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Apart from maybe Coinbase, I just take as a given that every single actor in crypto is a criminal, and so far this assumption has been pretty much bang-on accur

Apart from maybe Coinbase, I just take as a given that every single actor in crypto is a criminal, and so far this assumption has been pretty much bang-on accurate.

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dcist 3y ago
And although there hasn't been any evidence of top-level fraud, a Coinbase product manager was sentenced to two years in prison for an insider trading scam: https://fortune.com/crypto/2023/05/09/former-coinbase-employee-sentenced-to-two-years-in-prison-for-first-cryptocurrency-insider-trading-case/ https://fortune.com/crypto/2023/05/09/former-coinbase-employ...
dpflan 3y ago
Coinbase is dressed up nicely, but you say basically that all actors and therefore coin creators/owners are criminal, then CB facilitates criminal and is criminal implicitly by turning a blind eye to facilitation at a minimum assumption of involvement. It's been called a casino.
loeg 3y ago
Just to expand a bit on the "maybe," it seems pretty clear that the SEC's opinion is that most of Coinbase's business model is being an unregistered securities broker (except for perhaps allowing trading bitcoin and ethereum), which is illegal.
aionaiodfgnio 3y ago
Maybe Coinbase won't just waltz off with their depositor's money, but their business model appears to be illegal from top to bottom. The SEC alleges that basically everything they are doing is illegal. Even if the SEC is wrong, Coinbase's practice of operating as broker, exchange, and clearing agent is a massive conflict of interest.
SamPatt 3y ago
I co-founded an a16z and USV funded crypto startup in 2015, and I knew lots of people in the industry. There are certainly bad actors, probably more than other industries. But it's absolutely nothing like "every single actor." Many were (and presumably still are) true believers in the technology, and got into it the field with good (though perhaps naive) intentions.

Apart from maybe Coinbase, I just take as a given that every single actor in crypto is a criminal, and so far this assumption has been pretty much bang-on accurate.

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dcist 3y ago

And although there hasn't been any evidence of top-level fraud, a Coinbase product manager was sentenced to two years in prison for an insider trading scam: https://fortune.com/crypto/2023/05/09/former-coinbase-employee-sentenced-to-two-years-in-prison-for-first-cryptocurrency-insider-trading-case/ https://fortune.com/crypto/2023/05/09/former-coinbase-employ...

dpflan 3y ago

Coinbase is dressed up nicely, but you say basically that all actors and therefore coin creators/owners are criminal, then CB facilitates criminal and is criminal implicitly by turning a blind eye to facilitation at a minimum assumption of involvement. It's been called a casino.

loeg 3y ago

Just to expand a bit on the "maybe," it seems pretty clear that the SEC's opinion is that most of Coinbase's business model is being an unregistered securities broker (except for perhaps allowing trading bitcoin and ethereum), which is illegal.

aionaiodfgnio 3y ago

Maybe Coinbase won't just waltz off with their depositor's money, but their business model appears to be illegal from top to bottom. The SEC alleges that basically everything they are doing is illegal. Even if the SEC is wrong, Coinbase's practice of operating as broker, exchange, and clearing agent is a massive conflict of interest.

SamPatt 3y ago

I co-founded an a16z and USV funded crypto startup in 2015, and I knew lots of people in the industry. There are certainly bad actors, probably more than other industries. But it's absolutely nothing like "every single actor." Many were (and presumably still are) true believers in the technology, and got into it the field with good (though perhaps naive) intentions.