The fall of crypto takes down ‘effective altruism’
GETTING RICH FOR THE GOOD OF HUMANITY
What a year for crypto it’s been, and it’s still only November. I cannot tell you how much I am looking forward to reading the Michael Lewis book on Sam Bankman-Fried and the FTX drama. Presumably, the man they call SBF first appealed to Lewis because it fit into his favored narrative of “how one clever guy overcame the idiocy of the crowd,” but now it has become so much more interesting.
A lot has been written on this saga already, but I think the most amazing piece I’ve read remains this bonkers “spotlight” feature from Sequoia, the venture capital company which invested in SBF’s companies, and which SBF then invested in (an endearingly circular relationship, which may be of interest to regulators). If read at face value, it gives the impression that SBF is the closest thing to Jesus that Earth has hosted for years. I could quote all of it, but I’ll content myself with a couple of snippets.
- “The exchange that SBF had started to build, FTX, was Goldilocks-perfect. There was no concerted effort to skirt the law, no Zuckerbergian diktat demanding that things be broken. And, yet, FTX wasn’t waiting to get permission to innovate. The company had based itself offshore precisely because it aspired to build an advanced risk engine that would support all sorts of hedging strategies.”
Yes, that I’m sure is the only reason it was based offshore. What other reason could there be? Read on and learn about a “web3 lifestyle app”, which is sort of like a Fitbit but which earns you a little bit of cryptocurrency for every step you take. A pair of virtual sneakers costs a mere $800 (“more sneakers owned gives more total energy”)! If there’s a goldrush, sell picks and shovels (“more picks and shovels owned gives more gold”)! Anyway, the author of this piece gets really into SBF, who apparently was going to be a trillionaire. All the breathless enthusiasm gives quite an edge to the fact that he is now bust and under investigation by governments everywhere.