NASSAU, Bahamas — Despite being pushed out of the cryptocurrency giant he founded, Sam Bankman-Fried told CNBC he is trying to lock down a multibillion-dollar deal to bail out FTX, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection earlier this month.In a brief interview with CNBC late Friday, the FTX founder declined to give details about the downfall of his crypto conglomerate, or what he knew beyond liabilities being “billions of dollars larger than I thought.” Bankman-Fried declined an on-camera interview or broader discussion on the record. He said he was focused on retrieving customer funds and is still on a quest to secure a deal. “I think we should be trying to get as much value to users as possible. I hate what happened and deeply wish that I had been more careful,” Bankman-Fried told CNBC. Bankman-Fried also maintained that there are “billions” of dollars in customer assets in jurisdictions “where there were segregated balances,” including in the U.S., and said “there are billions of dollars of potential funding opportunities out there” to make customers whole. What was once a $32 billion global empire has imploded in recent weeks. Rival Binance had signed a letter of intent to buy FTX’s international business as it faced a liquidity crunch. But …
