‘I am not a rich person’: 30,000 Australian FTX customers left out of pocket after collapse

Australia is expected to introduce legislation to regulate cryptocurrency next year, with a spokesperson for the treasurer saying the government is closely monitoring the fallout of FTX’s collapse. Photograph: Leon Neal/Getty Images

Eswar, a 32-year-old IT worker based in Sydney, invested his family’s life savings with cryptocurrency platform FTX. With the company’s collapse, he has lost up to $60,000 – including $40,000 in Australian dollars and $20,000 in cryptocurrency.

Eswar invests most of his savings into cryptocurrency, he says, because he “believes in the crypto space”.