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Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted
- spandextwins 3y agoWhere did the all the money go?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- sillypuddy 3y agoHe was a big democratic donor, also some to media outlets.
- mcintyre1994 3y agoHe claims he gave about the same to both parties, so double that again: https://blockworks.co/news/the-gop-also-got-millions-from-ftx-execs https://blockworks.co/news/the-gop-also-got-millions-from-ft... Still a pretty small portion of the billions total though.
- eiirv33 3y agoCampaign donations, venture investments, loans to FTX executives, real estate in the Bahamas
- napierzaza 3y ago[dead]
- morkalork 3y agoHis parents must be so proud
- bordercases 3y agoThey helped him!
- bhouston 3y agoI understand his dad seemed to be intimately involved. How did he avoid prosecution?
- goodluckchuck 3y agoThis was a pet project for a number for very wealthy and powerful criminals. SBF likely had a decent understanding of his role as the fall guy.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- mechatrocity 3y agohttps://archive.ph/KRU47 https://archive.ph/KRU47
- Dig1t 3y agoWhy does this site always captcha loop on my phone?
- lreeves 3y agoIf you're using Google DNS servers that seems to happen, I switched my phone back to the ISP DNS and it started working again.
- ndr 3y agoIt does that for me too from time to time. I wish I knew why.
- kelseyfrog 3y agohttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36970702 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36970702
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- Vicinity9635 3y ago[dead]
- conkeisterdoor 3y agoI'd love to know too — I've never been able to use this site
- HenryMulligan 3y agoApparently there are ongoing hostilities between the archive.* websites (archive.today, archive.is, archive.ph, etc.) and Cloudflare. Try changing your device's DNS settings to something other than Cloudflare (1.1.1.1) to access the archive.* website. For example, Google's DNS is at 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 . If your browser has DNS-over-HTTPS enabled, add an exception for the archive.* sites. (I believe Firefox has it on by default and I had to add exceptions for three or four of the archive.* sites to be able to use them).
- gizajob 3y agoDon’t teach your kids Consequentialism folks.
- candiddevmike 3y agoDo teach your kids not to steal from rich people, lest there be real consequences
- gizajob 3y agoKind of my point. His mother, as part of her role as a professor of legal ethics, wrote a paper or two in support of consequentialism - that only the consequences of ethical actions are what is important. The issue with this, is that one can't tell in advance what they are, especially if it leads one to becoming completely ethically bankrupt while hoping for the best of all possible outcomes.
- jowea 3y agoA bunch of average people who put their money into FTX too. Consider all the advertising.
- alephnan 3y agoEffective Consequentialism
- sp332 3y agoAnd if you teach them about expected value, also teach risk of ruin.
- slibhb 3y agoExtremely prescient exchange between SBF and Tyler Cowen: COWEN: Okay, but let’s say there’s a game: 51 percent, you double the Earth out somewhere else; 49 percent, it all disappears. Would you play that game? And would you keep on playing that, double or nothing? BANKMAN-FRIED: With one caveat. Let me give the caveat first, just to be a party pooper, which is, I’m assuming these are noninteracting universes. Is that right? Because to the extent they’re in the same universe, then maybe duplicating doesn’t actually double the value because maybe they would have colonized the other one anyway, eventually. COWEN: But holding all that constant, you’re actually getting two Earths, but you’re risking a 49 percent chance of it all disappearing. BANKMAN-FRIED: Again, I feel compelled to say caveats here, like, “How do you really know that’s what’s happening?” Blah, blah, blah, whatever. But that aside, take the pure hypothetical. COWEN: Then you keep on playing the game. So, what’s the chance we’re left with anything? Don’t I just St. Petersburg paradox you into nonexistence? BANKMAN-FRIED: Well, not necessarily. Maybe you St. Petersburg paradox into an enormously valuable existence. That’s the other option.
- AustinDev 3y agoWell... this is justice. Sadly, we don't get to see justice very often. This is life in prison, correct? I know he hasn't been sentenced but all counts is easily several life sentences at the federal level. When do the parents go on trial? I can't see how they make it out of this without at least having all their ill-begotten assets stripped.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- beezle 3y agoProbably a lot of concurrent sentences
- eep_social 3y ago115 years maximum. I haven’t been following the judge closely enough to have a feel for how much they’re going to throw the book vs let him off but I have to imagine it’ll be the book given his attitude throughout. But that one rapist, Brock Turner, did like a year of community service so you never know. edit: Also seeing 110 years, TechCrunch said 115 here: https://techcrunch.com/2023/11/02/sam-bankman-fried-found-guilty-on-all-seven-counts/ https://techcrunch.com/2023/11/02/sam-bankman-fried-found-gu...
- Vicinity9635 3y agoBrock Turner got probation. I'd rather go to prison than go on probation. I know a cop that feels the same way. The people that think he got off easy don't know how awful probation is.
- woodruffw 3y agoMaybe you could educate us.
- throwaway5959 3y agoWhy is that?
- LispSporks22 3y agoI will still be surprised if he spends a single day in prison though.
- cdchn 3y agoHe's uh.. he's already been in prison for a bit.
- LispSporks22 3y agoHe’s been sentenced then?
- marcus0x62 3y agoNo, his bail was revoked.
- sp332 3y agohttps://www.cnn.com/business/live-news/ftx-sam-bankman-fried-testimony-fraud-trial/h_8dfc3e8b25a96638c5da151251d8f0ae https://www.cnn.com/business/live-news/ftx-sam-bankman-fried... For example, the Rikers Island jail is mostly for pre-trial detention. People don't get sentenced to Rikers.
- Vicinity9635 3y agoNo, he's been in jail. Semantic, and a bit simplified, but basically you're held in jail pending trial, and go to prison for a conviction.
- ozim 3y agoDays spent in jail are counted for your “prison time” so it counts as such even if it is jail ;)
- hamstrunghuman9 3y agoYou can't be told anything irl, can you?
- matheusmoreira 3y agoRemember: 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.
- candiddevmike 3y agoPretty sure banks get audited to prevent this exact scenario from happening.
- Kareem71 3y agoI guess you can call your bank a crypto bank, and skip the audits.
- matheusmoreira 3y agoNot really. No amount of auditing prevents banks from going bankrupt. It wasn't that long ago some Silicon Valley bank became insolvent and suffered a literal bank run. And people got bailed out. Again.
- pylua 3y agoThere are lots of mechanisms in place compared to other types of financial institutions including bank examiners.
- tsunamifury 3y agoYou got it backwards. They became insolvent due to a bank run. Based on false speculation that they couldn’t liquidate their treasuries. Which the government then bought back 1:1. So basically Peter Theil caused a run on a bank for no reason other than he got people panicked about their tbill risk ladder. Which by the way want as bad as Bank Of Americas right now.
- 3y ago
- neduma 3y agommm.. 110 years for stealing close to $10 billion
- matteoraso 3y agoI doubt that he's going to get the max sentence. I bet he'll be out in 10 years.
- unstatusthequo 3y agoThis time with an AGI startup.
- dieselgate 3y agoReminds me of the Fyre festival guy getting out of prison and trying to make it right by doing the festival again
- Waterluvian 3y agoIs that just based on your feelings or have you applied the sentencing guidelines to get a good estimate?
- ceejayoz 3y agoRelevant: https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentence-eleventy-million-years/ https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentenc... TL;DR: It won’t be the max.
- Waterluvian 3y agoA few lawyers in the Popehat Cinematic Universe are saying they calculate about 110, which maxes at 43, and they anticipate he will get much under the guidelines like Holmes did.
- compiler-devel 3y ago
- Sparkle-san 3y agoUnlocked article url: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/11/02/business/sam-bankman-fried-trial?unlocked_article_code=1.7Uw.hLyG.LWjOqd66fUiQ https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/11/02/business/sam-bankman...
- jpeter 3y agoWill he be allowed to play league of legends in prison?
- slowhadoken 3y agoLeague of Legends is it's own kind of prison
- bsima 3y agoPrison is it's own kind of League of Legends
- slowhadoken 3y agothis conversation, a prison.
- slowhadoken 3y agoI got down voted? Does no one watch Home Movies?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- jowea 3y agoThat Norwegian mass-shooter complained about not having the latest Playstation once IIRC.
