Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) debacle with FTX (1 Viewer)

[dickey moe]

My thought was nobody in their right mind would say what he said.

You are correct. Dude is a genius who is off his rocker.

Is he, though?

 

[dickey moe]

Have been following this closely, though I still don't really understand crypto. Fascinating story.

Same. Looking forward to the inevitable Netflix miniseries.

Who plays SBF? Maybe Andy Samberg or Adam Sandler?

Jonah Hill, obviously.

I was thinking Jesse Eisenberg is a shoe-in for this role, but all these actors are at least 40 now and I think SBF just turned 30 so its a stretch for any of them.

Or maybe that Chalamet kid with a Jheri curl.

 

[AAABatteries]

Wondering what folks thought about the reporter making this public. Not whether it's legal or not (it clearly is as he didn't say it was off the record), but ethically.

"Off the record" is not in any way legally binding. It's pretty sacred in terms of journalistic ethics, but it's a really bad idea to share potentially incriminating info with a reporter even with that disclaimer.

Yeah - I wasn’t sure what Joe meant by that - never heard of “off the record” being legally binding. Although maybe it allows for a civil suit?

 

[massraider]

The interview I want is with the person at Fortune magazine who decided to go with the
Next Warren Buffett? headline on their cover story in the summer.

 

[dickey moe]

The interview I want is with the person at Fortune magazine who decided to go with the
Next Warren Buffett? headline on their cover story in the summer.

As with Elizabeth Holmes/Theranos, the media fell in love with this guy. They WANT to believe this ****.

 

[Joe Bryant]

Do we know details on his current situation in the Bahamas? Who has authority in a case like this? Would he be arrested? Or questioned about the "hack"?

 

[dickey moe]

Do we know details on his current situation in the Bahamas? Who has authority in a case like this? Would he be arrested? Or questioned about the "hack"?

I had read somewhere that supposedly the U.S. is trying to get him extradited and SBF is currently "cooperating with Bahamian authorities."

 

[Desert_Power]

think its an insult to Bernie Madoff to even call this a "ponzi scheme" because that term implies some level of long-term planning to keep the thing running based on a confidence play and cooking of the books. From what I can tell, none of that happened here - there wasn't enough time or effort to set up a real ponzi operation. Its really just a case of bald, bold fraud and theft perpetrated by an incredibly stupid but confident group of criminals.

I think the plan was that crypto always goes up and eventually they would be too big to fail. Hence the lobbying and political donations.

 

[GroveDiesel]

I never understood anything about it

There's two distinct things. There is the original technology, which is interesting and may have some utility. Completely theoretical.

Then there's the scammy, speculative, money laundering nonsense that it is in its current form.

There’s also a big difference between crypto currencies and crypto currency exchanges. Crypto currencies are mostly worthless as their utility is still pretty limited and there’s still no good way for them to have high utility for the average person right now. But there’s potential there and as long as the currency doesn’t go away, there’s still some potential value.

Exchanges allow folks to buy and sell crypto currencies or even fractional shares, but like the stock market, you don’t ever hold the actual currency. The obvious danger in that is that the exchanges have zero regulation and these big exchanges keep stealing everyone’s money and folding (see Mt Gox).

 

[BladeRunner]

Have been following this closely, though I still don't really understand crypto. Fascinating story.

Same. Looking forward to the inevitable Netflix miniseries.

Already made. It's called, Mother, May I Sleep with Crypto?

 

[ILUVBEER99]

Ten 20 somethings with no business experience high on adderall running a multi billion dollar business.

How could this have gone wrong. Did the investors in FTX do any DD?

 

[New Binky the Doormat]

this worse than scary ...

https://twitter.com/GRDecter/status/1593272102047580161

 

[moleculo]

This is a separate question but related. I'm interested in the ethics of the reporter from Vox making the conversation public.

She's within her rights as a journalist as Bankman-Fried did not declare the conversation to be off the record.

But clearly, no one in their right mind would say what he said knowing it would be public.

He said that today. https://twitter.com/SBF_FTX/status/1593014934207881218?s=20&t=OTjPeTWFVVgIvr353m4SSw

25) Last night I talked to a friend of mine. They published my messages. Those were not intended to be public, but I guess they are now.

