6 ms·

He is a an exceedingly large donor to the establishment, especially to the party currently in charge (matters not which one). With his connections, he is in the

He is a an exceedingly large donor to the establishment, especially to the party currently in charge (matters not which one). With his connections, he is in the different tier. No judgement here on whether it’s good or bad.

cmeacham98 4y ago
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- thepasswordis 4y ago
  No, he’s in the Bahamas and yes is is a donor to the Bahamian government.
hash07e 4y ago
Maybe he belongs to a small tight knit group with institutional power?
lavventura 4y ago
What will happen when the party currently in charge change? Will he still be untouchable?
- frgtpsswrdlame 4y ago
  It's been coming out that he donated lots to them too so I guess we'll see. My impression overall though is that he will end up in jail, it's just going to take a while for everyone who received his money to come to terms with the scale of his fraud.
- mikeyouse 4y ago
  It's a dumb conspiracy in the first place -- he was a large donor to some congressional candidates, many of whom lost (over $10M of his 2022 funds went to a losing candidate in an Oregon primary). In any case, it's obvious he has zero money and zero future prospects to be politically useful so there's no reason that anyone in charge would go out of their way to "protect" him (contrary to someone like Corzine, Menendez or Rick Scott). These theories are just weird HN conspiracies to add mystique to the very normal slow Federal justice process.
  - MrPatan 4y ago
    If you were a politician interested in getting more of that sweet fraudster money, tell me, what would you do to send a signal that you're open for business to the next batch of fraudsters, hang the guy that paid you, or help him out? Sure, this may just be bullshit, we dont know, etc etc, but "he has no more money" is not a very good argument
- michaelbuckbee 4y ago
  Well, he claims to have given about as much to both parties (just in different ways). https://fortune.com/crypto/2022/11/29/sam-bankman-fried-political-donations-democrats-republicans-dark-money/ https://fortune.com/crypto/2022/11/29/sam-bankman-fried-poli... Cynically, this makes sense to me as what he was buying was really lack of government oversight.
  - acdha 4y ago
    > Cynically, this makes sense to me as what he was buying was really lack of government oversight. Yeah, I think a lot of people forget that for something like this he didn't need to actually get the government to do anything: simply delaying action gave him the chance to do hundreds of millions of dollars in fraud.
denlekke 4y ago
despite having donated to both parties extensively, i think it's largely a perceptional issue. while the FTX collapse IS mainstream news, the mainstream largely isn't impacted and has already written off crypto as a massive scam. so in some regards, i think joe regular-guy enjoys the spectacle of crypto people losing their money because it validates their skepticism of the entire ecosystem. for either party to feel really motivated to arrest or prosecute, they'd want joe regular-guy to be clamoring for that action and i don't think that's the case.
- angrycontrarian 4y ago
  > despite having donated to both parties extensively > both He was the second biggest donor to the DNC after George Soros. I'm not aware of any RNC contributions.
  - nobody9999 4y ago
    >I'm not aware of any RNC contributions. Now you are. https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/ftx-founder-sam-bankman-fried-prolific-donor-republicans https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/ftx-founder-sam-bankman... https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/04/11/ftx-co-ceo-donates-4m-to-republican-pac-ahead-of-midterm-elections/ https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/04/11/ftx-co-ceo-donate...
    - angrycontrarian 4y ago
      So 0.6% of his overall contributions? Not even a full percent?
      - mikeyouse 4y ago
        His co-president gave over $20M to republicans and some republican congressmen were among his staunchest defenders and were actively trying to prevent the SEC from investigating. It would behoove people to read a little bit about the case before they start pontificating on their pet conspiracy theories. I saw elsewhere you're now claiming that SBF was sleeping with Gensler's niece which is a straight lie as far as I can tell? I think it's just a mistaken reference to Caroline Ellison's dad working in a different department at MIT when Gensler was there? https://www.opensecrets.org/outside-spending/donor_detail/2022?id=U0000004758&type=I&super_only=N&name=Salame%2C+Ryan+D.+%26+Susan https://www.opensecrets.org/outside-spending/donor_detail/20... https://twitter.com/RepTomEmmer/status/1504117902080942084 https://twitter.com/RepTomEmmer/status/1504117902080942084? https://apnews.com/article/fact-check-sec-chair-ftx-ceo-daughter-679417036876 https://apnews.com/article/fact-check-sec-chair-ftx-ceo-daug...
insane_dreamer 4y ago
it turns out he was smart enough to give to both parties, knowing how power can change hands (not saying that giving to either party was a good thing)
DennisP 4y ago
He also is part of the establishment, as a former Jane Street trader.

