material effect on its financial results or capital return plans.

Prediction markets have grown quickly over the past two years. Segment has moved from a niche part of crypto and academic finance into a fast-growing trading market with rising user activity and volumes. Analysts told Reuters these products could help exchanges reach more retail traders and expand trading revenue beyond traditional futures and options.

Kalshi deal adds competitive pressure

The new ICE investment comes shortly after rival prediction market Kalshi raised about $1 billion at a reported $22 billion valuation. The funding round gave Kalshi a fresh boost as competition in event-based trading continues to grow.

The rapid growth of both Polymarket and Kalshi shows how prediction markets are moving deeper into mainstream finance. At the same time, the sector continues to face regulatory scrutiny as trading volumes and investor interest keep rising.

TLDR

• Franklin Templeton’s Head of Digital Assets Roger Bayston said Ripple is redeploying XRP capital into operating businesses.
• Bayston stated that Ripple has committed about $3 billion to expand custody, liquidity, treasury, and brokerage services.
• He explained that XRP is moving beyond speculation and supporting financial infrastructure.
• Bayston said Franklin Templeton supports a multi-chain strategy instead of launching its own blockchain.
• He described blockchains as “digital nation-states” that evolve at different speeds.

Franklin Templeton’s Head of Digital Assets Roger Bayston said Ripple is redirecting accumulated XRP capital into operating businesses. He shared the remarks during the Thinking Crypto podcast with Tony Edward. Bayston said the company now focuses on infrastructure that supports real financial activity.

Ripple Deploys Capital to Expand XRP Infrastructure

Bayston said early blockchain networks built large capital reserves during previous market cycles. However, he explained that the next phase requires those networks to deploy resources into operating businesses. He pointed to Ripple and said it has “fantastic plans” to redeploy capital generated through XRP into infrastructure and services.

He said Ripple has committed about $3 billion to expand custody, liquidity, treasury management, and brokerage services. He explained that the company uses XRP-linked resources to finance this expansion. He added that this strategy supports broader institutional use and strengthens the XRP ecosystem.

Bayston stated that XRP now operates beyond market speculation and supports business infrastructure. He said the company channels accumulated capital into platforms that serve financial institutions. He noted that scale around the network will determine long-term utility.

Multi-Chain Strategy and Tokenization Growth

Bayston said Franklin Templeton will not launch a proprietary blockchain network. Instead, he explained that the firm supports a multi-chain structure across public networks. He described blockchains as “digital nation-states” that evolve at different speeds and serve different purposes.

He contrasted this approach with firms like Coinbase and Robinhood that operate closed ecosystems. He said Franklin Templeton prefers access across networks rather than control over a single chain. He added that this framework allows participation as each network develops.

Bayston said institutional investors continue adapting to crypto market structures. He explained that platforms now combine custody, trading, and infrastructure into unified systems. He said this shift changes how institutions access and distribute financial products.

He cited Binance, Kraken, and OKX as examples of integrated platforms serving millions of wallets. He called this structure the “wallet ecosystem” that delivers products directly on-chain. He said Franklin Templeton views these platforms as distribution channels.

Bayston said tokenization efforts now extend beyond digital assets. He confirmed that Franklin Templeton manages about $1.6 trillion in assets. He stated that the firm already operates tokenized money market funds.

He said the firm plans to expand tokenization into real estate, commodities, and securities. He explained that these assets retain their structure but move into digital form. He noted that networks such as the XRP Ledger could support liquidity and settlement for these assets.

Bayston said blockchain networks with capital and operational strategy will continue evolving. He stated that Ripple currently uses its XRP-linked capital base to build financial infrastructure. He reiterated these points during the Thinking Crypto podcast interview.

The chances of former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried getting a pardon didn’t seem great this year, and a recent downtick on prediction markets shows that they aren’t getting any better. 

Both major prediction markets in the United States, Polymarket and Kalshi, have the likelihood of Bankman-Fried receiving a presidential pardon this year at 11% and 9%, respectively. 

Chances of a pardon have decreased 1% on Kalshi and 2% on Polymarket after a CNN interview on March 21 with Bankman-Fried’s parents, Joseph Bankman and Barbara Fried. In the interview, both explained why they’re challenging their son’s fraud conviction. 

The change may be small, but the interview and the public appeals for a reconsideration of the case have drawn renewed attention to Bankman-Fried’s parents’ role. 

Bankman and Fried challenge FTX narrative 

In a new interview with CNN’s Michael Smerconish, Fried and Bankman said that the judgement against their son was wrong. “There’s an appeal on the case, but we don’t think it’s fraud,” Bankman said. 

Bankman and Fried both agreed that Alameda Research had borrowed customer funds from their son’s exchange FTX. But Bankman said that the funds “were not used improperly.” On the exchange, “you were able to put in money, and you were able to borrow money. Alameda acted like everybody else, putting in money and borrowing money.” 