Wondering what folks thought about the reporter making this public. Not whether it's legal or not (it clearly is as he didn't say it was off the record), but ethically.

I don't understand why this is a question. I can't conjure up any reason why it wouldn't be ok to publish.

 

[GreenNGold]

Ten 20 somethings with no business experience high on adderall running a multi billion dollar business.

How could this have gone wrong. Did the investors in FTX do any DD?

I think it's even worse than that, some of them were already involved in previous scandals.

 

[General Malaise]

Ten 20 somethings with no business experience high on adderall running a multi billion dollar business.

How could this have gone wrong. Did the investors in FTX do any DD?

Let me repeat: No. Audited. Financials.

So no, the investors did not. That's check mark box 1.01 of any DD query. What a joke.

 

[Pip's Invitation]

I added a poll.

To be clear, Bankman-Fried did not declare the DM conversation to be off the record. The reporter did not hide who she was.

I'm a journalist. I probably wouldn't have done this myself but my job doesn't involve anything controversial (or of interest to most of the general public.)

However, if her capacity is known to the subject, and the subject is a public figure, and the subject did not say anything was off the record (or request it to be), then he has no right to complain if what he communicates ends up being published. IMO SBF was as cavalier with his words here as he was with other people's assets in the past year.

 

[massraider]

Fyre Fest 2: FTX Boogaloo

 

[fatness]

Where are these rumors?

Twitter is where I mostly saw them. https://twitter.com/search?q=sbf amphetamines&src=typeahead_click

And again, I have zero knowledge if they're true. I'm only saying it's a pretty well known thing and something the reporter would have known.

Is this like the thing widely spread on social media of Vladimir Putin gripping a table? That ended up telling us nothing and spurring tons of speculation.

 

[fatness]

this worse than scary ...

https://twitter.com/GRDecter/status/1593272102047580161

jesus christ

 

[Sand]

Below we excerpt some of the most notable highlights from the affidavit, which we embed at the bottom of the post and which everyone should read to get a sense of just how massive Sam Bankman-Fried's fraud was.

• I have over 40 years of legal and restructuring experience. I have been the Chief Restructuring Officer or Chief Executive Officer in several of the largest corporate failures in history. I have supervised situations involving allegations of criminal activity and malfeasance (Enron). I have supervised situations involving novel financial structures (Enron and Residential Capital) and cross-border asset recovery and maximization (Nortel and Overseas Shipholding). Nearly every situation in which I have been involved has been characterized by defects of some sort in internal controls, regulatory compliance, human resources and systems integrity.
• Never in my career have I seen such a complete failure of corporate controls and such a complete absence of trustworthy financial information as occurred here. From compromised systems integrity and faulty regulatory oversight abroad, to the concentration of control in the hands of a very small group of inexperienced, unsophisticated and potentially compromised individuals, this situation is unprecedented.
• For purposes of managing the Debtors’ affairs, I have identified four groups of businesses, which I refer to as “Silos.” These Silos include:
  • (a) a group composed of Debtor West Realm Shires Inc. and its Debtor and non-Debtor subsidiaries (the “WRS Silo”), which includes the businesses known as “FTX US,” “LedgerX,” “FTX US Derivatives,” “FTX US Capital Markets,” and “Embed Clearing,” among other businesses;
  • (b) a group composed of Debtor Alameda Research LLC and its Debtor subsidiaries (the “Alameda Silo”);
  • (c) a group composed of Debtor Clifton Bay Investments LLC, Debtor Clifton Bay Investments Ltd., Debtor Island Bay Ventures Inc. and Debtor FTX Ventures Ltd. (the “Ventures Silo”);
  • (d) a group composed of Debtor FTX Trading Ltd. and its Debtor and non-Debtor subsidiaries (the “Dotcom Silo”), including the exchanges doing business as “FTX.com” and similar exchanges in non-U.S. jurisdictions. These Silos together are referred to by me as the “FTX Group.
• Each of the Silos was controlled by Mr. Bankman-Fried.2 Minority equity interests in the Silos were held by Zixiao “Gary” Wang and Nishad Singh, the co-founders of the business along with Mr. Bankman-Fried. The WRS Silo and Dotcom Silo also have third party equity investors, including investment funds, endowments, sovereign wealth funds and families. To my knowledge, no single investor other than the co-founders owns more than 2% of the
  equity of any Silo.