- idlewords 3y agoIn under five hours! The jury was home in time for dinner. One question for legal people—why is there such a long gap between conviction and sentencing? In this case, the sentence won't be set until March of next year.
- pbj1968 3y agoGive him a chance to wrap things up. He’s not going anywhere in the interim.
- pb7 3y agoWrap up what things? He’s sitting in jail. Nothing to wrap up.
- tempsy 3y agothere’s an appeal process
- datavirtue 3y agoYeah, you work on that while you are in jail.
- chasil 3y agoWhy is this guy even in the country? He could have chartered a boat to Venezuela and taken a few hundred million with him. Of course, all the people he defrauded might follow him.
- pb7 3y agoGood. I hope they go after his parents next.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- munchinator 3y agoI'm not too familiar with the American system, could someone please explain how after the verdict does the sentencing work? The judge is the one who will now decide the sentence? And how long does that decision take, so when will we know what the consequences of the guilty verdict actually are? (For example, how many years in prison, or not).
- wmf 3y agoSentencing on March 28th. https://twitter.com/innercitypress/status/1720228642641330494 https://twitter.com/innercitypress/status/172022864264133049...
- bagels 3y agoTypically decided by the judge. There is a table of different degrees of crimes that have sentencing guidelines for minimum/maximum sentence. The judge will choose where on that spectrum the sentence lies. edit: From Ars Technica The five charges related to wire fraud and money laundering carry maximum sentences of 20 years each, while the two securities and commodities fraud charges have maximum sentences of five years each.
- bsjaux628 3y agohttps://youtu.be/kr8gSdJ_Ggw?t=4m32s https://youtu.be/kr8gSdJ_Ggw?t=4m32s
- chasil 3y agoIsn't there also the possibility of concurrent versus consecutive sentencing?
- bagels 3y agoYes. I intentionally left that out, because I don't know what the guidelines are for that on these charges. The quote I gave just lists the maximum sentence for each charge.
- 3y ago
- xezzed 3y agoSo what's his term in jail?
- CSMastermind 3y agoWe don't know yet, sentencing is separate from the trial that determines innocence or guilt. Now there will be another hearing in March during which the judge will consider all of the evidence (even that which wasn't allowed in the original trial) to determine what his punishment should be. The judge will have to abide by the federal sentencing guidelines which specify the punishments and severity they can apply but otherwise it's a matter of their discretion.
- tptacek 3y agoThe judge will not in fact have to abide by the guidelines, which are advisory, and are especially advisory in sui generis trials like this where the damages and victim counts blow out the guideline charts.
- dragonwriter 3y agoDamages blowing out the charts just means a very high guidelines offense level, it doesn't make the guidelines any less applicable (and there's not really charts for victim numbers, there's a few categories for financial offenses, but mainly the guidelines expect beyond a few the aggregate loss factor to handle it, and by the time you blow the top off that chart, you've also very nearly (with just that factor and the base offense level) maxed out to a sentence of life or whatever the maximum is for the offenses on which you were convicted -- it only takes a few additional modifiers like having a substantial portion of the criminal conduct outside of the US to do that. Way too many people here have read Popehat's (very important!) piece about how reporting of aggregate statutory maximum penalties is usually extremely misleading because in the vast majority of cases the guidelines ranges (1) will be applied, and (2) will be much shorter than the aggregate statutory maximum and are hypercorrecting into "SBF's actual sentence will be far below the aggregate statutory maximum because sentencing guidelines", without any idea of how the guidelines would apply to the facts at issue in the case.
- pr0crastin8 3y agoLike many of his strategies at FTX, his high risk approach to this trial for a high value payout (taking no plea deal and getting out with no charges) hasn’t worked out. I wonder if he himself is accepting of the outcome and isn’t already scheming or relying on another all-in gamble.
- eropple 3y agoHe can console himself with the pseudofact that there's a universe in which he won.
- mocha_nate 3y agoFrom an altruist perspective, he will meet so many more people in jail where the Net Opportunity to Max Out moral value is huge. He would never get this opportunity in the real world. Smart move.
- mrosett 3y agoI don’t think he was ever offered a plea deal
- Waterluvian 3y agoI wonder if a valid option could have been to plea guilty and throw himself at the mercy of the court to receive a lesser sentence.
- fakecontent000 3y ago[dead]
- methods21 3y agoAgain, justice is served for a small, very small, subset of the white collar criminals. Bring the real crooks (e.g. insider traders etc.) in for justice.
- pzh 3y agoWell, they got Martha Steward so there’s that…/s
- sob727 3y agoIf you know any, you can blow the whistle on them. You could be in for a nice pay day.
- semiquaver 3y agoInsider traders are the “real crooks”? That’s pretty far down one side of the abstract harm spectrum.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- chasing 3y agoWhat a pathetic person.
- ybessyehs654 3y ago[flagged]
- cactusplant7374 3y agoI don't agree with your pessimistic take, but I'll bite: Why pardon someone that won't be donating in the future? Surely no politician would take the money even if it's offered.
- ybessyehs654 3y agoBecause he'll use his connections to raise funds for future Democratic causes.
- gizajob 3y agohttps://time.com/6330323/sbf-trial-biggest-bombshells/ https://time.com/6330323/sbf-trial-biggest-bombshells/ - interesting in this article showing what Alameda spent their stolen money on is that they made a $500million bet/investment on Anthropic, who Google just committed to investing $2billion into. Could have turned out great!
- pests 3y agoCould have? FTX still owns that investment into Anthropic and the bankruptcy proceedings are sorting it out.
- gizajob 3y agoOver a longer timeframe than they had
- gemstones 3y agoIsn’t rule 1 of trading that it doesn’t matter if you’re right if the timing is wrong?
- mikeryan 3y agoThe outstanding creditors probably think the timing was pretty good.
- tim333 3y agoI had money on FTX. There are headlines like "FTX Customers May Get Full Payout Thanks to Google & Amazon" which make me hopeful of getting some back. https://cryptobriefing.com/ftx-customers-full-payout-thanks-google-amazon/ https://cryptobriefing.com/ftx-customers-full-payout-thanks-... It would be kind of ironic if the investments went up so much they could cover everything.
- PunchTornado 3y agoThere was an article about how bankruptcy lawyers are charging 2000$ per hour + other expenses.
- wnevets 3y ago[flagged]
- idlewords 3y agoWell, that's who has the money
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago> He made the biggest mistake you can make in America, he stole money from the rich No, he stole from millions of ordinary Americans. The reason we keep running into this is people take jokes like yours as serious tropes, and then filch from ordinary voters.
- WendyTheWillow 3y agoWhat do you mean no? He did both.
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago> What do you mean no? He did both Exactly. One of these made him hated. It is simply untrue that Bankman-Fried was prosecuted because he lost rich folks’ money. By default, there is very little public sympathy for gambling losers, including cryptos. That millions of voters were hurt turbocharged the prosecution.
- tsunamifury 3y agoWhat?! Americans couldn’t even use FTX without a foreign bank account. I would hardly call that ordinary.
- jowea 3y agoWasn't FTX.US a thing?
- anonymoushn 3y agoThis is not accurate in various ways. I deposited to my FTX.com account by wire transfer from my US bank (as a KYCed US citizen). My fund deposited to its FTX.com account by wire transfer from its US bank. FTX US also accepted wires from US people with US banks.
- tantalor 3y agoNo, they had pizza: https://twitter.com/tolstoybb/status/1720228218672988667?t=t-A7Rh-lUHZnEqKokVfdUQ&s=19 https://twitter.com/tolstoybb/status/1720228218672988667?t=t...
- Ivoirians 3y agoThat almost sounds like a made-up joke, but I guess it's a free government-subsidized pizza dinner.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- Tiktaalik 3y agolol I mean they're barely paid for their time they might as well get a pizza as a treat.
- heyoni 3y agoEvery jury orders food from local restaurants lol
- idlewords 3y agoOMG, that's even better!
