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Cryptoprowl / The shuttered cryptocurrency exchange FTX would be sitting on a venture capital portfolio worth approximately $114 billion today had its bankruptcy estate not liquidated key holdings to repay creditors, according to a new analysis of the firm's former assets.

The staggering valuation, which highlights a massive opportunity cost for the defunct empire, is primarily driven by the meteoric rise of artificial intelligence startup Anthropic. FTX’s 8% stake, purchased for $500 million in 2021, would now be worth an estimated $82 billion following a 165x return, as Anthropic’s private valuation soared amid the ongoing AI boom.

Other liquidated positions have seen similar, albeit less dramatic, appreciation. A stake in Elon Musk’s SpaceX, sold during the bankruptcy proceedings, would be valued at roughly $15 billion today, representing a 75x gain on the original investment. Meanwhile, holdings in Solana (CRYPTO: $SOL ), the blockchain network closely associated with FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried, would be worth $5.1 billion, a 27x increase from the estate's entry price.

The analysis also points to extraordinary gains from smaller bets. An early $200,000 investment in Cursor, an AI-powered coding platform, would be worth $3 billion today, a return of 15,000x. Additional holdings in the trading platform Robinhood (NASDAQ: $HOOD ) would have contributed another $4.9 billion to the total.

The FTX bankruptcy estate, led by CEO John J. Ray III, has successfully recovered and distributed roughly $13 billion to creditors, a feat largely made possible by the timely sale of these very assets. While the $114 billion "what if" figure dwarfs the actual recovery, legal experts note that the estate was mandated to prioritize risk reduction and immediate liquidity over speculative long-term holding.

Bankman-Fried, currently serving a 25-year federal sentence, has previously argued that the estate moved too aggressively to sell assets at depressed prices. However, prosecutors and bankruptcy officials maintain that the investments were funded by misappropriated customer deposits, rendering the massive theoretical gains a secondary concern over the legal requirements to repay victims.