I would disagree, solely because one or more of the following reasons:
1. the person taking the money had no guarantee that the money, or some of it, would not be lost.
2. it wasn't their intention to give all or some of it back to its rightful owners.
3. the fact that some of it could repay some of the rightful owner's was often a matter of luck, not intent (there is some overlap between 1 and 3).
SBF hits all three of these. Your intent matters. At some point SBF intended by conscious acts to run and continue running a Ponzi scheme. He wasn't trying to bail himself out of the hole other than to the extent required to keep the Ponzi scheme going and enrich himself in the process.
So, respectfully, I disagree. May there be other cases that I agree with you on, depending on the particulars? Perhaps so. But not this one.
I agree on your points of what matters.
I disagree that this was shown in the SBF case. In fact, it seems much of the case was based on the fact that these points were not pertinent to the charges he faced. Which is also likely why his appeal failed. The argument that he was disallowed from making would have spoken to those issues. If it had have been relevant to the charges, he should have been allowed to make the argument.
Intent isn't necessarily an element required to prove fraud. Recklessness can be sufficient. Also to the extent intent is required intent to deceive is sufficient, ie the intent to cause someone to rely on a false statement, even if there's no intent to harm because you're convinced your fraudulent scheme will ultimately lead to success.