Sunday Reads and Listens - Sam at FTX Leaves A Mess...What Is Next?
Howard Lindzon
November 13, 2022
Happy Sunday...
Ellen and I are in Coronado this weekend for the Bat Mitzvah of Tori Benitt, my partner Gary's daughter. It was fantastic weekend of friends and family and Tori did a great job.
The Bat Mitzvah was a nice break from a week in markets I won't ever forget.
The last time I sat at my desk this long and intensely to make calls, take calls and work my network was March of 2020.
Sam, the founder of FTX, has wreaked havoc on peoples lives, the markets, politics and left a huge and growing mess behind to be cleaned.
I have one friend at FTX that I have talked to over the last few years - Sina Nader. Sina was in charge of FTX growth and partnerships (Tom Brady, Larry David), not at all involved in day to day of the operations and the exchange. Sina and I talked strategy all the time the last few years. I had been checking in on Sina over in Berkeley all week and he appreciated it but was quiet. He finally took to Twitter yesterday and posted this:
On the 'All In Podcast', Brian Armstrong was a guest. Brian is the CEO of Coinbase and it is worth a listen. Brian talks about a few meetings with Sam and how he would never have believed Sam was a person that would perpetrate such widespread fraud.
But Sam did, and we can talk to thousands of people about it, but the point is, the governance and oversight was weak and the conditions to let Sam wreak havoc were fully left in his control and now here we are.
What happens next...
There will be lot's of bankruptcies in the industry, lot's of shutdowns and lot's of resets. FTX and Alameda money is everywhere which means mostly not where it should be.
The innocent bystander taxes and regulations will be significant for people that chose/choose the crypto industry as a place to start and build a business.
But, the next batch of companies will get started and at Social Leverage we are excited about this reset as we look out 8 to 10 years.