From Sam Bankman-Fried's arrest to bitcoin plunging below $20,000, here are the 9 craziest crypto stories of 2022

George GloverDec 26, 2022, 18:06 IST

Sam Bankman-Fried was arrested in the Bahamas on fraud charges.Mario Duncanson/Getty Images

2022 was a brutal year for digital assets as worries about stability rocked the crypto world.
Bitcoin plunged 64% as interest rate hikes made investors think twice about riskier assets.

In February, crypto exchange FTX made its Super Bowl debut with a commercial featuring "Curb Your Enthusiasm" star Larry David.

By December, the exchange had collapsed — and its disgraced former CEO Sam Bankman-Fried had been arrested and was facing eight criminal charges in the US.

All in all, 2022 was a brutal year for digital assets, as rising interest rates and high-profile bankruptcies helped feed a broad and deep selloff in the market.

Here are nine crazy stories that rocked crypto this year:

Cryptocurrency prices plummeted as investors started to fret about rising interest rates.

Crypto prices slipped in January as the Federal Reserve readied to raise interest rates.Neil Hall/Reuters

Crypto heavyweights like Coinbase and FTX dominated Super Bowl LVI's halftime ad slots.

Tom Brady was one of FTX's highest-profile celebrity backers.AP Photo/Jason Behnken

Stablecoin TerraUSD slipped away from $1 – and its sister token luna crashed to zero.

Terraform Labs' UST stablecoin lost its peg to the dollar in May.Idrees Abbas/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

Celsius Network froze all its customers' funds – after promising to never act like a bank.

Celsius founder Alex Mashinsky repeatedly told journalists he "hates banks".Bruno de Carvalho/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

Bitcoin fell under $20,000 to trade below its 2017 all-time high.

Bitcoin plunged 64% in 2022.REUTERS/Jim Urquhart

Hedge fund Three Arrows Capital defaulted on a loan and was ordered into liquidation.

Rafael Henrique/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

FTX filed for bankruptcy after a sell-off in its native token triggered a solvency crisis.

Major crypto exchange FTX filed for bankruptcy in November.Marco Bello/Reuters

Former FTX boss Sam Bankman-Fried was arrested by Bahamian officials on fraud and money-laundering charges.

FTX cofounder Bankman-Fried was arrested in the Bahamas to face US criminal charges.Dante Carrer/Reuters

Binance tried to reassure investors of its financial strength – and customers pulled $6 billion out of the exchange.

Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao has tried to reassure customers after FTX's collapse.Photo by Pedro Fiúza/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Meet Sam Bankman-Fried's family: His parents are Stanford law professors, his aunt is a dean at Columbia, and his brother is the founder of a nonprofit

Cookies on the Business Insider India website