By Geoffrey Smith
Investing.com -- FTX Ventures, the investment arm of Sam Bankman-Fried's FTX cryptocurrency exchange, is in talks to take a 30% stake in SkyBridge Capital, according to CNBC.
CNBC said SkyBridge, owned by former White House spokesman Anthony Scaramucci, will use the funding to finance some $40 million of investments in crypto assets. The company had been reported in July to be planning a new Web3-dedicated fund.
Skybridge styles itself as "a global multi-asset class alternative investments firm, specializing in hedge fund solutions and opportunistic investment vehicles."
Its First Trust SkyBridge Crypto Industry and Digital Economy ETF (NYSE:CRPT) has lost around two-thirds of its value since its launch in September last year, and its units fell over 22% in after-hours trading on Thursday, for no reason that was publicly obvious.
The troubles of the CRPT ETF prompted some speculation that FTX's involvement may be the latest in what has become a series of opportunistic acquisitions by FTX, taking advantage of the distressed valuations of some crypto companies that had overreached themselves before this year's slump in prices.
FTX didn't respond immediately to a request for comment. SkyBridge was unavailable for comment ahead of office hours in the U.S.