Feds were probably gathering evidence from Day 1, and the restructuring CEO seems to have found it: https://docs.house.gov/meetings/BA/BA00/20221213/115246/HHRG...
"Yaffe-Bellany says Bankman-Fried stayed on the line for over an hour – and yet there are no direct quotes concerning the conflict of interest between FTX and Alameda, neither a confirmation or denial that SBF illegally commingled funds between the two or further admissions of guilt. There's little sense SBF, who stepped down from the exchange, is taking responsibility for the situation.
But, what, you want SBF to perjure himself? It’s a shame that Yaffe-Bellany wrote about Bankman-Fried’s cryptic Twitter thread, rather than the tweets he has been deleting. It sucks we know nothing more about the Bahamian withdrawals FTX opened, claiming it was at the behest of the island nation’s securities regulator – which the agency debunked."
> The NYT profiles I've seen is pretty clear that Alameda and FTX were mingling customer funds, that he refused to answer questions about the handling of funds, and that he was under investigation.
>> But he would offer only limited details about the central questions swirling around him: whether FTX improperly used billions of dollars of customer funds to prop up a trading firm that he also founded, Alameda Research. The Justice Department and the S.E.C. are examining that relationship.
OK no quote, but if there's no information why should they quote three repeated "no comments"? If he did not answer the question there's nothing quotable there, that doesn't make it a puff piece.
Maybe coinbase has political motivation to call reporting from certain media puff pieces?
- commingling of funds between Alameda and FTX
- conflicts of interest between the two, including SBF's relationship with the CEO
- use of customer deposits to pay off loans for Alameda
- that FTX and SBF are under investigation
If you want to compare tone, you can look up any NYT article on FB https://www.nytimes.com/topic/company/facebook-inc.
If you want something specific to compare, just take a look at the headline/subtitle which about as far as most people get in any article.
That's because describing it as "deliberate fraud" would require evidence of intent that they don't have. I agree that it's likely the case, but I wouldn't expect a journalist to state it as fact at this point.
FTX firm headed by SBF collapses after failing to process user withdrawals. Mismanaged funds and risky trades are to blame. Victims and prominent figures within the crytposphere allege fraud.
Funny how when it comes to most stories, "Business is killing babies... says person (random person on twitter)" is good enough.
It’s kind of how we got one of our recent presidents…
Ignoring that he also donated to Republicans. This is all part of that narrative - substantiated or otherwise.
So instead of people taking a close look at the crypto space and saying "wait, maybe a lot of these other projects are flawed", their anger gets focused on the press and the regulators. It's pretty ridiculous when you think about it -- is the NYTimes really responsible for FTX because the tone of their pieces wasn't sufficiently harsh? I'm skeptical.
It's as if SBF lawyers handed NYT a list of questions to ask and nothing more.
SORKIN: I think the question is whether you supposed to have access to these accounts to begin with. If I worked at a bank and was a bank teller and I decided to leave the bank at the end of the evening and take the cash that I ostensibly had access to, even if I intended to bring it back to the bank later or with even more money to give them back — I still stole that money.
The full transcript is here: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/01/business/dealbook/sam-ban...
"The Rise and Fall of Respectability":
Seems SBF won’t be attending after all…