quinn emanuel

FTX bankruptcy fees near $20 million for 51 days of work

The FTX logo on a laptop screen.

Andrey Rudakov | Bloomberg via Getty Images

FTX’s top bankruptcy, legal and financial advisors have billed the company more than $19.6 million in fees for work done in 2022, according to Tuesday bankruptcy court filings. More than $10 million of that was for work done in November 2022 as Sam Bankman-Fried’s crypto empire entered bankruptcy protection in Delaware.

The firms will initially only be paid a little over $15.5 million, or 80% of the value of their work, under a court-ordered interim compensation plan.

The law firms that billed FTX are Sullivan & Cromwell, Landis Rath & Cobb, and Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan. Professional advisor Alvarez & Marsal and financial advisor AlixPartners also billed the company.

Some of the work the firms billed for involved taking meetings with other companies that also were billing FTX for their time or corresponding with former and current executives, including Caroline Ellison, the former CEO of Bankman-Fried’s hedge fund, Alameda Research.

Landis Rath & Cobb and Sullivan & Cromwell, FTX’s primary legal firms, billed the company a combined $10.7 million for more than 8,400 hours of work. Landis Rath & Cobb billed $1.16 million for work

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FTX Paid Crypto Bankruptcy Lawyers $12 Million for Early Work

Bankrupt crypto exchange FTX Ltd. paid its lead lawyers more than $12 million to handle the earliest portions of the closely watched Chapter 11 case, according to a Wednesday court filing.

Law firm Sullivan & Cromwell received a $12 million retainer from an FTX-controlled company shortly before the exchange’s Nov. 11 bankruptcy filing, the filing shows. The firm has drawn a little more than $3 million of that, largely for work done in the days leading up to the rushed bankruptcy filing.

Quinn Emanuel is also working for FTX and its board of directors as special counsel in a litigation capacity, looking for legal claims the bankruptcy estate might be able to bring. The firm received about $575,000 in the three months leading up to FTX’s filing, according to another court filing.

Landis Rath & Cobb, whose lawyers are FTX’s local Delaware counsel, received a $300,000 retainer in the 90 days leading up the filing.

FTX imploded in spectacular fashion in early November, leading to the firing of co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried and a rushed Chapter 11 filing of more than 100 FTX-related companies. In a sign of the hurried pace, FTX didn’t submit typical “first-day” filings until

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Google Ordered to Pick Up Boies Legal Fees at $2,000 an Hour (4)

A California federal judge has ordered Alphabet Inc.‘s Google to pay nearly $1 million for discovery misconduct after the company concealed employees and other relevant data in a lawsuit alleging web browser privacy violations.

Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan represents Google in the case, while Boies Schiller Flexner represents the class-action plaintiffs.

Quinn Emanuel lawyers had urged Magistrate Judge Susan van Keulen not to levy sanctions against Google, saying the company had “concealed nothing.” She ruled against them in May.

Boies Schiller’s lawyers had requested more than $1 million, but van Keulen ordered Google to pay just over $970,000 after deducting fees incurred by timekeepers billing less than 10 hours, time spent producing documents and computer research.

Though much of the original sanctions motion is redacted, Boies Schiller said Google failed to produce data that included “identifiers” associated with the named plaintiffs and their devices. The judge’s order granting the monetary sanctions is sealed.

The sanctions request from Boies Schiller earlier revealed David Boies, the famous lawyer, billed $1,950 an hour in the case.

“Google failed to comply with its discovery obligations, misled the plaintiffs and the Court, concealed the identities of key personnel, and concealed, and then destroyed,

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