- dragontamer 3y agoI'm assuming it went like this: "So this guy is guilty right?" (10x other Jurors) "Agreed". (That one "For Fairness" Juror) "I dunno, we're sending this guy to jail for an awfully long time. I think we need to think it over a bit longer." "Fine, Lets get pizza". * 4 hours later * "Okay, we thought about it some more. He's guilty right?" (11x other Jurors) Guilty. ----------- At least, I'm amused by the thought of a "reverse 12 Angry Men" style setup, where everyone agrees upon the same premise (that a quick decision is a bad idea for everyone), but the additional time thinking changed nothing.
- quickthrower2 3y ago
- prvc 3y agoWill he be held in custody before sentencing?
- ncallaway 3y agoProbably. It's up to the judge, but typically post-conviction release has a higher bar than pre-trial release. So since SBF was detailed pre-trial, it's very likely he'll be detained post-conviction as well.
- zoklet-enjoyer 3y ago1) What
- demondemidi 3y agoHe's a lesser evil. The only reasons why he went down were: 1. because he's not a greater evil, he didn't get dirt on people who can bring you down is a great way to never be brought down (Epstein is an anomaly); and 2. he did it publicly, there are about 2500 known billionaires in the world and estimated another 1000 that have assets that cannot be accounted for determine net worth accurately; he should worked on getting into that latter crowd of "shadow billionaries".
- nafey 3y agoAlso he was stupid, any other billionaire would have relocated to a country that does not have extradition treaty with the US.
- ciabattabread 3y agoBut are any of those countries fun? Russia ain’t exactly fun. China?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- isk517 3y agoEpstein probably had to much dirt on to many powerful people.
- xyst 3y agoabsolutely shocked! his iron clad defense on the stand was infallible!11 joking aside, glad this joker is going to rot in a federal prison. Even if it's "club fed"
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- ttul 3y agoDoes anyone know whether he will be re-bailed to his palatial parents' home in Palo Alto now that witness tampering is off the table?
- downWidOutaFite 3y agoNo. He might be never leave prison again
- KptMarchewa 3y agoVery doubtful he'll do more than 20 years.
- downWidOutaFite 3y agoBernie Maddoff got 150
- system2 3y agoAt age 79. Even if he got 10 he'd probably die in prison anyway.
- kosievdmerwe 3y agoThat might have been a major consideration before he took the stand, where he perjured himself and showed no remorse. Now, I'm not sure the judge might not decide "If I'm going to give him what's effectively a life sentence, I might as well make an example", like they did with Madoff.
- greenyoda 3y ago> ...now that witness tampering is off the table? It's not off the table. He may still face a trial on the remaining charges of campaign finance fraud and foreign bribery.
- jjtheblunt 3y ago
- anonu 3y agoLife in prison seems extreme. Im going to randomly guess sentencing will be 25 years and he'll be out in 15.
- notmytempo 3y agoIt's a federal case, so that's not possible. He must serve at least 85% of the final sentence.
- anonu 3y agoIt will depend if the convictions are served concurrently or consecutively. You're right about the 85% rule for federal convictions though.
- pests 3y agoI beleive the default for Federal convictions imposed at the same time are concurrently unless the statue or judge specifically asks otherwise.
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- BXLE_1-1-BitIs1 3y agoThere's a RICO prosecutor in GA who'd love to sit down with the SBF prosecutors to take notes.
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- preciousoo 3y ago> A high school librarian, a retired investment banker and a Metro North train conductor: Sam Bankman-Fried’s fate is in the hands of a diverse group of jurors who sat through weeks of scathing testimony against the former cryptocurrency mogul. Maybe I watch too much TV, but I wonder how the investment banker was allowed to stay on Jury. I've heard mostly anecdotes that lawyers do everything in their power to get experts on subject matter out of the jury
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- tkgally 3y agoI wondered the same thing. Maybe the retired investment banker had been involved only in conventional banking and had no connection to crypto or other more speculative investments.
- jowea 3y agoDo we know the details of the jury selection? I heard the lawyers only have a limited number of arbitrary strikes, maybe they spent them all on other jurors even worse for their position.
- preciousoo 3y agoI was thinking about that too. It is NYC after all, lots of investment bankers to be found
- drcode 3y agoMy understanding is the prosecution most of all wants to avoid "empathetic" jurors, people like social workers, artists, etc who cause hung juries because they randomly decide "this person deserves another chance!" So they will hold their noses and allow the investment banker if they have to
- SoftTalker 3y agoThey only have so many peremptory challenges in the jury selection process. Maybe there were others who were even more problematic, or he was challenged for cause and the judge denied it.
- gzer0 3y agoInterestingly, FTX made a $500 million USD investment in Anthropic; supposedly, this was made while Anthropic was valued at $4.6 billion (unconfirmed). Now, Anthropic is nearing $30 billion. Anyone know the latest on this? Is FTX going to sell that stake off to pay back the debts? [1] https://www.businessinsider.com/sam-bankman-frieds-anthropic-stake-wholly-irrelevant-prosecutors-2023-10 https://www.businessinsider.com/sam-bankman-frieds-anthropic...
- wmf 3y agoIt's being debated in the bankruptcy court. Some creditors want to sell it off and others want to let it ride. Because this is crypto, some people want to issue a crypto token that represents claims on the estate.
- moralestapia 3y ago>some people want to issue a crypto token that represents claims on the estate What could possibly go wrong? :D
- dsr_ 3y agoObviously they should divide it into a low-risk low-return tranche and a high-risk high-return tranche and market two tokens, with an LLM informed of the rules providing final arbitrage.
- moralestapia 3y ago"It can't literally go tits up"
- arcticbull 3y agoThe Legend of 1r0nyman
- dougSF70 3y agoBinance has offered to list it on their exchange.
- bo1024 3y agoAnyone know where to get good details? Specifically: do they know where the money went? If not, how did they prove intent (I assume they proved intent)? Edit: another thing I'm wondering is about jurisdiction, since most of this occurred offshore and didn't involve US customers.
- wmf 3y agoThe FTX bankruptcy case is tracking down where all the money went. SBF's criminal trial was more concerned with proving a small number of crimes with overwhelming evidence. There have been tons of articles, podcasts, videos, and tweets about the trial. Evidence was mostly chat logs of SBF ordering crimes and testimony from Caroline, Gary, and Nishad that he ordered them to do crimes.
- ncallaway 3y agoIf you want a good summary of each day of trial: https://www.theverge.com/authors/elizabeth-lopatto https://www.theverge.com/authors/elizabeth-lopatto and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHD5JP6xZcE&list=PLySrw1Nvf-srtnvhoEZ6wJzTI1nJ82rEu https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHD5JP6xZcE&list=PLySrw1Nvf-... If you want a really detailed overview of his testimony and cross-examination: https://www.youtube.com/@molly0xfff/streams https://www.youtube.com/@molly0xfff/streams > do they know where the money went Not all of it (at least, not for the trial). They showed significant components of it as part of the trial, but they don't need to show a super detailed breakdown of every single dollar as part of the trial, so I don't think we got that. > If not, how did they prove intent (I assume they proved intent)? Circumstantial evidence and witness testimony mostly. Including a cross-examination of Sam that thoroughly undermined his credibility.
- bo1024 3y agoThank you!
- bambax 3y agoCarly Reilly of Overpriced JPEGs also did a fantastic job of debriefing each day of the trial: https://www.youtube.com/@overpricedjpegs https://www.youtube.com/@overpricedjpegs Extremely informative and fun to watch (if you can get past the "sponsor breaks" for NFT platforms and the like).
- thelastgallon 3y agoI'm certain he will out soon with a slap on the wrist (don't do this again, mmmok? sorry, i didn't know, won't happen again). Then a16z will give him a few billions to start the next chapter in life. Wework is close to filing bankruptcy, a16z is funding Adam Neumann's next startup. SBF is similarly talented.
- ncallaway 3y ago> I'm certain he will out soon with a slap on the wrist Did you expect he'd never be charged? Did you expect he'd never be found guilty? I don't know where this kind of cynicism is coming from. I'd be absolutely shocked if he's sentenced to less than 5 years. I expect him to actually get north of 15 years.
- stevenwoo 3y agoI was guessing he would get in the neighborhood of at least half or so of Bernie Madoff 150 years since the dollar amount is so high.
