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Caroline Ellison, CEO of Alameda Research, pleads guilty to seven offences

theguardian.com

101–110 of 255 posts

Re: Caroline Ellison, CEO of Alameda Research, pleads guilty to seven offences

#101

She’s the queen of wallstreetbets. I think she’ll hold the yolo record for a long time. I wish we knew what the fateful market play was that sunk her ship. She mentioned she’s not a fan of stop losses, so I wonder if she went to bed with an open market position and woke up to negative three billion. Also I wonder if the entity on the other side of that trade realized they were making someone insolvent. It’ll be inter…

Much of the money Bernie Madoff stole in his ponzi scheme was recovered, however the difference is that his assets were "real" things vs derivatives on made up things (like FTT) so in this case, I'm thinking the losses are lost.

That said, there are participants in the crypto-coin market who have alternative resources for recovering losses so if any of them had exposure here it might go poorly for her in prison.

Re: Caroline Ellison, CEO of Alameda Research, pleads guilty to seven offences

#102
SBF’s plea deal can’t be far behind. He is uniquely positioned to help FTX’s receivers recover the maximum amount of money, and will use that leverage to strike the best deal possible. The whole FTX crew will likely pay their debt to society and be free before they’re 40 with the potential to do something useful with their skills and knowledge (think Mitnick).

Re: Caroline Ellison, CEO of Alameda Research, pleads guilty to seven offences

#103
post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> She mentioned she’s not a fan of stop losses At the volume they were trading, stop losses are no longer practical. The market is not infinitely deep.

I've never understood how stop losses are supposed to help. Traders read heaps of news, do God knows what technical analysis yet simple "moves bit too much in wrong direction" is supposed to be an acceptable exit strategy.

You're missing the bit that "moves bit too much in wrong direction" is a strong signal that your analysis is fundamentally flawed. Maybe catastrophic news came out since you bought in.

Re: Caroline Ellison, CEO of Alameda Research, pleads guilty to seven offences

#104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are assuming way too much here. She's not the queen of anything, she's a fraudster that will spend a long time in jail and that has probably much less understanding of the mechanisms involved than you give her credit for. If she did she wouldn't be in the position she's in. The last thing we really need is for people to start lionizing her.

But she’s highly regarded! It’s all just a little joke. Check out https://www.reddit.com/r/wallstreetbets . Also https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jg85H26wyLk She certainly earned her sentence, and I have no sympathy for her. But isn’t it hard not to be at least a little impressed with the sheer scale of her losses? Getting in the record books for “most money lost by a single individual” is a hard thing to do in general.

I think Elon threw his hat in the ring for "most wealth lost by and individual in a single year." And I agree, it is a really tough game to play. And now the table stakes are basically unreachable by most.

Re: Caroline Ellison, CEO of Alameda Research, pleads guilty to seven offences

#105
post #21

It's interesting to see this play out because much of it was predictable. Personally, I was amused at the people complaining that the SBF case was taking too long. If however you know something about how Federal prosecutions work, you'd know (and I made many comments about this) that the case was moving incredibly quickly. As soon as SBF was indicted, it confirmed that the Feds had 1 or more cooperating witnesses and…

Madoff clawbacks took years. Here’s a story from 2018, and litigation is still ongoing: https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-amazing-madoff-clawback-154...

Importantly, clawbacks went way back in time. If you put $5 million in in 2000 and pulled $10 million out in 2002 then you had FBI agents at your door in 2010.

There’s going to be a lot of Lamborghinis on the used market, and plenty of vacancies in Miami condo towers soon.

Re: Caroline Ellison, CEO of Alameda Research, pleads guilty to seven offences

#106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are assuming way too much here. She's not the queen of anything, she's a fraudster that will spend a long time in jail and that has probably much less understanding of the mechanisms involved than you give her credit for. If she did she wouldn't be in the position she's in. The last thing we really need is for people to start lionizing her.

That ship has long sailed. She's coming out of this with a slap on the wrist because she ratted on SBF. She's a hero of the alt right because her Tumblr is full of creepy eugenics shit. She has a pervo following for being a poly sex fiend (allegedly). She's going to write a book, sell her movie rights, etc. and live a life of luxury as the woman that took down SBF and FTX (who will be remembered as the real fraudster…

The now-deleted Tumblr posts, supposedly:

https://caroline.milkyeggs.com/

Re: Caroline Ellison, CEO of Alameda Research, pleads guilty to seven offences

#107
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two counts of wire fraud, two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to commit commodities fraud, conspiracy to commit securities fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering. Maximum sentence of 110 years.

I have always wondered why "x" and "conspiracy to commit x" are different counts.

The elements are different. Typically “conspiracy to commit X” requires some number of people agreeing to do X and then someone from the group doing at least one overt act in furtherance of that agreement. So you can be guilty of “conspiracy to commit X” without ever getting even remotely close to doing X.

So for example if two mates talk about that they are going to kill person Y, that is the agreement. And then one of them buys a gun, that is an overt act. And even if person Y has very good security, and the two dudes have no chance in hell of murdering Y ever, that is still a “conspiracy to muder” charge.

Re: Caroline Ellison, CEO of Alameda Research, pleads guilty to seven offences

#108
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My conspiracy theory is that USDT is actually well backed, but the Tether people intentionally make it look shady so they can buy the dip and arbitrage against panic selling. Some volatility would actually increase their ability to profit.

I mean if they're going to act (or rather, seem) malicious then they might as steal the backed assets they have right now rather than hope to pump-and-dump enough to make more money. It's not like either is more legal than the other.

Just arbitraging ensures this scheme never blows up in their faces and they can never get charged with a crime. Acting shady (but not actually stealing anything) isn't illegal.

Re: Caroline Ellison, CEO of Alameda Research, pleads guilty to seven offences

#109
post #46

What a Queen. Massively connected and after destroying the life of thousands of working class chumps she gets to walk free after getting her wrist slap.

> destroying the life of thousands of working class chumps

I have little sympathy for anyone who got burnt by playing in the crypto space.

Re: Caroline Ellison, CEO of Alameda Research, pleads guilty to seven offences

#110
post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean if they're going to act (or rather, seem) malicious then they might as steal the backed assets they have right now rather than hope to pump-and-dump enough to make more money. It's not like either is more legal than the other.

Just arbitraging ensures this scheme never blows up in their faces and they can never get charged with a crime. Acting shady (but not actually stealing anything) isn't illegal.

If your ability to make money off something is based on a pump-and-dump (or more fittingly, dump-and-pump) scheme, then you are either committing securities fraud or ending up in a lengthy legal battle over securities fraud.
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