There is much more information on each of these silos in the affidavit at the bottom of this post, but what we are curious about at this stage is what the Alameda balance sheet looks like: after all, that's what started this whole avalanche in the first place. Here are the details:

The parent company and primary operating company in the Alameda Silo is Alameda Research LLC, which is organized in the State of Delaware. Before the Petition Date (as defined below), the Alameda Silo operated quantitative trading funds specializing in crypto assets. Strategies included arbitrage, market making, yield farming and trading volatility. The Alameda Silo also offered over-the-counter trading services, and made and managed other debt and equity investments. In short, the Alameda Silo was a “crypto hedge fund” with a diversified business trading and speculating in digital assets and related loans and securities for the account of its owners, Messrs. Bankman-Fried (90%) and Wang (10%).
Alameda Research LLC prepared consolidated financial statements on a quarterly basis. To my knowledge, none of these financial statements have been audited. The September 30, 2022 balance sheet for the Alameda Silo shows $13.46 billion in total assets as of its date. However, because this balance sheet was unaudited and produced while the Debtors were controlled by Mr. Bankman-Fried, I do not have confidence in it and the information therein may not be correct as of the date stated.

Remarkably, among the assets listed in the document was $4.1bn of related party loans extended by Alameda, $3.3bn of which was to Bankman-Fried both personally and to an entity he controlled. Bankman-Fried previously said that FTX had “accidentally” given $8bn of FTX customer funds to Alameda.

The highlighted "related party receivable" is notable because as footnote 3 to the table reveals, it consisted of a loan by "Euclid Way Ltd. to Paper Bird Inc. (a Debtor) of $2.3 billion" and three loans by Alameda Research Ltd.: one to Mr. Bankman-Fried, of $1 billion; one to Mr. Singh, of $543 million; and one to Ryan Salame, of $55 million.
The liabilities as of September 30, 2022 were manageable. Unfortunately, the reality is that the asset and liability numbers at the consolidated level were flipped resulting in an $8 billion hole.

The problem, as we now know, is that the value of the assets was woefully overrepresented. But we'll get to that.

One thing we can certainly conclude from this fiasco is that Ray is one seriously impressive dude. To have done all this and I'm sure much more in this timeframe is staggering.

 

[Sand]

Have been following this closely, though I still don't really understand crypto. Fascinating story.

Same. Looking forward to the inevitable Netflix miniseries.

Who plays SBF? Maybe Andy Samberg or Adam Sandler?

Jonah Hill, obviously.

I was thinking Jesse Eisenberg is a shoe-in for this role, but all these actors are at least 40 now and I think SBF just turned 30 so its a stretch for any of them.

Or maybe that Chalamet kid with a Jheri curl.

I vote for Gaten Matarazzo.

 

[Mrs. Rannous]

This is a separate question but related. I'm interested in the ethics of the reporter from Vox making the conversation public.

She's within her rights as a journalist as Bankman-Fried did not declare the conversation to be off the record.

But clearly, no one in their right mind would say what he said knowing it would be public.

He said that today. https://twitter.com/SBF_FTX/status/1593014934207881218?s=20&t=OTjPeTWFVVgIvr353m4SSw

25) Last night I talked to a friend of mine. They published my messages. Those were not intended to be public, but I guess they are now.

Wondering what folks thought about the reporter making this public. Not whether it's legal or not (it clearly is as he didn't say it was off the record), but ethically.

I don't understand why this is a question. I can't conjure up any reason why it wouldn't be ok to publish.

Completely agree. Also, it is not the reporter's job to evaluate someone's mental health. I have no idea why you think it is.

 

[GroveDiesel]

this worse than scary ...

https://twitter.com/GRDecter/status/1593272102047580161

Goodness:

-Certain employees can't be located: Which could mean that some employees were fake.