- belltaco 3y agoFrom back when FTX imploded: "Kevin O'Leary Says He'd Invest in FTX Founder Sam Bankman-Fried Again" https://gizmodo.com/kevin-o-leary-bitcoin-ftx-ponzi-sam-bankman-fried-eth-1849788912 https://gizmodo.com/kevin-o-leary-bitcoin-ftx-ponzi-sam-bank...
- wmf 3y agoMan who received $10M of stolen money from SBF would back SBF again!
- enraged_camel 3y agoSBF is the opposite of talented. He’s actually a moron, and a conceited one at that.
- jacquesm 3y agoThat happened fast! I expected it to drag on for much longer. Wonder if he'll appeal.
- underseacables 3y agoThey always appeal.. "Dad, why is the American government the best government? "Because of our endless appeals system" Thank You for Smoking
- rubberband 3y ago"Your teacher crafted that question? Look, ignoring obvious problems in the syntax..." Beyond underrated (the book / movie)
- ncallaway 3y agoAppealing a criminal conviction is quite hard. It's certainly his right to file an appeal, but he's likely going to be detained for the duration of the appeals, and the likelihood of being successful seems pretty low to me.
- JackFr 3y agoYeah you don’t just automatically get an appeal. You need to point to specific errors in the trial. Of which it didn’t seem like there were many.
- kosievdmerwe 3y agoYeah, but even if it's not automatic and you need specific errors. A legal team is going to file one. Their arguments might vary and ultimately might not be very good, but you miss every shot you don't take.
- NoMoreNicksLeft 3y agoHe can only appeal on grounds that were raised during trial. Did his lawyers even object to anything? Did they try to prevent the admission of key evidence? Did they raise any points of constitutional law? If not, he might be fucked. Appeals aren't just "the lower court convicted me and I want to try again", they are "the lower court got it wrong, my lawyer brought the point up, but then they ignored it".
- bistro 3y agoIs this the actual article? It looks like some live twitter-style thread with a bunch a random updates.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- homero 3y agoLive reporting
- QuantumGood 3y agoIt's just how the NYT prefers to provide a "live updates" thread. They will also write other, more fully fleshed out, articles on whatever topic is available via "live updates".
- acomjean 3y agoThey put out an plain old article: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/02/technology/sam-bankman-fried-rise-crash.html?unlocked_article_code=1.7kw.vRU4.6yWOI7xZkkBI&smid=url-share https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/02/technology/sam-bankman-fr... via there "share" feature..
- ShamelessC 3y agoNot sure I like the unnecessary dig at people who study more math and don’t study enough English classes at the end there.
- RugnirViking 3y agoThe implication that only people who studied literature have morals is frankly a stunning insight into the authors view of the world
- acomjean 3y agoI agree, but thought it was an attempt to explain where SBF who claimed to be a "good guy" came from. Especially since his sequoia profile mentions he thought books useless.
- choppaface 3y agoImpressively fast response. Would Travis Kalanick be found guilty for Greyballing and more had Uber had a "run on the bank"? Would Adam Neumann be found guilty for fraud if WeWork's current Chapter 11 was more than just a real estate lease re-negotiation? If the FTX recovery rate gets up to 80-90%, SBF's net fraud might be reduced in scale. In which case, why aren't others like TK going to jail?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- leishman 3y agoNeither Uber nor Wework were financial institutions with consumer deposits they were funneling away to a slush fund.
- rossdavidh 3y agoWhile I agree that SBF was, to a certain extent, doing the promise-a-lot-and-stall-for-time method that a lot of overhyped founders do, there were two key differences: 1) he lied about key details of what would be done with the money people gave him, which is a specifically bad kind of lying because there are special laws for it 2) it wasn't just VC funds that lost money
- phire 3y agoNo. Both Uber and WeWork were "gambling" investor money, which is totally allowed and it's what those investors were expecting the companies to do with that money. There was never a chance of a "run on the bank" because investors aren't really allowed to demand their money back, short of a shareholder vote to liquidate. (Though, Newmann potentially committed fraud with some of the ways that investor money left WeWork and somehow ended up in his own pocket, but that's unrelated) Sam massively broke the law because FTX customers had given FTX those funds on the condition that FTX not touch them. The agreement was that all those funds would sit in a bank account or crypto wallet until it was time to withdraw. But Sam and friends stole the customer funds and gambled them away. Nobody would have ever known if the gamble succeeded before a "bank run", but it was still highly illegal. And investors get a share of the profits if the gamble pays off. That's why they are investing. If Sam's gamble had paid off, the profits would have gone to Alameda, not the customers.
- chatmasta 3y agoDoes anyone want to share their personal story of how they lost money on FTX? There were allegedly a million victims, so surely there are some on HN...
- quickthrower2 3y agohttps://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-66892685.amp https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-66892685.amp
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- thedangler 3y agoI want the former citadel employee saying tokenized stocks were one to one and use as locates to be in prison too. So much fraud with ftx
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- Havoc 3y agoAfter that train wreck of a trial i doubt anyone is surprised
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- lenerdenator 3y agoMmmm. 10-20 in prison sound about right?
- avarun 3y agoMore like 110-120
- lenerdenator 3y agoThat's what's possible if sentencing guidelines weren't a thing. Jeff Skilling (Enron) was convicted on more counts and ended up serving 14 of a 24-year sentence. Elizabeth Holmes of Theranos got 11 years and 3 months.
- ozr 3y agoMadoff got 150.
- lenerdenator 3y agoI feel like the zeitgeist was "the world economy got cratered by these assholes in NYC, and we need an easy guy to convict" and Madoff was just _there_. Not that he didn't deserve it, but I still don't see SBF getting Madoff-level time.
- StressedDev 3y agoHe was worse than Sam Bankman-Fried. First, his scam lasted decades. Second, he was much better at hiding his crime. Third, he destroyed his family (one of his sons committed suicide, and because of this, his wife ended up destitute and alone).
- dragonwriter 3y ago> Third, he destroyed his family Strangely enough, emotional effects of the revelation of the crime on the perpetrator’s family are not a factor in the federal sentencing guidelines.
- hintymad 3y agoI 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-wavy, and resorted to arguing about not-so-irrelevant specifics like how hard SBF worked. The closing arguments of the defense can be summarized as SBF was not guilty because he spent all the customer money on investment, on political donation, on private plane, and on company-owned real estate properties. They were company expenditures to build a business, not for personal gains. Therefore, SBF did not have any intention of committing a crime.
- hintymad 3y agoAnd the AUSA rightly made crypto a non-issue. This is not about crypto but simple fraud. As a result, people who are not familiar with crypto can still easily understand the trial.
- ekianjo 3y ago> customer money on investment, on political donation, So... money laundering?
- akira2501 3y ago> The evidences were air-tight SBF is a dumb criminal, who then screwed over everyone he abused into creating this theft. I honestly can't imagine many easier setups, less sympathetic defendants, or parades of pissed off co-workers willing to put the knife in him before he got it in them. > SBF did not have any intention of committing a crime. His fraud started early on, and he used the same tactic over and over again. He lied to his customers about how their funds were held, then abused them whenever any problem involving money came up in his life. Least self aware villan ever created.
- Terr_ 3y ago"Your honor, I never intended to commit a crime, I simply intended to start with mere childish mistakes and then exponentially escalate their damage and viciousness throughout my entire life without any repercussions. Is that so wrong?"
- constantly 3y agoFor anyone curious, Ken White has a good and entertaining article breaking down maximum sentences in print (here, 110 years) and what people actually serve. It's worth a read: https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentence-eleventy-million-years/ https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentenc... A takeaway: "1. Maximum sentences have very little relation to actual sentences in federal law. When the government quotes the maximum sentence, they are trying to scare you. When the press quotes it, they are uninformed or lazy. Exercise skepticism. Resist emotional appeals to "how is this sentence reasonable when murderers get less?"
- JackFr 3y agoYeah, I’ve heard that a bunch - about the press being uninformed or lazy. I’d offer that they are neither, but if they are restricting themselves to reporting facts and not prognostications and opinions, the statutory maximum is a reasonable thing to report.
- JohnFen 3y agoI think this is likely the case. It's the only number they could have that doesn't involve a judgement call. Also, usually when I see things like that reported, they mention that most people don't get the maximum.
