“Our society is run by insane people for insane objectives.” -JOHN LENNON
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FTX, the cryptocurrency exchange company organized by young American entrepreneur Sam Bankman-Fried, has collapsed.
Many fund and financial experts say the bankruptcy was a result of youthful alacrity and ambition fired by an ambitious young man who thought the world can be had in the palm of his hands.
According to news reports, TESLA CEO and Twitter chief Elon Musk suspects that FTX CEO SBF probably contributed $1B dollars to the Democrats’ 2022 midterm campaign which was more than what published numbers want everyone to believe.
Many have slammed Musk for making these implausible allegations without any proof.
Bankman is said to be the second largest donor after businessman George Soros.
Let me cite some published reports. According to Opensecrets, “he donated $39,884,256 to Democrats before FTX imploded and had to file for bankruptcy. An estimated one million customers and investors lost billions of dollars in the exchange collapse. FTX is currently being investigated for mishandling customer funds.”
News reports also said that while Bankman’s donations to the Democratic Party were of public knowledge, he also made public his claims that he donated a similar sum to the Republicans as if to balance his actions.
Musk’s accusations are opening a Pandora’s box.
I think I recall that FTX was also one of the principal sponsors of the Meltwater Chess Tour, an on-line Rapid and Blitz tournament that had mainstays as world champion Magnus Carlsen, superGMs Levon Aronian, Wesley So, Anish Giri, Fabiano Caruana, Alireza Firouza, Shahkiyar Mamedyarov, Jan Krystoff Duda, MVL and a host of other elite top 20 chess masters.
I often get to watch and listen to Bankman’s post games interviews as is usually the case when a sponsor deserves time to promote his business endeavor.
FTX was just then on the rise and I thought the sponsorship of an on-line chess tournament was way beyond the cryptocurrency nature of business.
Yes, of all things, why did FTX take interest in promoting cryptocurrency through an on-line chess competition?
At any rate, as I cursorily read through SBF’s business journey, I learned he was holding office in the Bahamas and not in the USA mainland.
His parents are prominent and respected educators
He employed his classmates in college who are reportedly not knowledgeable in the crypto currency trade as company executives who handled their jobs like it were a sorority or fraternity activity.
There were photos circulating on social media platform like Facebook about some casual sexual liaisons within.
Born on March 3, 1992, the 30-year old Californian was educated at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology). Wow, impressive!
His parents are both lawyers who earned law degrees from Yale.. Joseph Bankman, who is a BA alum from UC Berkeley, and Barbara Fried both teach law at Stanford where they are held in high esteem..
Just how rich FTX has become when it was on its way up, Wall Street Journal reported last November that SBF “sold a stake in the company worth $300 million when the crypto exchange raised capital last year, citing the firm’s financial records and people familiar with the transaction.”
Continuing, the WSJ report cited “ FTX’s October 2021 funding round where the company had raised USD 420 million from a clutch of big name investors including Temasek and Tiger Global, valuing the crypto exchange at USD 25 billion.”
Since FTX filed for bankruptcy, it is expected that several crypto firms face the ignominy of falling out of grace because of lost millions of investment with the crypto exchange company.
Is this scheme similar to the notorious multi-million Ponzi networking scheme which many others here in the Philippines have copied and aped?
As Lao Tzu said: “He who conquers others is strong; he who conquers himself is mighty.”
Nothing has changed. Fools remain fools chasing the stars in the firmament. (Email feedback to fredlumba@yahoo.com.) GOD BLESS THE PHILIPPINES!
