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$477M FTX ‘hack’ was a Bahamian government asset seizure

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211–220 of 243 posts

Re: $477M FTX ‘hack’ was a Bahamian government asset seizure

#211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not so sure. Is it correct that the Bahamian government prompty converted all the seized tokens to ETH? If the seizure was for purposes of "safekeeping", what gives the Bahamians the right to trade in other people's cryptographic tokens?

This is conjecture on conjecture, but generally if you're holding assets in trust you can sell/trade them if it would be in the beneficiaries' best interests.

"Holding assets in trust" Does that apply to assets that were seized? To me, the phrase "in trust" implies that the owner of the assets has entrusted them to you, and you have a fiduciary duty to them.

[I'm uncomfortable referring to cryptographic tokens as "assets". I think of an asset as something with an intrinsic value, albeit floating. Cryptographic tokens have a price, but no value.]

Re: $477M FTX ‘hack’ was a Bahamian government asset seizure

#212

Any thoughts on why SBF lied to the Vox reporter about it being a hack? https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/23462333/sam-bankman-frie... Maybe he just didn't want to have to explain some breaking news to her.

Any idea why a serial liar lied once again? In an interview where he basically admits to his public persona having been fake and almost everything he said in interviews over the past years being untrue. It's not the only thing that seems untrue in that interview, because it's been reported he had a special setup that let him transfer funds and cook the books without even regular employees noticing. It wasn't simply a…

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Re: $477M FTX ‘hack’ was a Bahamian government asset seizure

#213
post #20

Maybe this is a stupid question, but how ? Was the Bahamas' SEC holding its own copies of FTX's keys? I thought the entire point of these schemes was that this kind of seizure-by-force wasn't possible (absent exploits or insiders).

I'm assuming they walked over to the person holding the keys and handed them a court order.

Why would you need to assume when there’s an article that has the answer?

Re: $477M FTX ‘hack’ was a Bahamian government asset seizure

#214
post #186

There was definitely a hack (perhaps in addition to government action). The FTX holdings database was wiped, and malware was hosted on their website and mobile apps: https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/11/12/ftx-crypto-wall...

Yeah, the ftx coins were moved to two addresses. One is the one most folks were watching, where most of the non-eth funds were sold to eth on decentralized exchanges, and sometimes at really high slippage. The stable coins were all converted to DAI, which doesn't have any blacklist feature. This address is also a basic private key wallet, like metamask, not a multisig or contract wallet. None of this sounds like a regulator doing the bare minimum to preserve a company's assets for future bankruptcy liquidation.

The other address that recieved substantial funds is a contract based multisig wallet, and it recieved everything that is truely a shitcoin. And that wallet hasn't sold or moved anything beyond the initial movement. On the night of the hack there was speculation that this was a whitehat rescue of the remaining tokens.

To me this sounds more like there was both a hack, and a seizure to preserve what was left.

Re: $477M FTX ‘hack’ was a Bahamian government asset seizure

#215

Maybe this is a stupid question, but how ? Was the Bahamas' SEC holding its own copies of FTX's keys? I thought the entire point of these schemes was that this kind of seizure-by-force wasn't possible (absent exploits or insiders).

It says right in the article SBF did it himself because the government asked him to after declaring bankruptcy.

The ol' wrench attach

Re: $477M FTX ‘hack’ was a Bahamian government asset seizure

#216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SBF publicly lied about this and called it a hack. If it was all aboveboard why would he have done that?

You're assuming SBF is a rational agent, which if he was, he wouldn't be in this position.

He’s rational, he’s just using a different set of ethics.

In the Vox interview he says he’s trying to win a jurisdictional battle with Delaware, this just part of that fight.

Re: $477M FTX ‘hack’ was a Bahamian government asset seizure

#217
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bahamian government is seizing assets "to protect the interests of clients or customers".

That's just dodging the key question. Obviously the government has some rationale other than that they're taking it because they can. The problem is that they're still taking money that's owned by someone else, even if it's controlled by SBF. I'm sure there are strong international norms if not laws against a sovereign power directing a foreign financial actor to repay some sort of debt by pilfering client deposits,…

You could just read the bill, its pretty plain language. For the LOLs I'll read it for you. The DARE act boils down to crypto is completely socialized in the Bahamas UNLESS the business is being operated under pretty typical accounting principles. Or rephrased, hands off anarcho if you're not a crook, but if you're a crook then what amounts to "The SEC for the Bahamas" is your new CEO. This is not exactly the way banks are run in the USA, but its close enough to echo. It seems a reasonable way to regulate criminality in an industry. Its very easy to follow the common sense laws to avoid, essentially having your company nationalized by the regulator.

Who is "they":

Under Part V Section 41. Co-operative Power paragraph 2, as what boils down to "the SEC for the Bahamas" they will cooperate with other nations equivalent of the SEC "other domestic regulatory authority". So if the US SEC or US bankruptcy court asked them nicely, they can at their discretion (see paragraph 4) cooperate. My point above is the "they" deciding to do this is kind of unclear. Certainly gaining control of assets would kind of be the job of the bankruptcy court so if they asked the Bahamas Commission to help out, could, and in my opinion, probably did.