-Crypto deposited by customers weren't even recorded on the balance sheet. Presumably, all crypto assets just went into one central slush fund used for whatever.

Sure seems like it was always setup as a scam and that the scammers were also being scammed (by fake employees).

 

[General Malaise]

This is Bernie Madoff 2.0, the Gen Z version. A lot of people are going to get hurt but in the process, new regulations and compliance measures will spring forth and hopefully we all learn some hard lessons.

It's going to happen again in the future with the advent of new ideas, technology and opportunities to take advantage of investors eager to make a profit. Greed is always ripe for criminals to take advantage of since the dawn of man. And make no mistake, that's what this "genius" is - a criminal who took advantage of investor's hunger for a quick buck.

Ponzi schemes don't fade away, they just evolve.

 

[FairWarning]

This is Bernie Madoff 2.0, the Gen Z version. A lot of people are going to get hurt but in the process, new regulations and compliance measures will spring forth and hopefully we all learn some hard lessons.

It's going to happen again in the future with the advent of new ideas, technology and opportunities to take advantage of investors eager to make a profit. Greed is always ripe for criminals to take advantage of since the dawn of man. And make no mistake, that's what this "genius" is - a criminal who took advantage of investor's hunger for a quick buck.

Ponzi schemes don't fade away, they just evolve.

I’m surprised it hasn’t happened sooner with crypto. Who wouldn’t want to give their money who looks like Blutarski?

 

[Juxtatarot]

I’m having trouble understanding how much of this was malicious and how much was incompetence. I’m leaning more to the latter but, again, I’m uncertain.

 

[GroveDiesel]

This is Bernie Madoff 2.0, the Gen Z version. A lot of people are going to get hurt but in the process, new regulations and compliance measures will spring forth and hopefully we all learn some hard lessons.

It's going to happen again in the future with the advent of new ideas, technology and opportunities to take advantage of investors eager to make a profit. Greed is always ripe for criminals to take advantage of since the dawn of man. And make no mistake, that's what this "genius" is - a criminal who took advantage of investor's hunger for a quick buck.

Ponzi schemes don't fade away, they just evolve.

I’m surprised it hasn’t happened sooner with crypto. Who wouldn’t want to give their money who looks like Blutarski?

Mt Gox in 2014.

Virtually the exact same thing. Mt Gox was a crypto exchange that was handling 70% of all crypto exchanges. It abruptly closed in 2014 and disappeared with hundreds of millions in bitcoin (approximately 650,000 bitcoin).

 

[Joe Bryant]

I don't understand why this is a question. I can't conjure up any reason why it wouldn't be ok to publish.

Maybe that he claims it was meant to be private and off the record? https://twitter.com/SBF_FTX/status/1593014934207881218?s=20&t=XzEOoXWxwgFTSuvUgKpQFw

Last night I talked to a friend of mine. They published my messages. Those were not intended to be public, but I guess they are now.

I can easily not see not believing him or not thinking that's a good reason. But it doesn't seem difficult to "conjure up" why someone might question it.

 

[Joe Bryant]

I’m having trouble understanding how much of this was malicious and how much was incompetence. I’m leaning more to the latter but, again, I’m uncertain.

Same.

 

[massraider]

Maybe that he claims it was meant to be private and off the record?

Then SBF should share screen shots of the DM conversation where he clarified that he preferred the discussion be off the record.

That would clear it up immediately.

 

[culdeus]

The daily did a episode on this today. He had comments on and off the record. No idea why he doesn't have a pr team and lawyers between him and the media but here we are.

FTX Bankruptcy Explained!

Sign up for The Daily Upside using this link: https://bit.ly/3G6QKpEFTX, the cryptocurrency exchange recently valued at $32 billion dollars, has filed for ba...

youtu.be

If anyone has time this is the best deep dive of the overall topic I have heard, plus is funny.

 

[culdeus]

The deeper question is if you can't keep crypto on exchanges because people will steal it, and you can't use it for anything, then how is it an inflation hedge? If it's just a dozen or so words on paper in a vault where is the value proposition as an investment, and when does it just become a complicated way to stuff money under a mattress and watch it slowly lose value?

