Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

491–500 of 1001 posts

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#491

Post by dragonwriter »

tptacek wrote: post #358
CSMastermind wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We don't know yet, sentencing is separate from the trial that determines innocence or guilt. Now there will be another hearing in March during which the judge will consider all of the evidence (even that which wasn't allowed in the original trial) to determine what his punishment should be. The judge will have to abide by the federal sentencing guidelines which specify the punishments and severity they can apply but…

The judge will not in fact have to abide by the guidelines, which are advisory, and are especially advisory in sui generis trials like this where the damages and victim counts blow out the guideline charts.

Damages blowing out the charts just means a very high guidelines offense level, it doesn't make the guidelines any less applicable (and there's not really charts for victim numbers, there's a few categories for financial offenses, but mainly the guidelines expect beyond a few the aggregate loss factor to handle it, and by the time you blow the top off that chart, you've also very nearly (with just that factor and the base offense level) maxed out to a sentence of life or whatever the maximum is for the offenses on which you were convicted -- it only takes a few additional modifiers like having a substantial portion of the criminal conduct outside of the US to do that.

Way too many people here have read Popehat's (very important!) piece about how reporting of aggregate statutory maximum penalties is usually extremely misleading because in the vast majority of cases the guidelines ranges (1) will be applied, and (2) will be much shorter than the aggregate statutory maximum and are hypercorrecting into "SBF's actual sentence will be far below the aggregate statutory maximum because sentencing guidelines", without any idea of how the guidelines would apply to the facts at issue in the case.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#492

Post by elcritch »

saeranv wrote: post #474

I sure hope all the HN commentators confidently predicting this would never happen because of his large donations to the democrats see this.

Eh, he must be pretty much broke now so why would politicians from either party care about him anymore? He made his donations and they looked the other way on regulating crypto.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#493

Post by talldatethrow »

saeranv wrote: post #474

I sure hope all the HN commentators confidently predicting this would never happen because of his large donations to the democrats see this.

I don't care either way, but I would guess most people expect that the sentencing to be very light if you have friends in important places.. not that you're just totally let off on all charges.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#494

Post by peyton »

MattGaiser wrote: post #484
saeranv wrote: post #474

I sure hope all the HN commentators confidently predicting this would never happen because of his large donations to the democrats see this.

The goalposts will change to his imminent pardon.

His campaign finance trial is March 11, sentencing March 28. I think it’s reasonable to speculate on whether he’ll plead guilty in exchange for clemency at sentencing. Who knows. I don’t think anybody reasonable has ever believed a pardon is on the table for the largest fraud ever.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#495

Post by FFP999 »

fsckboy wrote: post #473
FFP999 wrote: post #393

> You’d think this MIT graduate would wise up, but he never did. The MIT campus has a major public road running through the middle of it, one of the busiest surface streets in the area. You don't have to stand there very long to see a crowd of students almost get hit by a car because they didn't look before they crossed the street. Point is, the old cliche is true, there really is such a thing as a person with a lot…

that "almost hit by car" anecdote is complete nonsense. There is plentiful jay-walking in Boston/Cambridge (just as there is in New York City, and has been recently legalized in California). To an outsider, perhaps it looks like people are dangerously walking into traffic? But how many MIT students actually get hit by cars? the number would be unusually high if the number of close calls were unusually high, but witho…

Damn, you found me out. smoke bomb

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#496

Post by jimmySixDOF »

randycupertino wrote: post #320

I liked the article detailing how poorly he did on the stand: https://www.thefp.com/p/humiliating-cross-examination-sam-ba... “Did you say in private, ‘Fuck regulators?’ ” “Did you call some customers ‘dumb motherfuckers?’ ” “Did you fly to the Super Bowl in a private plane?” “Most FTX customers did not have a line of credit, correct?” “Do you deny that Alameda had a $65 billion line of credit?” And on, and on, and o…

There is an hr long interview with Michael Lewis about his time with SBF and its fascinating how his unusually high aptitude for jane street type decision making under uncertainty was able to paper over his unusually high emotional disconnectedness.

Great interview (available as podcast and on YouTube)

https://www.intelligencesquared.com/events/the-rise-and-fall...

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#497

Post by kortilla »

saeranv wrote: post #474

I sure hope all the HN commentators confidently predicting this would never happen because of his large donations to the democrats see this.

Regardless of whether or not corruption is the case, it only has forward guarantees if there is a hint of blackmail involved.

Donating a bunch of money to a group gives you no power over that group unless they think there is more on the table. When you’re about to get arrested they will cut all ties immediately unless there is an actual obligation to support you.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#499

Post by manonthewall »

FFP999 wrote: post #393

> You’d think this MIT graduate would wise up, but he never did. The MIT campus has a major public road running through the middle of it, one of the busiest surface streets in the area. You don't have to stand there very long to see a crowd of students almost get hit by a car because they didn't look before they crossed the street. Point is, the old cliche is true, there really is such a thing as a person with a lot…

the whole "book learning nerd not living in the real world" is quite cliche these days, there are much better descriptors such as emotional, literary, mathematical, etc intelligences. Someone may be high in all of them or in just one or none.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#500

Post by caturopath »

gzer0 wrote: post #120

Interestingly, FTX made a $500 million USD investment in Anthropic; supposedly, this was made while Anthropic was valued at $4.6 billion (unconfirmed). Now, Anthropic is nearing $30 billion. Anyone know the latest on this? Is FTX going to sell that stake off to pay back the debts? [1] https://www.businessinsider.com/sam-bankman-frieds-anthropic...

They're going through normal bankruptcy stuff and may liquidate the Anthropic stake. It looks at this point like there's likely going to be money enough to pay all creditors, which is just hilarious.
Post reply on HN