I am still not convinced that he did not steal the missing FTX client funds. So at this point it is not clear to me how much he lost or gained from this. I do hope the DOJ conduct a full investigation and trace where all the money went.

I assume all those political donations bought something :)

Let's hope some congresspeople were stupid enough to put their money into FTX.

If so, then he will be facing jail time. If not, then he is fine.

well, they're not giving the donations back, and it doesn't look like he'll have much to give in the future. Where's their motivation?

Where there is fraud there is embezzlement

Does he still hold on to the billion dollar worth Robinhood shares?

He was running a Ponzi scheme. Don't feel sorry for him.

I'm not. Just saying that he won't get away with it like other CEOs have done in the past while "taking responsibility". His punishment has already begun.

Which is what, exactly? Living in hiding?

Yes, losing his money, reputation and freedom (whether that's in hiding or in jail). He's obviously royally screwed, regardless if he goes to jail or not, and yet people are saying he walks away from this unscathed.

To be fair to the guy, he wasn’t afraid to admit it in some very public interviews. But yeah, don’t feel sorry.

> To be fair to the guy, he wasn’t afraid to admit it in some very public interviews.

I don't think brazen criminals should get a different perspective than sneaky ones; perhaps a worse characterization because they either don't recognize what they're doing is wrong, or they simply hold society in contempt.

It wasn’t a Ponzi scheme, at least based on what’s publicly known.

This is just investing with client funds, which the US learned the hard way must be carefully restricted. The US has the Glass-Steagall Act, and deposit insurance to try to prevent bank runs like this.

The investing with client funds part is probably the easiest charge but his self-description sounds Ponzi-like:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-25/sam-bankm...

This sounds like Napoleon Dynamite type of reasoning

Me, as a kid: “the emperor’s new clothes is nonsense, nobody would go along with something that obviously wrong”

Me, after watching people sell no-hope dotcoms, dubious real estate, and cryptocurrency: “… unless they thought they could cash out before the other fools wised up”

They were talking about stuff like Celsius. I don't think FTX was itself offering yield-farming products, just letting people trade those tokens. "Yeah, the stuff people trade on my platform are probably Ponzis" is definitely not great publicity, but it's not obviously admitting to your own crimes.

>It wasn’t a Ponzi scheme, at least based on what’s publicly known.

>This is just investing with client funds...

This is just plain not true.

He had $16b in Magic Dollars(TM) and he can have the same amount in the same token tomorrow if he wants, though.

I am 100% sure he must have siphoned off some sizable part of his net worth in cash or other non-crypto assets.

He will have worked with some accountants and lawyers to move money into untouchable places. There will be someone employed to hold it for him, and dole it out in the future. Sure he will have to keep a low profile, but there will be resources.

He will probably have dispersed quite some sums to friends and family, some of that will come back to him in one way or another.

Finally, he will be able to go on the celebrity speaking circuit for quite a while...

> Finally, he will be able to go on the celebrity speaking circuit for quite a while...

Yeah, talking about the power of failure what he learned from it.

Maybe this is good - maybe it will keep the lesson of crypto alive in the public mind...

Several million dollars is a lot of money - but not sizable compared to $16B.

If he siphoned off 10-20% ($160M+)- you can bet he's going to lose it in bankruptcy proceedings.

10% is $1.6B. Only needs 1% for $160M. .1% for $16M. Which is still generationally rich. Yeah, I think he would have taken that out right?

10-20% is not $160M, it's $1.6B.

SBF personally owns a 7.6% stake in Robinhood worth ~$700m at the current price.

I stand corrected on this point. Bloomberg is reporting that SBF's Robinhood stake was apparently held through Alameda and may have been used as collateral for loans.

Lol give me a break. He will be fine and rich forever, just maybe not a billionaire. There are no real consequences when you are that wealthy.

No death threats because he had money? Have you perhaps seen the extensive list of Russian billionaires who "committed suicide" during like the past five years?

Russia is a terrorist state oligarchy with a murderous dictator. No one is actually going to kill this guy in the US. He will obviously get threats, and then reboot with a new $500mm seed round for some new scam from Marc Andreessen in a few years. Nevermind that's Adam Neumann.

Pretty likely that he has money on the side or some sort of assets that are worth a fair amount. Likely not Billions, but certainly in the Millions.

Hopefully the US Gov goes after him and forces him to pay it back to creditors/customers, similar to Trevor Milton/Nikola

When you have a net worth of 16B it's probably pretty easy to make 10's or 100's of millions disappear.