Live Updates: Sam Bankman-Fried sentencing

Put simply, prosecutors say he not only stole from customers and deceived investors, but he also engaged his business partners in the scheme and subsequent cover-up.

In total, prosecutors say the fraud amounted to $10 billion, including $8 billion siphoned from FTX customers without their knowledge or consent.

Here’s what the seven counts mean: 

• Wire fraud is a kind of arcane-sounding name for when someone uses electronic communications — email, texts, tweets — to further a criminal act. The government says Bankman-Fried knowingly and willfully participated in a scheme to steal from customers. 
• Fraud is a broad term but in general refers to a plan to deprive another person of money or property through false or deceptive means. 

• This is the same as the above, but it involves at least one other person as a co-conspirator. In this case, three of the government’s cooperating witnesses have pleaded guilty to being co-conspirators with SBF in the hopes of securing a lighter sentence. 

• This count refers to knowingly participating in a scheme involving the sale of commodities (or crypto swaps) under the purview of the US derivatives regulator, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, or CFTC. 
• In this case, cryptocurrencies like bitcoin and ethereum are being treated as commodities subject to CFTC oversight. 

• These are similar to counts one and two (fraud against customers), but refers to the companies that gave loans to Alameda. 

• This charge refers to a scheme to defraud or make false statements about a security. In this case, the security is FTX stock. (While not a publicly traded firm, FTX raised capital by selling equity in the company to investors.)
• The government contends that Bankman-Fred lied to investors about the financial ties between FTX and Alameda. 

• Money laundering, broadly, is concealing the source of money that’s obtained from illicit activities — such as embezzlement or gambling.