- NoMoreNicksLeft 3y agoA statement like "but it is often true that statutory maximums far exceed actual sentences" wouldn't be a prediction nor an opinion. This isn't the place to be sticking up for journalism. They really are both uninformed and lazy.
- quickthrower2 3y agoIt is almost logical. They would not be maximums but prescribed sentences if they always use the max.
- 3y ago
- cubefox 3y agoI always wondered whether the American guilty / not guilty system isn't obviously too binary.
- steveBK123 3y agoWhat is the alternative here and where do they use it? The audience has voted and you've been declared.. 4% guilty! You will now serve 4% of the statutory 25 year sentence!
- serf 3y agothe granularity of the legal convictions and the punishment ranges provides the fine strokes needed to make a binary decision work.
- eqmvii 3y agoOf course it's not. Where there are gradients, there are different charges. Murder I, Murder II, (voluntary/involuntary) Manslaughter, etc. To the extent grey areas exist, they are accounted for in a gradient of crimes, each of which has a binary degree of guilt.
- mikeyouse 3y ago
- opportune 3y agoI really don’t think they should have let the rest of the executive team walk, especially Ellison. They knew what they were doing too, and I’m sure they could have built a strong enough case to convince SBF and the others through plea deals and such
- upupupandaway 3y agoNobody is walking. All of them will be jailed, but some will get lighter sentences.
- jraines 3y agoNot sure about the others but I don’t think Ellison is walking. Her reward for cooperation was just a letter to the sentencing judge noting her cooperation.
- opportune 3y agoNot true. The prosecution agreed to only pursue criminal tax violations. See my other comment.
- JackFr 3y agoIANAL, but I think you misunderstand her plea agreement.
- phire 3y agoShe pled guilty to 7 counts. 1 Count of actual wire fraud and 6 counts of various "Conspiracy to commit wire fraud, commodes fraud, securities fraud and money laundering". They have a total maximum sentence of 110 years. Prosecution agreed to not pursue any additional charges, except perhaps criminal tax violations.
- compiler-guy 3y agoThe plea deal also includes the prosecution electing to charge her with much lesser crimes than they otherwise could.
- 3y ago
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- spiffytech 3y agohttps://archive.ph/mMIka https://archive.ph/mMIka
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- docmars 3y agoMore like Sam Bankman-Fraud, amirite?
- JackFr 3y agoSam Bankfraud-Man
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- Nextgrid 3y agoSam Bankrupt-Fraud?
- willcipriano 3y agoThe Bankman was Fried when he did business with Sam.
- quickthrower2 3y agoSam Bankman Freed? No
- randycupertino 3y agoI liked the article detailing how poorly he did on the stand: https://www.thefp.com/p/humiliating-cross-examination-sam-bankman-fried 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 on. Under the circumstances, SBF’s wisest course would have been to just say yes—or yep—to her questions. And sometimes he did that. But just as often, he chose to dance around the question, to quibble about the phrasing, or say that he couldn’t remember the details. And every time he did that—every single time—Sassoon projected an email or video or a spreadsheet onto the screen, showing that he had done exactly what she was accusing him of doing. Which then gave the jurors another look at the evidence while reminding them that SBF was being something less than forthright. You’d think this MIT graduate would wise up, but he never did. (He even equivocated on whether he had taken a private plane to the Super Bowl—to which Sassoon responded by presenting a photograph of SBF fast asleep in the embrace of a comfy chair on a private jet. In the overflow room, we burst into laughter.)
- fsckboy 3y ago[flagged]
- fsckboy 3y ago[flagged]
- CoastalCoder 3y agoI wonder if you and the other commenters are making different assumptions about his private thoughts during testimony. It sounds like you think he might be trying to be honest and forthright, but his intentions are lost in translation. Whereas the other commenters think it's more likely that he was being obstructionist?
- 3y ago
- siskiyou 3y agoReminds me of working for MCI-Worldcom. When you think you’re working for crooks, you probably are. Run away.
- boppo1 3y agoTell a naive young guy more. What are the red flags?
- ansible 3y agoSpending money like water to make a big splash with advertising, sponsorships and such. But really, anything to do with crypto or NFTs should be a red flag at this point.
- atoav 3y agoI think a big one is if nobody can explain you where the money is supposed to come from. If it is all hand-wavy and nobody can explain what that company is doing get out. In the best case it was legal, but they are incompetent morons.
- danielfoster 3y agoI'm studying for my CFE (Certified Fraud Examiner) and can shed some light on this. As others mentioned, unexplainable business models or money coming out of nowhere are major red flags. A few others to look out for if you are applying for a job: 1. Few or no internal controls. A medium-size or larger company not having a CFO is particularly questionable. 2. People in high positions, including the CEO, lack qualifications or experience. Often the CEO will hire inexperienced or incompetent people for high-level positions because they a) won't figure out what is going on or b) can figure it out, but are too grateful for the position to say anything. Or maybe the CEO never finished college in a field where everyone has a PhD (think Elizabeth Holmes). 3. History of experienced / qualified people joining the company and leaving soon after 4. Seemingly unexplained success. 5. Extravagant spending and inappropriate workplace behavior. 6. Cult of loyalty to the CEO and/or a "circle" around this person, including close interpersonal relationships.
- grumblingdev 3y agoWhat was the exact moment the fraud began? What should he have done instead?
- dboreham 3y ago> What was the exact moment the fraud began When assets held on behalf of customers were comingled with company assets?
- jahewson 3y agoAh but that’s not fraud. Though it did pave the way for it.
- vikramkr 3y agoI'm sure there was a long slippery slope to more and more brazen fraud, but for what he should have done instead that's a very very simple question to answer. He shouldn't have committed fraud. All the illegal stuff he did with comingling funds and stuff? Just - don't do that.
- StressedDev 3y agoRE: What should he have done instead? Here is what he should have done: 1. Sam Bankman-Fried SHOULD NOT HAVE STOLEN CUSTOMER MONEY. 2. Sam Bankman-Fried should have been honest. 3. FTX should have kept excellent records. FTX was notorious for its bad record keeping. Also, its poor record keeping meant it was not sure how much money it had and it was not sure which money it owned and which money its customers owned.
- cortesoft 3y agoNot commit fraud? The fraud began when he gave false information to investors and customers.
- cowsup 3y ago> What was the exact moment the fraud began? There's not necessarily an "exact moment" that they can pinpoint, nor is that their job to do so. FTX was promising customers it would hold onto their funds and keep them safe, much like a bank. Then they did not. That's the short of it, tat is what they uncovered. The date it "began" was not in scope of the case, just the end result, and the end result was that there was fraud. > What should he have done instead? Again, the short of it is: He should have delivered what he promised to customers, or not make those promises to begin with.
- jscipione 3y ago[flagged]
- kjeetgill 3y agoI haven't heard about this, can you elaborate on this?
- jscipione 3y agoSecond biggest individual Democratic donor in 2022 midterms was Sam Bankman Fried after the foreigner George Soros: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/biggest-donors-2022-midterm-elections/ https://www.visualcapitalist.com/biggest-donors-2022-midterm...
- rootusrootus 3y agoRight about the same time the Republican politicians do. SBF contributed to both sides...
- timmytokyo 3y agoHe was an equal-opportunity briber. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/nov/30/ftx-billionaire-sam-bankman-fried-dark-money-republicans https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/nov/30/ftx-billi...
- thordenmark 3y agoSBF was the largest donor to the Democrat party. Can we rehold those elections?
- rootusrootus 3y agoNo, he was not the largest donor. And he gave to the Republic party too.
- jahewson 3y agoQuick back of the envelope calculation based on FEC data for 2022 says that SBF’s $40m donation accounted for about 0.03% of Democratic-aligned PAC donations. PACs across the political spectrum raised over $7bn and spent over $6bn.
- K5EiS 3y agoHe donated the same amount to both Democrats and Republicans.
- babelthuap 3y ago[dead]
- throw_m239339 3y agoI'm curious about the political donations aspect of the story. Can a court force politicians who got money from FTX/SBF to give back to creditors?
