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Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

nytimes.com

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Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#761

Post by jackbravo »

zztop44 wrote: post #750
lubesGordi wrote: post #739

Sequoia invested $200M in this guy. Has anyone looked at whether SBF could've done as much damage without that investment? Has anyone looked at if Sequoia did their due diligence? Seems like Sequoia could've seen red flags just from knowing Alameda existed. The potential abuse there was completely obvious.

The whole Sequoia thing is so interesting. Here is an excerpt from their (now taken down) profile of SBF, highlighting the moment he convinced them to invest: > That’s when SBF told Sequoia about the so-called super-app: “I want FTX to be a place where you can do anything you want with your next dollar. You can buy bitcoin. You can send money in whatever currency to any friend anywhere in the world. You can buy a ban…

I think that idea in particular is quite good actually ^_^

I mean, I'm not imagining that they have groceries listings on the app, but that the app allows you to transfer money directly to someone from your crypto wallet. Like a venmo payment but with crypto.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#762

Post by pclmulqdq »

_n_b_ wrote: post #733
pclmulqdq wrote: post #720

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that the AUSA's performance here was not particularly impressive. Yes, they constructed an airtight case, but to do that, they handed out immunity deals like candy to all of SBF's co-conspirators. Sure, they got their guy, but it almost looks like they wanted to craft a narrative that puts all of the blame on him. Because of that, several other huge fraudsters here (eg Carol…

> several other huge fraudsters here (eg Caroline Ellison) get to walk Caroline Ellison pleaded to 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. Looking at the Federal Sentencing Guidelines[1], even accepting for her being a cooperating witness, she's very likely going to…

I would rather trust the opinions of experienced criminal lawyers than someone who gets their information by running a "sentencing points" calculator:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-11-03/sbf-s-inn...

"Ellison, Wang and Singh will likely get no or very little prison time for their testimony, several criminal defense lawyers who’ve followed the case said."

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#763

Post by FFP999 »

matsemann wrote: post #634
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…

It's quite insane that your society puts the onus on the pedestrians not to get hit, and even makes it illegal to cross the road. It should be the licensed drivers' responsibility to not hit someone. And in the middle of a campus cars should of course yield to pedestrians. Such a car-centric world.

It's a little more complicated than I've laid out here. There's not a hard boundary between the MIT campus and the rest of the city, in contrast with Harvard Yard on the other side of Cambridge, which is surrounded by high brick walls. Cambridge is an old city and MIT is, for a New England university, fairly young--not to mention that for the first few decades it was at a different location than today, in Boston proper. I'm pretty sure the road was there long before the first university building.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#764

Post by the_snooze »

zztop44 wrote: post #750
lubesGordi wrote: post #739

Sequoia invested $200M in this guy. Has anyone looked at whether SBF could've done as much damage without that investment? Has anyone looked at if Sequoia did their due diligence? Seems like Sequoia could've seen red flags just from knowing Alameda existed. The potential abuse there was completely obvious.

The whole Sequoia thing is so interesting. Here is an excerpt from their (now taken down) profile of SBF, highlighting the moment he convinced them to invest: > That’s when SBF told Sequoia about the so-called super-app: “I want FTX to be a place where you can do anything you want with your next dollar. You can buy bitcoin. You can send money in whatever currency to any friend anywhere in the world. You can buy a ban…

I think the practical business/technical goals are almost irrelevant. It's not that SBF had a brilliant business model in mind. It's that he fit the "look" of a founder that those VCs expected. He was one of them, with the right pedigree and right connections. It's affinity fraud [1].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affinity_fraud

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#766

Post by jackbravo »

whalesalad wrote: post #760
zztop44 wrote: post #750

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole Sequoia thing is so interesting. Here is an excerpt from their (now taken down) profile of SBF, highlighting the moment he convinced them to invest: > That’s when SBF told Sequoia about the so-called super-app: “I want FTX to be a place where you can do anything you want with your next dollar. You can buy bitcoin. You can send money in whatever currency to any friend anywhere in the world. You can buy a ban…

Let's not forget the league of legends incident. https://www.businessinsider.com/ftx-sam-bankman-fried-league...

Oh wow! It was in that same meeting!

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#767

Post by Tangurena2 »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #407
Gustomaximus wrote: post #389

I'm curious how the sentencing goes, not only for SBF but those around him that took deals. In my limited view of US cases, it often seems prosecutors let off lightly anyone that will testify in return for their whale. Sometimes feels it's more symbolic justice that way than real.

That depends heavily on what you think the purpose of the justice system is. For most purposes, nailing the whale and breaking up the party is enough to set an example and send a message. There isnt much value in incarcerating additional people simply for the sake of punishment/revenge. The other individuals are unlikely to cause future harm.

The federal prison system abandoned the concept of rehabilitation back in the 1970s. The current system is a combination of exile (we don't want you around), some punishment (this place sucks) and some mitigation (if you're in jail then you can't do more crimes). I do not believe that potential criminals are the sort who are capable of thinking something like "I better not do X, I don't want to be in jail that long".

There's a YouTube channel called "Insider" and they have a series of videos called "how crime works" which are part interviews with past-criminals about how their particular scheme worked:

https://www.youtube.com/c/thisisinsider/videos

The videos all have extensive credits and one thing was that very few of the participants actually considered potential punishment/incarceration beforehand.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#768

Post by ActionHank »

zztop44 wrote: post #750
lubesGordi wrote: post #739

Sequoia invested $200M in this guy. Has anyone looked at whether SBF could've done as much damage without that investment? Has anyone looked at if Sequoia did their due diligence? Seems like Sequoia could've seen red flags just from knowing Alameda existed. The potential abuse there was completely obvious.

The whole Sequoia thing is so interesting. Here is an excerpt from their (now taken down) profile of SBF, highlighting the moment he convinced them to invest: > That’s when SBF told Sequoia about the so-called super-app: “I want FTX to be a place where you can do anything you want with your next dollar. You can buy bitcoin. You can send money in whatever currency to any friend anywhere in the world. You can buy a ban…

This whole exchange made me think that there must have been a family or friend connection back to Sequoia.

As a humble poor, if I were running the show over at Sequoia I would have these people out on their asses, but again, I also don't have buckets of money clouding my judgement.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#769

Post by s1artibartfast »

DebtDeflation wrote: post #666

The SBF "magic box" interview with Matt Levine where he casually describes yield farming as nothing more than a Ponzi scheme never gets old. https://www.ft.com/content/eac0e56c-f30b-4591-b603-f971e60dc...

I thought that was a great interview and sbf was a great and clear speaker. He really got his point across.

It kinda makes me sad that he fucked up doing some unrelated shit.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#770

Post by scotty79 »

hintymad wrote: post #243

I was reading the trial report by Inner City Press. The AUSAs were incredibly thorough and strategic. The evidences were air-tight, the cross-examination was masterfully controlled with precision and incisiveness, and of course the closing argument was forceful. It was a great joy to read the report, as if I was watching an extended episode of The Good Fight. On the other hand, the defense was really weak, quite hand…

Bribing politicians with donations depicted as business development oficially in court. US is such a weird country.
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