June 29 (Cointime) - There has been speculation about the financial success of FTX and Alameda Research, with rumors suggesting that Chinese capital flight may have played a role in funding the American cryptocurrency companies. Although there were arbitrage opportunities during Alameda's startup period, it seems unlikely that co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried could sustain it while billionaires and giant funds couldn't.

Alameda Research received large loans from billionaire Jaan Tallinn and cryptocurrency trader Luke Ding, but the loans came with an extremely high interest rate of 43%.

There are discrepancies in timelines and accounting practices that suggest Bankman-Fried may have taken on more loans and investors to pay back those he owed money to. Chinese funding for FTX's first seed round in 2019 included investors from the US, China, and Singapore, but there is a strange discrepancy on Crunchbase regarding a seed round from January 2018 with a single investor, Redline DAO.

Redline DAO was bought out of their FTX investment by SBF, and it is unclear how much Chinese capital helped stave off the original problems facing Alameda Research or whether the mainland cash allowed SBF to perpetuate schemes.