- StressedDev 3y agoIn practice, I don't think it matters. Here is why: 1. The donations to candidates are usually pretty small (think $2,900/candidate). The candidates can return the money but getting all of the money back will not do much for the creditors. 2. Some PACs got a LOT of money (think millions of dollars). The problem is they probably already spent it. You can probably sue them to try to get back the money but the PACs will probably just declare bankruptcy. Here is a link to the donations: https://www.opensecrets.org/donor-lookup/results?name=&cycle=&state=&zip=&employ=FTX&occupation=&jurisdiction=&cand=&type= https://www.opensecrets.org/donor-lookup/results?name=&cycle...
- jokethrowaway 3y agoExcept there are 5M, 200k, 300k donations Still small compared to all the stolen money
- StressedDev 3y agoThose are to political action committees, not politicians. The probably spent most or all of it during the last election cycle. If they raise more money, you can go after that but what are you going to do if they don’t raise more money?
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- m3kw9 3y agoHow many years?
- system2 3y agoAnother trial will determine that. "His sentencing was scheduled for March 28, 2024." Up to 110 years: https://abcnews.go.com/Business/sam-bankman-fried-trial-verdict-reached-federal-fraud/story?id=104520346 https://abcnews.go.com/Business/sam-bankman-fried-trial-verd...
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- youknowitaz 3y ago[flagged]
- swader999 3y agoI fear this too.
- worstestes 3y agoLiterally no basis for this to actually happen
- throwaway14356 3y agoCharles Ponzi also forgot to run with the money. But Ponzi only got 12.5 years.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- Gustomaximus 3y agoI'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.
- epolanski 3y agoI'm not American, but it's my understanding that there's more scrutiny on prosecutors to "nail" and close cases due to the stupid double jeopardy rule. You lose the chance to convict a criminal, you lose your face and the chance to see him behind bars.
- dragonwriter 3y ago> the stupid double jeopardy rule You really want the government to decide to re-arrest and re-try you indefinitely if you are acquitted of a crime? The double jeopardy rule is not stupid.
- danielmarkbruce 3y agoBut it's shown to be stupid in movies. How could that possibly not be right?
- epolanski 3y agoThat's not what happens in countries that don't have double jeopardy, you know that right?
- dghlsakjg 3y agoDouble jeopardy is a relatively common protection and predates the United States. All of Europe, India, all of the Americas, and any other country that inherited English common law are among the majority of countries on earth that have this protection in one form or another.
- 3y ago
- Uptrenda 3y agoMark Karpelès did nothing wrong!
- system2 3y agoBesides designing a crappy site that validates the data in user's browser with JS.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- FFP999 3y ago> 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 of book-learning but less common sense than a sea slug. I think we saw one such get convicted today.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- JohnFen 3y agoThere's also a fact of human nature that smart people often don't understand: you can be the smartest person in the world and still be stupid under the right circumstances.
- FFP999 3y agoQuite right. One more related fact: competence in area X does not necessarily translate into competence in area Y, even if X seems to be a much more difficult thing than Y.
- StressedDev 3y agoHis problem was not a lack of common sense. His problem was he was dishonest, a conman, and a thief.
- 1vuio0pswjnm7 3y agohttps://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/statement-us-attorney-damian-williams-conviction-samuel-bankman-fried https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/statement-us-attorney-d... "This case is also a warning to every fraudster who thinks they're untouchable, that their crimes are too complex for us to catch, that they are too powerful to prosecute, or that they are clever enough to talk their way out of it if caught."
- CobrastanJorji 3y ago"Oh no," a person just like SBF is surely thinking in response to this verdict, "I'd better straighten up and stop thinking that I am clever enough to talk my way out of situations if caught."
- w-ll 3y agohe talked his way into this conviction. Any news on his ethics teacher parents?
- bee_rider 3y agoIt turns out this whole thing, SBF’s entire upbringing, was in fact a giant scheme on their part to get the ultimate case study for their classes. Actually, kind of a twofer, since raising him to be like that was in and of itself unethical.
- elcritch 3y agoIf they did it for a good cause and the betterment of man kind, then would the ends justify the means? ;)
- StressedDev 3y agoThey have not been charged with any crimes and I have seen no evidence that they committed any. They are being sued by FTX. For more information, please see https://www.npr.org/2023/10/02/1200764160/sam-bankman-fried-sbf-parents-ftx-crypto-collapse-trial-stanford-law-school https://www.npr.org/2023/10/02/1200764160/sam-bankman-fried-... and https://restructuring.ra.kroll.com/FTX/Home-DownloadPDF?id1=MjUyNzIzOA==&id2=-1 https://restructuring.ra.kroll.com/FTX/Home-DownloadPDF?id1=... .
- bartwr 3y agoOne aspect of SBF's downfall that is not discussed enough, IMO: amphetamines (even taken for medical reasons/ADHD) release a ton of dopamine, seek more release, and make you do some weird stuff and seek risky behaviors (and reinforce them through reward system). I recall his interviews and annoyed tone at uncomfortable questions - made me laugh, just like people on speed. And absolutely avoid selegiline for "productivity", especially with amphetamines, this will turn anyone into a pathological compulsive person (e.g. a gambler).
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- tombert 3y agoThis makes me very happy. I was honestly slightly worried that if I ever saw SBF in person, I would be unable to stop myself from kicking him in the nuts. Since I was a victim of the Winklevoss twins' GUSD unregistered security scam (Gemini Earn) [1], there has not been a day since ~November 2022 that I haven't wished something kind of bad happened to SBF. To be clear, I genuinely am not advocating for violence, but I'm saying that if he walked free, and if I were to see him just casually sauntering along in NYC, I think I would have an overwhelming compulsion to hurt him, and then I would go to jail, which I don't think I'd enjoy, so it's a much better outcome for me personally if he's behind bars. Well, upon typing this out, I guess if he gave me the 13 grand that was taken from me, I'd be willing to forgive him. [1] I've posted about this before, but just to reiterate, not my opinion, but the SEC's https://www.sec.gov/news/press-release/2023-7 https://www.sec.gov/news/press-release/2023-7
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- newobj 3y agoTotally normal post
- tombert 3y agoHeh, I'll acknowledge it's a weird post. Basically, the FTX stuff blew up at the very worst possible time for me personally. I had just been laid off (really fired) from my job in November 2022, and I had naively believed the kind of hand-waivey advertising about Gemini Earn and GUSD being safe, so a lot of my cash reserves were stored in GUSD, but the day that I need to use it to pay for my mortgage, I'm unable to withdraw it because apparently Genesis Holdings was in bed with Alameda Research, which in turn was in bed with FTX and thus SBF was throwing my money away. Now, I'm one of the fortunate ones, because I didn't keep all (or even most) of my savings in GUSD and Earn; I keep most of my savings in the form of low-risk ETFs (VOO and VTI), so there was never a risk of me being homeless or anything, but I did have to sell a good chunk of them at a loss in order to pay for my mortgage and for my food, and that wasn't fun. The entire ordeal really depressed me, and I've been upset with SBF for the last year for exacerbating an already frustrating experience.
- infogulch 3y ago> These charges carry a maximum sentence of 110 years. Didn't HN recently conclude that calculating the 'maximum sentence' as the sum of sentences of the individual convictions is journalistic malpractice? Do better, NYT (they won't). Given that there were 7 charges and assuming all charges can be served in parallel that's a minimum sentence of ~15 years (why is left as an exercise to the reader).
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- reaperman 3y agoUsually the judge has discretion whether to make them serve consecutively or in parallel.
- retsibsi 3y ago> Given that there were 7 charges and assuming all charges can be served in parallel that's a minimum sentence of ~15 years (why is left as an exercise to the reader). Looks like your logic is 110/7 = ~15, therefore there must be at least one charge with a maximum sentence of at least ~15 years. But why does that imply a minimum sentence of ~15 years? He could get less than the maximum sentence for some or all of the charges.
- infogulch 3y agoYes I assumed he would get the maximum sentence on all charges, which given optimal parallelism would be a minimum of 15 years (less optimal parallelism would mean more). But you're right that it's called a maximum sentence for a reason and that assumption may not be valid; thanks for the correction.
- retsibsi 3y agoThanks, I honestly appreciate this reply. I'm always a bit worried I'll come across unpleasantly when making posts like that, and spark a negative reaction. In terms of what's likely, from a quick search it looks like the maximums are 20 years for some of the charges and 5 for the others, and 10-20 years is a realistic guess for his actual prison time.
