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Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

nytimes.com

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Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#611

Post by kvathupo »

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...

Even more interestingly, Anthropic isn't traditionally structured: it's a Long-Term Benefit Trust [1]. That's not say shares can't be sold, but, rather, shareholders have very little governance rights. Debatable whether this is good, e.g. Meta's success being tied to Zuck's large holdings. On the other hand, you have WeWork.

[1] - https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/23794855/anthropic-ai-ope...

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#612

Post by mejutoco »

shever73 wrote: post #589
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…

> there really is such a thing as a person with a lot of book-learning but less common sense than a sea slug I don't even think SBF had the book-learning, just intellectual arrogance. "I don’t want to say no book is ever worth reading, but I actually do believe something pretty close to that. I think, if you wrote a book, you f---ed up, and it should have been a six-paragraph blog post."

The craziest thing to me is that when he was saying things like that noone in the mainstream media was questioning him. The FT had a very flattering lunch interview with him shortly before his demise. It was embarrassing how they were portraying him.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#613

Post by danielfoster »

boppo1 wrote: post #510
siskiyou wrote: post #324

Reminds me of working for MCI-Worldcom. When you think you’re working for crooks, you probably are. Run away.

Tell a naive young guy more. What are the red flags?

I'm studying for my CFE (Certified Fraud Examiner) and can shed some light on this.

As others mentioned, unexplainable business models or money coming out of nowhere are major red flags. A few others to look out for if you are applying for a job:

1. Few or no internal controls. A medium-size or larger company not having a CFO is particularly questionable.

2. People in high positions, including the CEO, lack qualifications or experience. Often the CEO will hire inexperienced or incompetent people for high-level positions because they a) won't figure out what is going on or b) can figure it out, but are too grateful for the position to say anything. Or maybe the CEO never finished college in a field where everyone has a PhD (think Elizabeth Holmes).

3. History of experienced / qualified people joining the company and leaving soon after

4. Seemingly unexplained success.

5. Extravagant spending and inappropriate workplace behavior.

6. Cult of loyalty to the CEO and/or a "circle" around this person, including close interpersonal relationships.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#614

Post by caconym_ »

fsckboy wrote: post #521
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…

[flagged]

SBF's case didn't go his way because he was obviously lying and lying and lying ("I don't recall") and equivocating and evading when he wasn't outright lying, because he was guilty. There may have been instances where he was genuinely trying to communicate a salient truth in response to a prosecutor's rhetorical trap, but indulging him in those cases wasn't going to change the outcome. He should not have testified; he should have pled guilty.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#615

Post by mejutoco »

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…

Occam‘s razor suggests simpler explanations than book smart, stupid at common sense. For a person openly opposed to reading books, and proud of it.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#616

Post by dmoo »

shever73 wrote: post #589
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…

> there really is such a thing as a person with a lot of book-learning but less common sense than a sea slug I don't even think SBF had the book-learning, just intellectual arrogance. "I don’t want to say no book is ever worth reading, but I actually do believe something pretty close to that. I think, if you wrote a book, you f---ed up, and it should have been a six-paragraph blog post."

That’s an unfortunate attitude for a guy looking at a stretch with not a lot to pass the time…

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#617

Post by itronitron »

harimau777 wrote: post #380
constantly wrote: post #244

For anyone curious, Ken White has a good and entertaining article breaking down maximum sentences in print (here, 110 years) and what people actually serve. It's worth a read: https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentenc... A takeaway: "1. Maximum sentences have very little relation to actual sentences in federal law. When the government quotes the maximum sentence, they are trying to scare you. When…

In some ways I can understand white collar criminals being "more evil" than murderers. As I understand it, murderers are often acting out of desperation, poverty, etc. On the other hand, it seems like a lot of white collar criminals who have everything but feel entitled to take from people who already have less than them. Although clearly the murderers did the more heinous crime. Not trying to say that this is someth…

I like to think that I want to know what SBF's circle of friends and family had to think about this fraud, as it was going on, but I'm probably better off not knowing.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#618

Post by Synaesthesia »

WD40forRust wrote: post #605

Poor dude. Nobody deserves what we call 'prison'.

I’m also an abolitionist and I agree the US prison system is atrocious. But we have to be morally consistent. If he doesn’t deserve it, neither do other criminals deserve to be punished egregiously.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#619

Post by StressedDev »

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.

Thank you for bringing this up. I cannot believe how many people tried to use this case as a tool to smear a political party.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#620

Post by xwolfi »

mejutoco wrote: post #612
shever73 wrote: post #589

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there really is such a thing as a person with a lot of book-learning but less common sense than a sea slug I don't even think SBF had the book-learning, just intellectual arrogance. "I don’t want to say no book is ever worth reading, but I actually do believe something pretty close to that. I think, if you wrote a book, you f---ed up, and it should have been a six-paragraph blog post."

The craziest thing to me is that when he was saying things like that noone in the mainstream media was questioning him. The FT had a very flattering lunch interview with him shortly before his demise. It was embarrassing how they were portraying him.

But you had Zeke Faux, a specialist, going there, looking at SBF screen and seeing nothing too special too.

Blame the "mainstream media" all you want but as long as we refuse (for good reason) to give audit power to journalists, mainstream or specialist, you'll keep reading positive pieces about frauds if they stay hidden purposefully.

I'm not sure why you would have wanted to NYT to destroy every company it interviews just for the sake of it. Wouldnt they need proof ? And how do you get them, when they're hidden by a conspiracy ?

Plus, the police in the US, Hong Kong and the Bahamas found nothing and waited for Coindesk to publish a leak by CZ, a competitor, to start looking...

I say that because at the peak of the crypto fever I couldnt distinguish SBF from, say, the CEO of Kraken, and I suspect it's hindsight convincing you something could have been done.

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