 

[Zow]

This is a separate question but related. I'm interested in the ethics of the reporter from Vox making the conversation public.

She's within her rights as a journalist as Bankman-Fried did not declare the conversation to be off the record.

But clearly, no one in their right mind would say what he said knowing it would be public.

He said that today. https://twitter.com/SBF_FTX/status/1593014934207881218?s=20&t=OTjPeTWFVVgIvr353m4SSw

25) Last night I talked to a friend of mine. They published my messages. Those were not intended to be public, but I guess they are now.

Wondering what folks thought about the reporter making this public. Not whether it's legal or not (it clearly is as he didn't say it was off the record), but ethically.

Assuming we have the complete rundown of the messages, the speaker never voices that he wishes he conversation to be "off the record" or requests that it not be published. Seems reasonable then, without such explicit instructions to the journalist, to expect that your communications about an issue of public interest to a journalist may be published.

 

[Joe Bryant]

Then SBF should share screen shots of the DM conversation where he clarified that he preferred the discussion be off the record.

That would clear it up immediately.

He doesn't have them. Which is why most people don't believe him. I think it's already cleared up.

But it's pretty clear he said after the fact they weren't meant to be public.

Clearly those seem like things one would never in their right mind want to be public.

So it doesn't seem overly difficult to conjure up a thought that he didn't want them to be public.

 

[Joe Bryant]

Assuming we have the complete rundown of the messages, the speaker never voices that he wishes he conversation to be "off the record" or requests that it not be published. Seems reasonable then, without such explicit instructions to the journalist, to expect that your communications about an issue of public interest to a journalist may be published.

Yes. He didn't expressly say the words. So that's the assumption. I think that's what most people think. And why I asked the question as I was interested in what people thought.

 

[Zow]

Assuming we have the complete rundown of the messages, the speaker never voices that he wishes he conversation to be "off the record" or requests that it not be published. Seems reasonable then, without such explicit instructions to the journalist, to expect that your communications about an issue of public interest to a journalist may be published.

Yes. He didn't expressly say the words. So that's the assumption. I think that's what most people think. And why I asked the question as I was interested in what people thought.

Yeah I get that, um, a particular notable public figure tried to generalize and normalize giving scarlet letters to "leakers" to try to distract public attention to the primary issue but I don't even see this as "leaking." Guy reached out to a journalist in a DM (which, legally speaking, is probably no different than a phone call or an in-person conversation) and said a bunch of stuff that pertains to national news. I don't see this issue as being even close from an ethical perspective and the poll results appear to reflect that as well.

 

[Zow]

Then SBF should share screen shots of the DM conversation where he clarified that he preferred the discussion be off the record.

That would clear it up immediately.

He doesn't have them. Which is why most people don't believe him. I think it's already cleared up.

But it's pretty clear he said after the fact they weren't meant to be public.

Clearly those seem like things one would never in their right mind want to be public.

So it doesn't seem overly difficult to conjure up a thought that he didn't want them to be public.

Criminal defendants almost always do not want their incriminating statements used against them. When somebody drives drunk he almost certainly doesn't want to crash or injure somebody. When Kirk Cousins plays in primetime I'm sure he wants to play well.*

I agree with you that this guy probably didn't want these statements made public (assuming he's in his right mind). But he either knew or should have known the ethical rules surrounding the nature of a conversation with a journalist. Accordingly, in this situation, the Rolling Stones are correct.

Frankly, I don't see this issue as close and, instead, it more so detracts from the real issue of potential fraud.



*skol

 

[(HULK)]

I never understood anything about it

There's two distinct things. There is the original technology, which is interesting and may have some utility. Completely theoretical.

Then there's the scammy, speculative, money laundering nonsense that it is in its current form.

There’s also a big difference between crypto currencies and crypto currency exchanges. Crypto currencies are mostly worthless as their utility is still pretty limited and there’s still no good way for them to have high utility for the average person right now. But there’s potential there and as long as the currency doesn’t go away, there’s still some potential value.

