The Bahamian government has announced that it has secured $3.5 billion worth of FTX assets and plans to return them to their rightful owners – customers and creditors – when the country’s Supreme Court gives the go-ahead. Authorities in the country where FTX is headquartered seized the assets shortly after the firm filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

A PDF document released by Bahamian authorities says the decision to take sole control of the assets was made after a cyber attack targeting FTX resulted in the loss of funds. The authorities said, “there was a significant risk of imminent disappearance” of the digital assets and therefore used their regulatory powers to protect the assets.

The move should give the stakeholders more confidence about the state of the funds, as in the past it was reported that assets worth billions of dollars got up and disappeared. It’s unclear if some of that previously reported figure includes the $3.5 billion we now know is in the safe hands of Bahamian authorities.

For people who trusted Sam Bankman-Fried with their money, they will now have to wait for a claims process that should be available at some point in the future. They will be able to reclaim some of their assets but it is not clear how much. The fact that Bahamian authorities have so much under their control seems like a good sign for customers.

source: Government of the Bahamas (PDF) Through Bloomberg