Bankman and Fried’s claim challenges the public narrative on the case, one in which they themselves were involved. Bankman worked as a paid advisor to FTX, chiefly concerned with the exchange’s efforts regarding “effective altruism,” while Fried served as a political consultant, per the CNN interview.

FTX attempted to sue them as the exchange was restructuring in 2023. In a complaint in the Delaware Bankruptcy Court, FTX sought to recover millions of dollars that it claimed Bankman and Fried “fraudulently transferred and misappropriated.” 

“Bankman played a key role in perpetuating this culture of misrepresentations and gross mismanagement and helped cover up allegations that would have exposed the fraud committed by the FTX Insiders,” the complaint alleged. 

Chiefly, FTX claimed that “Bankman and Fried discussed with Bankman-Fried the transfer to them of a $10 million cash gift and a $16.4 million luxury property in The Bahamas.” The exchange sought the return of both of these funds and of the luxury property. 

The case was eventually dismissed without prejudice in February 2025. This means that the case is not permanently closed and the plaintiffs could still refile at a later time and different venue. 

A year later, in February 2026, Fried filed an appeal on behalf of her son. Documents filed in the New York Southern District Court said that new testimony, “would have refuted three principal claims the Government made about FTX’s financial condition on which its allegations of fraud rested.” These were that:

1. FTX was insolvent on Nov. 11, 2022,

2. There was no prospect that customers would be repaid, and

3. Alameda regularly ran a multi-billion-dollar deficit in its account on FTX.

Speaking to CNN, Bankman said that “the money was always there” and that Alameda “always had more than enough security to cover everything.” He said that everyone has already gotten paid back; “the money never left the companies.”

Fried said that “all the money was turned over by Sam voluntarily when there was a liquidity crisis. All the assets ended up in the estate in FTX which was taken over by the debtors, so-called debtors, who ran the bankruptcy. All the money, it was there, every penny of it.”

Looking for a pardon

The appeal filing also moved to change the judge, claiming “many instances of extreme prejudice” that Judge Lewis Kaplan showed to Bankman-Fried during the trial. 

In the interview, Fried claimed that “Sam’s prosecution was essentially political.” She added that the “Biden administration had decided to destroy crypto, to strangle the baby in the crib, if I can use that horrible metaphor.” 

Rather than clearly state the administration was not going to legalize crypto and outline how it would punish offenders, “they quite deliberately tried to sabotage the crypto industry behind the scenes.” 

She further claimed the prosecutions were being used for political ambition. “I am describing a part of the Biden administration that I think did really bad things,” she said. 

Bankman-Fried made significant political donations to the Biden administration and to Democratic lawmakers. But in the CNN interview, his parents attempted to distance him from liberal politics. 

Bankman said, “Sam came to DC and did contribute to Biden. But by the time he got to DC, he had had bad experiences with the Biden administration on crypto and on business in general.”

“He ended up giving at least as much to Republicans. To think of Sam as just a liberal Democrat was never true,” he said.    

Bankman-Fried himself has attempted to downplay any support he’d given to Democratic politicians. Last year, he told the media that he was “really frustrated and disappointed with what I saw of, you know, Biden’s administration of the Democratic Party.”

He also tried to liken himself to Trump in regards to his prosecution and frustrations with Judge Kaplan. Kaplan found Trump guilty of sexual abuse and defamation, awarding the plaintiff E. Jean Carroll $88 million in damages. 

His parents doubled down on these claims and appeared to make a direct appeal to Trump. When asked, “What does Sam Bankman-Fried’s mother want to say to the President of the United States?” Fried replied, “I think that Sam was a victim of an out-of-control prosecution and I know that Trump himself feels he was.”

“I would say also that being one of the most brilliant, talented young men of this generation and the amount of good that he can do in this world, if he is free to live a life he wants, it would be of enormous benefit to the economy, to a lot of things that Trump cares about in this world. He [Trump] ought to regard Sam as a huge asset going forward for the country.”   

Pardons have become an industry unto themselves. A Campaign Legal Center analysis showed that Trump usually pardons allies in exchange for loyalty, rewards people who broke the law on his behalf or, crucially, offers brokered pardons, “where deep-pocketed individuals hire well-connected lobbyists or political fixers to secure clemency.”

Amid the most recent push for a pardon, Pro-crypto Senator Cynthia Lummis told Politico, “I hope the president doesn’t fall for that. […] He hurt a lot of people.” Trump himself indicated to The New York Times that he would not pardon Bankman-Fried.

According to Bloomberg, Fried and Bankman have been exploring ways to get a pardon for their  son since Trump took office in January of last year. This reportedly included speaking to lawyers and “other figures considered to be in Trump’s orbit.”

On March 18, Bankman-Fried wrote a post through legal proxies, supporting Trump’s decision to bomb Iran. Polymarket odds show the chance of a US/Iran ceasefire by year’s end at 78%, some 68 points higher than a pardon for Bankman-Fried.  

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