Exchanges allow folks to buy and sell crypto currencies or even fractional shares, but like the stock market, you don’t ever hold the actual currency. The obvious danger in that is that the exchanges have zero regulation and these big exchanges keep stealing everyone’s money and folding (see Mt Gox).

If this whole thing isn't Toto pulling back the curtain, I don't know what will be.

Take a bitcoin. It is a currency which is, in the simplest terms, a medium used to exchange value. Thing is, you can barely use it to exchange value. It's not like you can walk into your local 7/11 and buy a pack of gum with it. First of all, we already have plenty of currencies with much higher utility. They're all backed by nations and work within each nation. Some, like the US dollar, can even be used quite easily in many foreign countries as an exchange of value. So, you have bitcoin and other crypto, which has just a fraction of a percent of the utility as existing currencies, why would anyone use it? They don't. Yes, it has a way of tracking everyone who ever owned it (sorta), but really, when I want a pack of gum, do I care that the Sultan of Brunei once owned this dollar 7 years ago, or do I care that it buys me a pack of gum? On top of this, the lack of regulation has created a situation where the entire crypto space is absolutely flooded with scams, from ponzi schemes, to rug pulls, and to outright theft/hacks. Additionally, many cryptocurrencies (including Bitcoin) burn up tons of energy to "mine". Like, using more energy than most nations. Humans are literally burning coal to run machines doing cryptologic calculations to find the next bitcoin. Why put up with all of that for a low utility store of value? And beyond that, why put up with all of that AND decide that it's worth somewhere between 20,000 and 50,000 times the value of a dollar? The dollar is much more useful to the user, and it's not even close. The real true value of a bitcoin is probably a fraction of a penny. Everything else built into its price is nothing but speculation and irrational exuberance.

It's nonsense. I can't remember the exact quote but I agree with Warren Buffet who said something like, "If someone offered me all of the cryptocurrency in the world for $20, I'd turn them down."

 

[(HULK)]

Ten 20 somethings with no business experience high on adderall running a multi billion dollar business.

How could this have gone wrong. Did the investors in FTX do any DD?

Apparently they were also all in a polyamorous relationship with each other. I have no problem with polyamory, but when it comes to making effective business decisions, I think that sort of relationship amongst all of the decision makers would be suboptimal.

 

[Juxtatarot]

and when does it just become a complicated way to stuff money under a mattress and watch it slowly lose value?

Slowly?

 

[massraider]

But it's pretty clear he said after the fact they weren't meant to be public.

Clearly those seem like things one would never in their right mind want to be public

His regret is not someone else's ethical problem.

 

[(HULK)]

This is Bernie Madoff 2.0, the Gen Z version. A lot of people are going to get hurt but in the process, new regulations and compliance measures will spring forth and hopefully we all learn some hard lessons.

It's going to happen again in the future with the advent of new ideas, technology and opportunities to take advantage of investors eager to make a profit. Greed is always ripe for criminals to take advantage of since the dawn of man. And make no mistake, that's what this "genius" is - a criminal who took advantage of investor's hunger for a quick buck.

Ponzi schemes don't fade away, they just evolve.

I’m surprised it hasn’t happened sooner with crypto. Who wouldn’t want to give their money who looks like Blutarski?

Mt Gox in 2014.

Virtually the exact same thing. Mt Gox was a crypto exchange that was handling 70% of all crypto exchanges. It abruptly closed in 2014 and disappeared with hundreds of millions in bitcoin (approximately 650,000 bitcoin).

I thought it was hacked. And they eventually caught the hackers in NYC, posing as rich millennial influencers. I think one rapped badly.

 

[(HULK)]

The deeper question is if you can't keep crypto on exchanges because people will steal it, and you can't use it for anything, then how is it an inflation hedge? If it's just a dozen or so words on paper in a vault where is the value proposition as an investment, and when does it just become a complicated way to stuff money under a mattress and watch it slowly lose value?

Or rapidly lose value.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

I guess where I come down is that it is the job of a journalist to report interesting stuff to the public. If I talk to a reporter about anything newsworthy involving me, I don't think I can reasonably expect those statements to remain confidential unless we agreed on that up front.

