Zane worked at Bitfinex and Okex prior to FTX so he could credibly have been admin of this group prior to FTX existing.

I think it's pretty obvious what's happening.

CZ, not yet fully aware that he is dealing with an unsophisticated bumbler (and thus the risk that this chat would someday be part of congressional testimony), is talking candidly but at cross purposes with Sammy.

CZ knows (and presumes SBF also knows) how incredibly thin this market's liquidity really is, and thus the potential destabilization that a mere 250k signal could ignite. while Sammy apparently believes something closer to version of the numbers meant for public FOMO consumption.

This little screenshot, (if not eventually proven fabricated, which is almost certainly going to be the counter signal message by CZ, parroted across the crypto community) likely is the biggest bombshell tell in this testimony so far.

There's zero chance $250k can affect Tether's liquidity. If you were talking $250 million, I'd still highly doubt it, but then you'd be reaching well past what I can dispute. The idea that $250k can budge this market is laughable.

The CEO of binance was upset about it enough to privately message his competitor. Who should we believe, his supposedly private actions, or you.

Just for clarification, from the messages:

SBF: "Are you claiming that 250k of USDT would depeg it?"

CZ: "no, I don't think 100x that size will succeed. It just cause small issues here and there"

Not sure what small issues CZ is referring to, but he's the expert here

The point isn't the size of the trade; the point is that smart money might follow Alameda, and so news that Alameda is "shorting" Tether might, on its own, be enough for CZ to ask that Sam stop.

What's not being pointed out here is that to CZ, and actually even to Sam, there really is no distinction here between Alameda and FTX. CZ is calling him on a position taken by Alameda, via their "Exchange chat," to coordinate between FTX and Binance.

Tether daily trading volume is ~$30 billion. Good luck depegging it with your $0.25 million short.