- nodesocket 3y agoOffice Space seems appropriate here -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBzvMLW0ii4&ab_channel=PeterGhosh https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBzvMLW0ii4&ab_channel=Peter...
- saeranv 3y agoI sure hope all the HN commentators confidently predicting this would never happen because of his large donations to the democrats see this.
- TulliusCicero 3y ago90% of them will never willingly admit they were wrong.
- xray2 3y agoI don’t remember a single person even claiming that. HN delusion is real.
- EricDeb 3y agoI believe there is quite a few in the comments section here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33908577 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33908577
- jcranmer 3y agoI've definitely seen several people claim it on HN. Almost invariably, such comments were downvoted into oblivion though, or had replies basically saying something along the lines of "what crack are you smoking?" Some specific links to comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33909026 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33909026 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33908850 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33908850
- starcraft2wol 3y agoSo our friend saeranv is actually just parroting the consensus.
- udev4096 3y agoI agree on this
- deleted 3y ago
- zoklet-enjoyer 3y ago[flagged]
- Gwarzo 3y ago[flagged]
- zoklet-enjoyer 3y agoHaha how is it absurd? It's the way he talks. The way someone talks isn't contempt.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- dragonwriter 3y agoIt is if the reason they talk that way is contempt. It is not if its not.
- dang 3y agoPlease don't respond to a bad comment by breaking the site guidelines yourself. That only makes things worse. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- zoklet-enjoyer 3y agoHow is that a bad comment? I'm serious. The way a person naturally talks is ok and is never contempt. SBF says yup instead of yes. I usually say yeah. That's just how people talk.
- dang 3y agoIt's a bad comment because it was a generic tangent that was very likely to lead (and indeed already did lead, a bit) to a flamewar about race.
- someonehere 3y agoAnyone else have a weird vibe on how fast this went? I don’t remember how long Bernie Madoff’s trial was, but this one flew by really fast. The Spidey senses tell me there’s more to this we’re seeing. Whether you believe Elon or not, FTX was greasing the DNC wheels with a lot. FTX also had a lot of celebrities on board. They had the Miami Heat arena with their name on it. Now it’s all wrapped up, guilty as charged, and now what?
- throwaway1777 3y ago[flagged]
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- dang 3y agoWe've banned this account for posting too many unsubstantive and/or flamebait comments. That's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for. Please don't create accounts to break HN's rules with; it will eventually get your main account banned as well. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- bobse 3y agoSo she walks free because of muh vagina?
- dang 3y agoWe've banned this account for posting too many unsubstantive and/or flamebait comments. That's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. They're here: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
- quietthrow 3y agoCurious: why does the legal system work for some and not for others. Eg: how come this guy is convicted but trump walk free especially after Jan 6th? Does the legal system also fall prey to money ? ie the better your representatives the Better they can argue for you. And the better ones cost a lot of Money so essentially the people with money have higher odds of succeeding in such a legal system?
- k__ 3y agoBecause some people throw tea into the sea and some help to collect taxes.
- fastball 3y agoBecause every case is different? For example, there is little-to-no overlap in any of the details related to this case and to the Jan 6th insurrection shenanigans.
- ehsankia 3y agoMy guess is: 1. SBF's crimes hurt rich powerful people 2. Trump has a third of the voting population in a cult-like trance 3. Prosecuting political figures is a lot harder, especially presidents
- jeffreygoesto 3y agoWhat about the politicians who happily took the bribes?
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- j7ake 3y agoWhen are we going to stop calling him a “book smart kid who lacked common sense and things spiralled out of control” to “scam artist who is too dumb to keep his mouth shut”? There is no evidence this person is smart in any way, yet some people still portray it as a narrative. There are dumb people at MIT (and at every institute or company) let’s admit it.
- bmitc 3y agoI agree. The more we learn, the more he looks like a tweaked out Miles Bron. He doesn't seem to understand how anything actually works.
- j7ake 3y agoI think the narrative is to cover up the bruised egos of the powerful people and institutes (Jane Street, MIT, investors) that got scammed or thought he was smart.
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- WD40forRust 3y agoPoor dude. Nobody deserves what we call 'prison'.
- ltbarcly3 3y agoSo edgy. So opinion.
- Synaesthesia 3y agoI’m also an abolitionist and I agree the US prison system is atrocious. But we have to be morally consistent. If he doesn’t deserve it, neither do other criminals deserve to be punished egregiously.
- r0ckarong 3y agoI can finally share my brainworm since all of this started: Don McLean - American Pie melody "The daayy the Bankman fried".
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- nikster 3y agoFall guy took the hit. That had always been plan B.
- birracerveza 3y agoHis conviction is 200% deserved. Certainly there were other people involved, and hopefully they will receive their due as well, but to say he's just a "fall guy" is not at all accurate.
- DebtDeflation 3y agoThe 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-f971e60dc58b https://www.ft.com/content/eac0e56c-f30b-4591-b603-f971e60dc...
- activitypea 3y agoI listen to this a few times year, cheers me up everytime
- oldgradstudent 3y agoWell, he wasn't wrong about that.
- MrsPeaches 3y ago“if you’d like to gain greater insight about “valuable boxes” with no economic use case that go “to infinity” because of “the bullishness of people’s usage of the box”, don’t forget to sign up for the FT’s Crypto and Digital Assets Summit beginning Tuesday.”
- s1artibartfast 3y agoI 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.
- robertlagrant 3y agoThis is why it's silly to say that the prosecution had an airtight case. It's like saying the winning fighter boxed perfectly, when actually the other one just kept smashing his own face into the ground.
- morsch 3y agoHere it is, with audio: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KZYqL79GDXU&t=1289s https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KZYqL79GDXU&t=1289s
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- berniedurfee 3y agoSo 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?
- skriticos2 3y agoThis is just the conviction. Sentencing is sometime end of March next year. But considering that he was found guilty on all accounts and after the mess he was making during the trial, his sentence will most likely be no good news for him. He is also kind of being made an example of to encourage more due diligence in the industry. Being bad at business is one thing, but handling billions without basic risk management is basically gambling with customer funds.
- kuhewa 3y ago> but handling billions without basic risk management is basically gambling with customer funds He actively gambled with customer funds, not just basically did because of poor institutional controls.
- hoofhearted 3y agoI agree. I believe the evidence in this trial will support a civil trial against him showing that he pierced the corporate veil, and that he was personally tied to FTX with some of his purchases with company funds.
- cedws 3y agoFor someone unfamiliar with law, why is sentencing at a later date and not immediate? Does SBF just get to roam free for 5 months in the meantime?
- mahidol 3y agoConsidering his bail was revoked before and the notoriety of the case, I have a feeling they are going to make him wait behind bars.
- gigatexal 3y agoHere’s hoping he gets 100 years. Good riddance. Let this be a warning against charlatans doing this again in crypto.
- pgporada 3y agoWhat about Brett Harrison? Where did he dissappear off to?
- dontlaugh 3y agoOfficially Sam Jailman-Jail. Not my joke, I heard it on TrueAnon. But I like it.
- user3939382 3y agoIMHO our whole country is run by criminals and financial crime. Remember when HSBC knowingly laundered millions for cartels and no one went to jail? The President is a criminal. SBF is either a patsy or didn’t grease the right palms.
- birracerveza 3y agoHe certainly lost the wrong people's money, that's for sure...
- DonHopkins 3y agoNow convict his parents!
- styren 3y agoOf what?
- itsyaboi 3y agoFacilitation
- Jonovono 3y agohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLvOT2AldwM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLvOT2AldwM
- pizzalife 3y agoWire-fraud and other forms of fraud.
- bitcharmer 3y agoIs this a serious question or just trolling?
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- valleyjo 3y agoI want to see his parents go down too. Sounds like some criminal actions there too.
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- biasedestimate 3y agoI 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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- lubesGordi 3y agoSentencing isn't until March, and it's pretty unlikely he'll get a life sentence. Could be decades though.
- daedrdev 3y ago[dead]
- thr0waw4yz 3y agoWho would have thought that Ross is followed by SBF.
