Still amazed at all the cult members suggesting the guy who was paying their bills was just a victim of some philosophical errors and bad judgment. He took something that was nothing but fraud to beign with (crypto) and then just stole all the money! It
was all fraud!
There were no financial statements at FTX; invoicing was done through QuickBooks and Slack messages, a shockingly crude process for a multibillion-dollar company. Executives had access to customer assets through special “back doors” and private keys, which they used to acquire funds and separately make hundreds of millions of dollars in real estate and other purchases. “Insiders,” per Ray’s testimony, were able to receive loans and payments of over $1 billion. In the hearing, Ray said that on one loan, Bankman-Fried signed as the issuer and the recipient. All of this is right out of what I imagine would be a Fisher-Price “My First Fraud” manual.
Really the entire thing was:
1) Get rich VC guys who high on their own farts and whatever else to give him money
2) Use money to fund a massive PR effort to get people writing nice things about him. Use the word "philosophical" and "altruism" a lot. Focus on Harvard inbreds, they're the best marks.
3) Use money to get politicians to turn "being a crook" into "not being a crook" (got pretty close here!), with the help of the journalists in 2)
4) Fill a box with fake money, and have people give you real money for it
5) Steal the real money