Kind of like how I don't expect a police officer to keep it on the down low that I had three martinis with supper when I get pulled over for a rolling stop. That's just not how this works.

 

[massraider]

I agree with you that this guy probably didn't want these statements made public

I think he was quite comfortable with the conversation, and someone else explained how bad it looked to him.

These Bahamas kids really need a publicist.

 

[General Malaise]

I’m having trouble understanding how much of this was malicious and how much was incompetence. I’m leaning more to the latter but, again, I’m uncertain.

He literally described his investment as a Ponzi Scheme. On the record. His words. Before the house of cards fell. And there is confusion over whether this was maliciousness or incompetence? They didn't have audited financials. My god...that's not a "whoops, we forgot". That's flat out giving the investment world the finger and there is going to be a LOT to answer going forward. From regulators, investors, counter parties.....


This guy is a criminal. A no doubt about it, modern day Bernie Madoff. He admitted it.

 

[Zow]

I guess where I come down is that it is the job of a journalist to report interesting stuff to the public. If I talk to a reporter about anything newsworthy involving me, I don't think I can reasonably expect those statements to remain confidential unless we agreed on that up front.

Kind of like how I don't expect a police officer to keep it on the down low that I had three martinis with supper when I get pulled over for a rolling stop. That's just not how this works.

I think your take(s) here are blatantly obvious and not even really debatable.

 

[GroveDiesel]

Assuming we have the complete rundown of the messages, the speaker never voices that he wishes he conversation to be "off the record" or requests that it not be published. Seems reasonable then, without such explicit instructions to the journalist, to expect that your communications about an issue of public interest to a journalist may be published.

Yes. He didn't expressly say the words. So that's the assumption. I think that's what most people think. And why I asked the question as I was interested in what people thought.

In my mind, I guess a lot of it depends on just how much the two really communicated/hung out previously.

He said that he thought he was just talking with a friend, but how reasonable is that? Were these two regularly chatting, hanging out, etc? Or was their entire previous relationship as CEO and reporter?

Either way, the guy was the CEO of a $40B+ company and seemingly made off with billions of dollars in other people’s money. A CEO of a company worth that amount of money only has themselves to blame if they blab to a reporter about a hugely controversial/notorious event going on and don’t cover themselves appropriately. There’s a much higher responsibility when dealing with that much money, especially when things go sideways. Running away to a country where you think you can’t be extradited and where you think you can keep stolen money and then complaining when your conversation with a journalist is made public garners little sympathy from me.

At best, he was cavalier with other people’s money. His practices (or even possibly theft) may very well have financially ruined a whole lot of people. Even though I think they were foolish to invest like that, they are the ones my sympathies most lie with. Him being cavalier with over sharing with a reporter just how much he doesn’t care about ruining other people and it burning him doesn’t even begin to tick my care meter. Even more so with how much he was saying publicly on social media in the first place (including outright lying to investors).

 

[Sammy3469]

This is Bernie Madoff 2.0, the Gen Z version. A lot of people are going to get hurt but in the process, new regulations and compliance measures will spring forth and hopefully we all learn some hard lessons.

It's going to happen again in the future with the advent of new ideas, technology and opportunities to take advantage of investors eager to make a profit. Greed is always ripe for criminals to take advantage of since the dawn of man. And make no mistake, that's what this "genius" is - a criminal who took advantage of investor's hunger for a quick buck.

Ponzi schemes don't fade away, they just evolve.

I mean the problem with crypto is there's always going to be someplace in the world where these companies can setup and defraud folks. It might be Isle of Man next time or Comoros, but there's already places these fraudsters gravitate towards. I do agree the US will figure something out, but frankly the reason he was in the Bahamas (as opposed to Coinbase) is that he didn't want to deal with the patchwork of US and state (hi NY) regulations around money movement.

 

[Sand]

Either way, the guy was the CEO of a $40B+ company and seemingly made off with billions of dollars in other people’s money.

And he donated a bunch of this dirty money to folks who are now mum about returning it. All those donations and recent purchases (FTX Arena, etc.) should be returned to the corpus to be distributed back to defrauded creditors (i.e. regular folk depositors).