Based on my opinion of what I've read about what happened, SBF violated the entirety, not just one or two paragraphs, but the entire section, of Part III section 17 "Adequate systems and controls for digital token exchanges", subs a thru e inclusive, so they could be operating entirely on their own.

They could be doing all of this on their own or as a favor to the USA SEC, I donno. But no one seems to have considered Sec 41 in their rush to decide to "they" are whom are deciding things.

Anyway, regardless who decided to act:

Under Part II Section 5 paragraph 2 sub h, "do all things, and take all action, which may be necessary or expedient or are incidental to the discharge of any function or power given to the Commission".

The power they're probably invoking is Part II Section 4 paragraph 2 sub b, for the purposes of ensuring the "... development and maintenance of investor protection standards with respect to digital asset business..." So their legal purpose is to stop crooks from embezzling investors money. Combined with the paragraph above they likely think the leaving the investor assets in the control of SBF would be a little unwise as everyone seems to think he's already stolen billions of dollars worth of them, so what little is left should be preserved or at least removed from his opportunity to continue to pilfer.

Under Part III section 19 para 1 sub e, when they declared bankruptcy the registration to operate is auto-revoked and then para 4 hits "Where the Commission has suspended the registration of a digital asset business, the Commission may impose such conditions upon or give such directions to the registrant, including timeline for compliance, with which conditions or directions the registrant must comply."

So I have not seen the paperwork served on SBF in a leak or whatever, but it probably resembles the above.

Re: $477M FTX ‘hack’ was a Bahamian government asset seizure

#218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"You can beat me all day, but it's impossible for me to fulfill your demands, you'd also need to beat these other four people, and they're located all over the globe." Someone might be quite happy to engage squads in lots of countries to kidnap and beat everyone if the payout is billions of dollars, but it's a very different problem and e.g. the Bahamas government or some local thug won't be able to do it. I have no…

Sounds like an operational Challenge but with billions on the line people will consider it. Perhaps one or two if the multisig holders are already on board and will "reassure" the others that everything is fine. Or one government (like the US) coordinates with others to get it done.

Sure, but that's a tall order. The US cooperating with e.g. China, Russia and the EU to get everyone? Or the US running covert ops in China, Russia and the EU to take the money themselves? Both are a very different situation than the US simply sending a cop to some address and asking the person living there to please come with them to the station.

For criminals, it'll also be a huge operation, and it'll come with insane publicity which criminals typically don't like. Who's powerful enough and willing to potentially burn their existence in entire countries for such a payout, when they make billions a year?

Re: $477M FTX ‘hack’ was a Bahamian government asset seizure

#219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FTX is incorporated in Antigua and Barbuda and headquartered in The Bahamas. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FTX_(company)

FTX Trading Ltd. has a bunch of legal entities on the Bahamas. As shown in the latest Delaware court fillings. The Bahamas have at least jurisdiction over those legal entities and their assets. That FTX as a whole was unable, and/or unwilling, to keep proper track of accounts, cash and assets across their overly complicated corporate structure is hardly the Bahamas fault.

OK, yes, there are Bahamian entities over which Bahamian authorities likely have jurisdiction. But given what you say with regards to the complexity of FTX's corporate structure, it's likely difficult to determine that the assets that were transferred to Bahamian authorities actually belong to those Bahamian entities.

Maybe it's better that these assets are in the hands of Bahamian authorities, but it is highly questionable that the transfer happened after the Delaware filing, and that it was made in such a sloppy way that destroyed so much value.

My albeit very basic understanding is that once the bankruptcy filing was made in Delaware, the Bahamas had some obligation to defer to the Delaware courts. It makes one wonder if this was actually an official action to begin with, and was not instead given a post hoc imprimatur only when it became obvious that the transfers could not be hidden.

Re: $477M FTX ‘hack’ was a Bahamian government asset seizure

#220
post #61

interesting, since FTX was headquartered in the bahamas this seems lawful and not unreasonable. though some will argue the government doesn't have the right to do that, I think you sacrifice your protection when you commit fraud. how quickly should the bahamas have announced about the asset seizure? is it common in other countries to not comment about (seizures in) ongoing investigations?

Another interesting angle to this is that the funds were collected in various different currencies, but all of them were converted into ETH. And they weren't converted carefully to make sure they got the full value, no attempt at OTC deals or anything; they were converted in a rush and dumped on the open market. This resulted in pretty clear loss of funds. It seems like a strange way for a government to operate. That…

I'm not defending their action, but there is a question of (a) authority and (b) capability. You're asking about authority, and yes SBF has stepped down, but the Bahamian regulator may have undertaken this on its own authority (possibly also with a judicial warrant, to perfect the authority), and so all they were lacking at that point was capability, which SBF could provide. It's sort of like if a criminal has a key to a shed with stolen goods in it -- we all agree the criminal does not legally own the goods, but he has the key, so you compel him to open it up.
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