cmeacham98 4y ago

thepasswordis 4y ago
No, he’s in the Bahamas and yes is is a donor to the Bahamian government.

hash07e 4y ago

Maybe he belongs to a small tight knit group with institutional power?

lavventura 4y ago

What will happen when the party currently in charge change? Will he still be untouchable?

frgtpsswrdlame 4y ago
It's been coming out that he donated lots to them too so I guess we'll see. My impression overall though is that he will end up in jail, it's just going to take a while for everyone who received his money to come to terms with the scale of his fraud.
mikeyouse 4y ago
It's a dumb conspiracy in the first place -- he was a large donor to some congressional candidates, many of whom lost (over $10M of his 2022 funds went to a losing candidate in an Oregon primary). In any case, it's obvious he has zero money and zero future prospects to be politically useful so there's no reason that anyone in charge would go out of their way to "protect" him (contrary to someone like Corzine, Menendez or Rick Scott). These theories are just weird HN conspiracies to add mystique to the very normal slow Federal justice process.
- MrPatan 4y ago
  If you were a politician interested in getting more of that sweet fraudster money, tell me, what would you do to send a signal that you're open for business to the next batch of fraudsters, hang the guy that paid you, or help him out? Sure, this may just be bullshit, we dont know, etc etc, but "he has no more money" is not a very good argument
michaelbuckbee 4y ago
Well, he claims to have given about as much to both parties (just in different ways). https://fortune.com/crypto/2022/11/29/sam-bankman-fried-political-donations-democrats-republicans-dark-money/ https://fortune.com/crypto/2022/11/29/sam-bankman-fried-poli... Cynically, this makes sense to me as what he was buying was really lack of government oversight.
- acdha 4y ago
  > Cynically, this makes sense to me as what he was buying was really lack of government oversight. Yeah, I think a lot of people forget that for something like this he didn't need to actually get the government to do anything: simply delaying action gave him the chance to do hundreds of millions of dollars in fraud.

denlekke 4y ago

despite having donated to both parties extensively, i think it's largely a perceptional issue. while the FTX collapse IS mainstream news, the mainstream largely isn't impacted and has already written off crypto as a massive scam. so in some regards, i think joe regular-guy enjoys the spectacle of crypto people losing their money because it validates their skepticism of the entire ecosystem. for either party to feel really motivated to arrest or prosecute, they'd want joe regular-guy to be clamoring for that action and i don't think that's the case.

angrycontrarian 4y ago
> despite having donated to both parties extensively > both He was the second biggest donor to the DNC after George Soros. I'm not aware of any RNC contributions.
- nobody9999 4y ago
  >I'm not aware of any RNC contributions. Now you are. https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/ftx-founder-sam-bankman-fried-prolific-donor-republicans https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/ftx-founder-sam-bankman... https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/04/11/ftx-co-ceo-donates-4m-to-republican-pac-ahead-of-midterm-elections/ https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/04/11/ftx-co-ceo-donate...
  - angrycontrarian 4y ago
    So 0.6% of his overall contributions? Not even a full percent?
    - mikeyouse 4y ago
      His co-president gave over $20M to republicans and some republican congressmen were among his staunchest defenders and were actively trying to prevent the SEC from investigating. It would behoove people to read a little bit about the case before they start pontificating on their pet conspiracy theories. I saw elsewhere you're now claiming that SBF was sleeping with Gensler's niece which is a straight lie as far as I can tell? I think it's just a mistaken reference to Caroline Ellison's dad working in a different department at MIT when Gensler was there? https://www.opensecrets.org/outside-spending/donor_detail/2022?id=U0000004758&type=I&super_only=N&name=Salame%2C+Ryan+D.+%26+Susan https://www.opensecrets.org/outside-spending/donor_detail/20... https://twitter.com/RepTomEmmer/status/1504117902080942084 https://twitter.com/RepTomEmmer/status/1504117902080942084? https://apnews.com/article/fact-check-sec-chair-ftx-ceo-daughter-679417036876 https://apnews.com/article/fact-check-sec-chair-ftx-ceo-daug...

insane_dreamer 4y ago

it turns out he was smart enough to give to both parties, knowing how power can change hands (not saying that giving to either party was a good thing)

DennisP 4y ago

He also is part of the establishment, as a former Jane Street trader.