881–890 of 1001 posts
So what’s the final outcome? A long prison sentence or a few years hanging out on appeal followed by a few years in a low security federal penitentiary and a long career doing speaking engagements and appearances? Holmes got 9 years, but her actions had severe real world effects on people. Is that the ceiling for SBF?
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…
I want to see his parents go down too. Sounds like some criminal actions there too.
Remember: this is not a cryptocurrency problem, it's a banking problem. This guy created a literal bank. People deposited funds in it. Instead of simply being a custodian, he took the money and "invested" it. And lost it all. I wish this sort of thing would happen every time bankers screwed things up. Instead the government bails them out.
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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…
I agree, didn't they admit they knew what they were doing? They should all do the same amount of time.
I am as happy as anyone about arrogant half-smart crypto bros being called out as the frauds they are. It is still sad that a young person's life is taken away today. I don't think any type of nonviolent crime should get anyone a life sentence, especially not in a prison system as inhumane as in the US.
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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…
There is this weird thing in venture investing: the line between "crazy, brilliant founders who will build world changing companies" and "crazy, lunatic founders who will lie and cheat and be awful" is very hard to distinguish, especially at the series seed/series A level. It can lead to false positives and false negatives all the time.
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I feel bad that Sam is going to go away for life, and ideally we'd live in a society where we don't need prison to reform people, but Sam is a case where there is considerable deterrent effect and well as a public protection interest. When someone steals so much from so many and admits no fault, that's not a person who can go to a day program and reform their ways, they need severe consequences to get the to honestly reform.
There's also what the victims say should be done. Just thousands and thousands of people felt pain, and will get a say in the sentencing. If they all forgive, sure, it's okay to give him a light sentence, but the degree of suffering SBF caused is just so profound people will want justice to an un-repentant fraudster who stole their future.
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Just asking, because all three of those guys did several years of federal time.
I somewhat agree with what you say about prison, but I'm not sure we should start with the charismatic and media-savvy child of politically connected Stanford professors, who had plenty of opportunities to do well and live a full life without stealing anything or cheating anyone.