There was no exponential growth or betting or downsides here. The Jr. bankers billed a metric-ton of hours and made their firms truckloads in fees. They're probably just disappointed all those late nights were essentially for nothing.

Saudi Aramco is still a 1.5 trillion dollar company. Just not a publicly listed one. A public listing wouldn't change the value of the company. This is not some hot high-growth tech IPO that retail investors would clamor over.

Except they weren't. If a junior banker was placed on the Aramco deal team, that tells you they're well regarded. You don't put your C team on the Aramco deal. Furthermore, a client of this calibre brings together powerful people from across the firm and industry. The juniors will have had a chance to network with them. That's huge. (Not to mention, everyone at these firms gets paid salary, benefits and bonuses.)

I'm not harping on this to be mean. Downside management matters. That seems to have gone out the door around cryptocurrencies. These bankers made something if the deal failed and a lot more if it went through. Cryptocurrency investors had no such levers with which to manage downside risk (apart from limiting exposure). Savvy investors (and bankers) get rightfully suspicious at all-or-nothing propositions like the one cryptos collectively pitched.

But, again, I'm still a little confused why we're bending over backwards to try to relate this back to crypto somehow? Are there not enough crypto discussions on HN already?

Disappointed but not devastated.

> I'm still a little confused why we're bending over backwards to try to relate this back to crypto somehow?

I think it's one commenter. Unfortunately, it reflects a prevalent (and wrong) hypothesis from the cryptocurrency community that the investment risks inherent to cryptocurrency are normal. They're not.

Why would that make a difference? Generally, an asset the same risk/return profile will be more valuable if it's highly liquid, right? Which an IPO would do.

Yes and no. A lot of that work if not most would have been essentially speculative in the hope of getting a big payoff if the deal went through.

The lawyers on the other hand would have billed hourly.

I recently became a multi-millionaire (not from crypto) and this is so true. I'm less happy than I was when I rented month to month, didn't own a couch and ate ramen most nights. I actually really miss it- too many obligations and responsibilities to go back now. I wish I enjoyed my 20s more.

I thought that I wanted money above all else. Then I got the money and realized I don't really need that. I'm only close to 1 other human in the whole world and sometimes I wonder if she even cares for me anymore since all I do is work to make more money.

I was just so wrong about my whole life. Even though I'm young, I feel as though I'm entrenched in this game now with no viable way out.

It's worth considering whether you'd feel the same if you'd chosen some other path. Having people you're close to doesn't appear to depend on what you do with your working life, at least that's my perspective.

I also spent my working life chasing money, but it's not like I don't have friends. I have a load of family that I'm close to as well. Somehow it seems none of them care what I'm actually up in terms of business, in fact I doubt they'd even be able to explain it as a one-liner. I'm in my hometown at the moment for a family wedding. I don't think I know what most of the dozens of family members do for a living, other than headline.

Basically if you want to have fulfilling relationships, go and do that. In fact it's even easier now that you have some money to pay for expenses. Just call your old pals from school and say you want to hang out. You'll find you have more friend than you think.

> Even though I'm young, I feel as though I'm entrenched in this game now with no viable way out.

I'd be happy to take those unwanted millions off your hands so that you could return to the life you miss. I'm the breadwinner of a single-income family in the Seattle area and I don't make a FANG-level salary. If we could afford to buy a home instead of renting, I think we'd be much happier.

Don't worry so much about it, likely you're a bit burned out and feel trapped when you're actually more free than most people.

I think one source of my woes is the proverbial "golden handcuffs". Yes, I have a lot of money already. But, I'm expected to continue operating as I have been for multiple years to come (and yes, there is a strong financial incentive to perform). Willful failure to perform could bring lawsuits, resignations, bankruptcy, who knows.

To my rationale, I already committed to n additional years of start-up-hustle level work (100% growth per year for multiple years). There is a strong financial incentive to complete this. If I willfully fail to perform I risk essentially bankruptcy.

I'm aware that I said in my previous post that I don't really need the money. But, at the same time I do? I have a mortgage, wife, (soon) children. I do regret almost all significant life choices I've made to date currently, but now that I'm here it's overly painful to get out (I think?).

