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Why Is No One Asking SFB What Happened to the $3.3B He Borrowed?

nakedcapitalism.com

81–90 of 136 posts

Re: Why Is No One Asking SFB What Happened to the $3.3B He Borrowed?

#81

It's not at all surprising that the corporate media has failed on this aspect of the story, they're the ones who hyped this guy to the moon, after all. Most of the so-called journalists are just stenographers for the rich and powerful-- just look at their abysmal reporting on Ukraine.

I'm curious on why you think reporting has been abysmal in Ukraine?

https://fair.org/home/us-medias-intellectual-no-fly-zone-on-...

https://fair.org/?s=ukraine

Re: Why Is No One Asking SFB What Happened to the $3.3B He Borrowed?

#83

Should be corrected from "SFB" to "SBF" (I know it's incorrect in the original title)

It is funny that with the mistake it now comes out as: "Fried Bankman", which is kinda apropos.

Haha that's too funny

Re: Why Is No One Asking SFB What Happened to the $3.3B He Borrowed?

#84
Several reports – & SBF in recent statements – have identified $2.1B to $3B as the cost of buying out others' stake in FTX, primarily Binance (an early investor). That was true traditional but not publcly-traded equity, not FTT tokens (though perhaps FTT tokens were accepted as part or most of the payment value out).

Now, by structuring these as "loans" to SBF, for him alone to increase his (already overwhemling) majority control, meant he'd unethically levered up the enterprise into a "heads SBF wins even more, tails everyone else loses everything" precariousness. Losers at risk from such an arrangement would include, and eventually now have included, customers with custodial funds that should never have been at any risk at all - but were so commingled across purposes & entities under SBF's shoddy self-dealing & criminally-negligient management that they were de facto contributors to these unwise sweetheart insider loans.

So at least $2.1B, & perhaps up to ~$3B, of this "loaned" value (in cash & other tokens) may have made its way to Binance, and thus we wouldn't expect it to be in SBF's current pockets. It was still taken inappropriately, though. And, the magnitudes further make SBF's claims of not knowing the details of either Alamedas or FTX's balance sheets not credible. Honest people generally don't send $3B of value through themselves, to elsewhere, without at least some sense of the stocks & flows involved.

However, perhaps after those loans, the large venture investments into FTX are reported to have sent around $300M cash (of the raised funds) to SBF. He's also described that as repaying him for acts like buying out Binance with personal funds, almost as if he hadn't been loaned billions from FTX to do that. That money looks instead more like a VC's willingness, in a suitably hot deal, to let the founder take some value out to have more-diversified wealth. I'd expect the debtors to especially chase that cash money, to see where it landed, for possible recovery by SBF's victims.

Another missing question from recent interviews: when SBF does his, "I've got nothing, now" or "maybe $100k" act, ask him: why hasn't he declared bankruptcy?

He borrowed ~$3B from FTX/Alameda-related entities, in order to lever-up further into FTX. If he presumably per the debtors-in-management team still owes his associated-entities $3B+, and has "nothing", he should be in bankruptcy.

SBF is a very smart person with a now-documented history, during his ascent, of blatant misrepresentations about weighty matters & a flexible view of ethics.

When such a person claims "oops, I kept poor records & didn't manage the staff or complicated legal entities I'd chosen & didn't pay close attention", but then slowly & vaguely describes past actions in the most self-exonerating ways possible, the presumption should be that the post-fall accounts are retroactive fabulations. The character 'hapless-Sam' is just as much a self-aggrandizing fiction as the character 'hyperethical-and-hypercompetent-Sam' was.

And even if fully true, "I was a reckless gambler bad with math even when I was selling people on the idea I'd hedged out all the gambles and was brilliant at math" only helps explain, but does not excuse, criminal deception.

Re: Why Is No One Asking SFB What Happened to the $3.3B He Borrowed?

#85

The All-In podcast about this is worth listening to. Considering that part of the money went to you-know-who, it’s no surprise that those groups don’t ask any tough questions.

you-know-who?

Voldemort

Re: Why Is No One Asking SFB What Happened to the $3.3B He Borrowed?

#86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious on why you think reporting has been abysmal in Ukraine?

https://fair.org/home/us-medias-intellectual-no-fly-zone-on-... https://fair.org/?s=ukraine

looks like you complain that the media is not working for the rich and powerful, i.e. Putin?

Re: Why Is No One Asking SFB What Happened to the $3.3B He Borrowed?

#87

This may be a "culture gap" (or language gap) between crypto and traditional finance. The FT text directly addresses the question that we're told "No one [is] asking." They asked where's the money, and they're exposing the fact that no coherent response has been forthcoming. That's reporting. The likely interpretation of that piece of reporting is crystal clear to the intended readership. (I.e., the money is probably…

Correct - the "everyone" is mainly NYT and some politicians. There are some questions there as it's a bit sketchy why they're treating him with such kid gloves.

I don't understand these media criticisms in the form of "Why doesn't every MSM outlet cover everything at once and ask every question of everyone and also make every inference we all want to hear?" The NY Times elicited more details out of SBF than anyone else. He more or less confessed to some of the major elements of his crime while pleading ignorance/incompetence at the girth of his wrongdoing. Asking in a friendly, non-challenging tone is a pretty standard interview technique to disarm your subject and encourage cooperation. "How much did you steal and why aren't you in jail?" isn't going to get a useful answer.

Re: Why Is No One Asking SFB What Happened to the $3.3B He Borrowed?

#88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious on why you think reporting has been abysmal in Ukraine?

https://fair.org/home/us-medias-intellectual-no-fly-zone-on-... https://fair.org/?s=ukraine

It seems that they are critiquing two major news sources (NYT & WSJ). I've been following the conflict from BBC News and The Economist, and the reporting has been solid in my opinion.

This site also only seems to push back against more left-wing news outlets, I didn't see anything saying how Fox News pushing for appeasement isn't a good idea.

Re: Why Is No One Asking SFB What Happened to the $3.3B He Borrowed?

#89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Correct - the "everyone" is mainly NYT and some politicians. There are some questions there as it's a bit sketchy why they're treating him with such kid gloves.

Seems to me people have completely unrealistic expectations of how financial crimes play out. This will take years to unwind. Pretty obvious the "why isn't he in jail yet" screaming is coming from the same place as "why aren't I rich yet," on which this entire empire was built. This stuff takes time. He's very obviously going to prison. For context: Enron, whose operations and collapse caused way more negative impact…

>>>Seems to me people have completely unrealistic expectations of how financial crimes play out. This will take years to unwind.

I remember Bernie Madoffs case unwinding rather quickly once news broke.

The elephant in the room that needs to be addressed is that SFB was the second largest doner to the democratic party where the DOJ is headed by an democratic appointee. This is a very bad look for justice and the democratic party and the longer they let this drag out the worse it looks for them.

Re: Why Is No One Asking SFB What Happened to the $3.3B He Borrowed?

#90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://fair.org/home/us-medias-intellectual-no-fly-zone-on-... https://fair.org/?s=ukraine

It seems that they are critiquing two major news sources (NYT & WSJ). I've been following the conflict from BBC News and The Economist, and the reporting has been solid in my opinion. This site also only seems to push back against more left-wing news outlets, I didn't see anything saying how Fox News pushing for appeasement isn't a good idea.

Ah yes, questioning the wisdom of sending tens of billions of dollars in weapons and cash to a regime controlled by neonazis and that is so corrupt it was denied EU membership is "appeasement".
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