The Guardian (November 11)
Sam Bankman-Fried, the convicted cryptocurrency fraudster, “talked a lot of venture capitalists into pouring millions of dollars into his business. Maybe they should be more careful next time. Despite protestations of improving VC due diligence, little is likely to change due to the fear of missing out (FOMO). So-called reforms are instead likely to amount to “stable door securely locked… until next time.”
Tags: Bankman-Fried, Careful, Convicted, Cryptocurrency, Dollars, Due diligence, FOMO, Fraudster, Improving, Protestations, Venture capitalists
Financial Times (December 7)
“Not only does Bankman-Fried appear to be lacking in shame; he seems almost contemptuous towards those who feel complex moral emotions.” Feeling embarrassed is not sufficient “when we are talking about as much as $8bn having gone missing, as many as 1mn creditors having lost their money, and a collapsed $32bn crypto empire being investigated by criminal prosecutors for alleged fraud on a vast scale (which Bankman-Fried denies).”
Tags: $8bn, Bankman-Fried, Collapsed, Complex, Contemptuous, Creditors, Criminal prosecutors, Crypto, Embarrassed, Feeling, Investigated, Lacking, Missing, Moral emotions, Shame, Sufficient
Newsweek (December 2)
“The failure to conduct basic due diligence of Bankman-Fried is after all what led to his ability to take so many people for a ride. That refusal to investigate reflects the complexity of the crypto industry and the difficulty involved in tracking the flow of funds and risk on the blockchain. But it’s also further evidence of how the media gets hoodwinked by Robin Hood narratives, something many technology leaders have learned to leverage well.”
Tags: Bankman-Fried, Blockchain, Complexity, Crypto industry, Difficulty, Due diligence, Evidence, Failure, Funds, Hoodwinked, Investigate, Media, Risk, Robin Hood, Tracking
The Economist (November 17)
“Nobody in crypto has slept in days.” Despair has filled the crypto universe since ftx, a Bahamas-based crypto exchange and crown jewel in the empire of Sam Bankman-Fried, its once-feted founder, filed for bankruptcy on November 11th…. He was supposed to be crypto’s future. Instead, he may have robbed the industry of one.”
Tags: Bahamas, Bankman-Fried, Bankruptcy, Crypto, Despair, Exchange, Founder, FTX, Future, Industry
Financial Times (November 11)
The bankruptcy of “Sam Bankman-Fried’s business empire includes billions of dollars of illiquid venture capital investments… including exposure to Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Boring Company.” The giant sprawl of his “venture capital portfolio will add to the complexity of the insolvency proceedings, which itself includes more than 130 companies controlled by Bankman-Fried. FTX’s collapse is among the most dramatic failures in the crypto industry not just this year, but since the creation of bitcoin more than a decade ago.”
Tags: Bankman-Fried, Bankruptcy, Bitcoin more, Business empire, Complexity, Crypto, Exposure, Failure, FTX, Illiquid, Insolvency, Investments, Musk, SpaceX, Sprawl, VC