Sorry for the rant. Lots of pressure. I should probably start writing in a journal instead of posting my thoughts publicly online.

When I made a throwaway some years ago, I also made a gmail and put it in the throwaway's profile. I ended up getting a lot of supportive emails that helped me through a rough time. Some of the advice was stuff that can't really be shared publicly too, which was useful.

I empathize a lot with the expectation to continue doing your job, and it's worth addressing. Take care of yourself.

I shut everything down and went and got a full time job.

It’s only after a year of not working more than 40hrs a week have I realised how close to the wind I sailed (burnout co-incided with some serious health issues).

Now I work 9-5 for a decent wage and have time for my partner, her boy and my hobbies (Chess and cycling).

We are fortunate, we work in an in demand industry, from deciding I just wanted to go work for someone else to getting a job took 9 days.

My point is that if the money isn’t making you happy then take a few weeks off mull over what you want, write it down, put it in an envelope and open that envelope in 3mths, if it’s still what you want then go for it.

The only thing certain in life is none of us have enough time.

I'm going to do this. Thank you. I have a leisure trip planned soon for 2 weeks (first time ever taking >1 week off at a time). I will do it then.

I think you're missing the point. It's not really about not getting rich quick...the junior bankers probably spent months/years of 100+ hours weeks working on slide decks to get this done, only to have all their work thrown out. For the guys at the top its just one of many deals that fell threw, but for the junior bankers it's probably the most important if not only deal they've worked on in their short careers, and now it's thrown out. I think you'd be upset if a year+ of your work suddenly counted for nothing, regardless of the amount of money involved.

> People in life are what matters. Money matters too, of course, and it's tempting to dream about having FU riches. But when we live in this culture where we're all trying to gamble, and institutions are trying to gamble, and the losers get quietly swept under the rug and silenced, all that's left is the impression that everyone is winning except you.

FWIW most of the people working in the finance industry are not chasing money thinking of themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires, they are simply trying to provide stability and a good life for their families.

> My Bitcoin friend from 2010 wound up a millionaire, but he lost his love along the way, and as far as I know he still hasn't found anyone. Was that rich life worth it?

Isn't this a false dichotomy? Tons of people divorce because of lack of money too.

Why would I care if I get paid salary for the work done anyway?

> Why would I care if I get paid salary for the work done anyway?

While I agree with you, some people need more than monetary compensation to feel fulfilled at work. Some find value in ownership, autonomy, discovery, and other things. It's not hard to imagine some people (IMO _especially_ more junior people, who may be more 'starry eyed' so to speak) to be more motivated by these other factors.

And even if they were robots, having a deal like this fall through hurts their career. It's not irreparable damage, but people are going to give way less of shit about the fact that they worked on it now.

I mean, apart from the fact that you left it on MtGox, that investment had a 6,000x return. What's so bad about that, and why did it "hit you" in 2013? I can't make heads or tails of your comment. How did you manage to lose money buying Bitcoin before 2013?

The takeaway is not about love and life lessons, it's about listening to people who are smarter than you when they scream that something is a pyramid scheme.

It's really not. Senior bankers carefully weigh downside risks. Those risks are hedged by retainers (i.e. up-front, non-refundable advisory fees), cross-sales (e.g. management fees from a client's assets in the fund business making up for false starts at equity capital markets) and diversification (e.g. "ARAMCO is a juicy whale, but I'll keep a quarter of my staff working on other prospects").

Junior bankers get less deal diversification, but having worked on a deal of this calibre is nothing to sneeze at. The qualified will have distinguished themselves and earned front seats on future deals.

Furthermore, both senior and junior bankers have salaries, benefits and stock in their company. At quite a few of those firms, buying cryptocurrencies in any meaningful quantity would be reason to question a junior's judgement.

Was his loss of his 'love' related to his 'investment' in bitcoin? If not, how are the 2 events related?

Some of us took the old adage to heart that "if it's too good to be true, then it probably is" and invested wisely in assets that give a nice, compound return. I'm not rich, but I'm very very comfortable and I travel a lot. It's a good life and it was achieved the "old fashioned way."