- txru 3y agoHmm, I don't usually see people defending white collar crime as being oversentenced.
- papichulo4 3y agoRevenge isn’t cool, but it did just get that much harder to become a crypto-bro-ponzi-scheming-asshole, of which SBF is the biggest x dumbest kind. But if we’re so worried about individual lives, like SBF’s life in prison, what can we do to save the lives that he’s ruined? Help me understand how letting SBF off the hook could be a net positive for society or how he could begin to repay his debt without indulging in similar activities.
- lubesGordi 3y agoSequoia 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.
- zztop44 3y agoThe 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 banana. You can do anything you want with your money from inside FTX.” > Suddenly, the chat window on Sequoia’s side of the Zoom lights up with partners freaking out. > “I LOVE THIS FOUNDER,” typed one partner. > “I am a 10 out of 10,” pinged another. > “YES!!!” exclaimed a third Like, he’s rambling about how you should buy bananas with Bitcoin. How was this compelling to people who control serious money? It always struck me as the opposite. If someone running a crypto futures exchange said they wanted people to buy bananas and groceries on their platform that’s be a signal to pass, right?
- Brushfire 3y agoThere 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.
- cj 3y agoFTX didn't have a CFO. They didn't have a legitimate board of directors. No VC in their right mind should ever pour billions into a finance company that doesn't have a CFO or risk management team, doesn't have properly audited financial statements, doesn't have board oversight, etc. Especially so in a risky industry like crypto where scams and fraud are well known to be rampant. This is the main criticism I have of the people who invested in FTX. Even if you thought SBF was a world-changing entrepreneur 2 years ago, the structure of his company should have disqualified it from investment.
- hoschicz 3y ago[flagged]
- netcraft 3y agoI also have conflicting opinions on this, but the usual reasoning is more about deterrence than revenge. We want others who might try these things to see that they can and do get punished.
- majani 3y agoOnly victimless crimes should involve rehabilitation. If you harm others, punishment is fitting as a deterrent and to restrict your freedom to repeat the crime.
- bspammer 3y agoAt some number of 0s, white collar crimes are more damaging to society than violent ones. $10 billion definitely meets that threshold, there has to be a deterrent.
- phone8675309 3y agoThe number of years of savings he stole from people is less than the maximum time he can get in prison, so if anything, he's getting off light. If there were justice in this world his mind would be put in a simulation and he'd be forced to do all of the things that the people who lost money did to get theirs in real time. Let him feel that loss before you then wake him up and make him spend the rest of his time in prison.
- cedws 3y agoPunishing the individual is only half of the reason we have prisons. The other half is to dissuade others from doing the same.
- Spivak 3y agoSurely we can do better than that, right? Like I imagine for a white-collar rich boy capping his income at $55k+inflation which includes the monetary values of gifts and any income from debt has to be pre-approved [1] would be far far more devastating, less cruel, and less drain on society. And this lasts for x years or until he pays back the damages. [1] so he could buy a car and house but not skirt the rule by using loans against an asset portfolio to make more "income" for himself.
- Ographer 3y agoA reddit post called out SBF as a fraud 2 years ago and no one on the Bitcoin subreddit believed them! https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/p1oqqu/the_ceo_of_ftx_sam_bankmanfried_copied_the/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf&utm_content=1&utm_term=22 https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/p1oqqu/the_ceo_of_...
- sfmike 3y agogreat idea for a trader. scrape anything where people say something like "this is so f* dumb I don't have the time to explain it" as it could be a black swan and call puts against it.
- paulgb 3y agoGood find, but worth noting that this is accusing him of front-running when what he actually did was dumber and more criminal: using FTX customer deposits to cover losses on the Alameda side.
- acaloiar 3y agoI imagine SBF's charges are more serious than a front-running charge. The prosecution also may not have had sufficient evidence of front-running to get the charges to stick. But any exchange in such close company with a hedge fund should always be suspected of front-running. There's an inherent conflict of interest between those two entity types. And I would be surprised if Alameda wasn't front-running FTX customers, given both firm's obvious ethical shortcomings.
- muldvarp 3y agoIs front-running something you could/would do manually? The prosecution had access to the source code and git history of FTX.
- acaloiar 3y agoFront-running efficacy can be measured in milliseconds. It's a world where microwave towers sometimes replace fiber lines, to gain a few milliseconds of advantage. That is, when the front-runner isn't "in-house", which Alameda had ample opportunity to be. Alameda and FTX were separate legal entities, but Sam largely headed both. Alameda front-running servers, in theory, could have been running right along side FTX servers, with only inches of network-induced latency. You can of course front-run manually, depending on the degree of automation in the systems one is front-running, but front-runners will generally want to automate. And to scale the scheme for a realtime system of FTX's volume, Alameda would certainly want to automate it. I wasn't following the case closely enough, but did the prosecution have access to Alameda source code, or was it only FTX? As long as Alameda had access to FTX order records, any front-running code would likely have resided in Alameda repositories.
- martin82 3y agoNow throw the parents in jail next.
- pseingatl 3y agoBTW, no more Adderall for SBF once he is "remanded to the custody of the Attorney General." Once he gets out of US Marshals' custody and is transferred to the BoP, he can kiss Adderall goodbye. Amphetamines of any kind are not allowed by the BoP, unless he is undergoing a surgical procedure which requires its use (don't know of any, but can't say there are none).
- strikelaserclaw 3y agodon't know why you need adderall in prison even with adhd, not like there are many responsibilities that need executive function.
- altairprime 3y agoRehabilitation requires executive function, so it's possible that a therapeutic dosage of an ADHD medication would be appropriate; however, therapeutic stimulant dosage levels may be considerably lower than recreational levels. Fortunately, non-stimulant treatments are available, that have no recreational value.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- thedangler 3y agoCitadel took advantage of this situation to "tokenize" stocks and say there were 1 to 1 to perpetuate their fraud. Fake locates, fake margin. Hope Kenny G is next on the list. The whole stock market would benefit from his downfall. Maybe we would get real price discovery.
- ralfd 3y ago> Mr. Bankman-Fried’s sentencing is set for March 28. What is the reason that is 4 month away? Clogged up justice system?
- sleepybrett 3y agoAlso another potential trial for five other counts in mid march i think.
- TheRealHB 3y agoDoes that changes the scene in any way? Is Bankman-Fried's Guilty Verdict a Crypto's "Madoff" Moment? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38128260 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38128260
- MacsHeadroom 3y agoCrypto is rallying. Bitcoin is higher than it has been in over a year. It's been trending up for a while though.
- jahnu 3y agoI would love to know why. I don’t see any new great thing it can do. Who are these people pouring in billions in a world with real interest rates. Criminals moving money?
- Saig6 3y agoSEC might allow/not be allowed to block spot bitcoin ETFs
- lancesells 3y agoCan you buy bitcoin with other crypto? Some of that makes sense if you can create a currency, pump it's value, and then exchange for bitcoin.
- somenameforme 3y agoDifferent world views than you probably have. A person who thinks the USD is stable and the stock market is priced reasonably is going to have a different attitude than one who thinks the USD is going through its riskiest in modern history and that the stock market is looking more and more like an astronomically sized bubble, all with WW3 looming. And then there's the guy in the middle who's just diversifying to try to maximize his gain (or minimize his risk) across all possible outcomes.
- warthog 3y agoI wonder what his cell is going to look like - swimming pool and playstation included?
- ksherlock 3y agoNo but he'll have a pillow to bite on.
- m3kw9 3y agoGuud
- m3kw9 3y agoWhat’s the over under on the years
- tibbydudeza 3y agoWhy was it not broadcast ???. I have seen several US murder trails that is available on Youtube.
- beart 3y agoFederal criminal trials don't allow cameras.
- Beijinger 3y ago[flagged]
- mark_mart 3y agoWell deserved.
- phone8675309 3y agoLove that his "uwu im just a small lil bean oh gosh shucks gee im sorry" defense didn't work.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- shiftleft 3y ago[flagged]
- diamondfist25 3y agoHis parents and all the democrats he bought need to cough back the money or go to jail. ESP clinton
- RecycledEle 3y agoNow do the companies that pretend "it was in the terms of service (TOS,) didn't you read it" when it was not there.