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Comment by tombert | Hacker News Reader

Well, there was some hand-waviness claiming that GUSD was FDIC insured [1], and they kept comparing it to bank accounts. I will admit that I should have done more research before putting it in, but I just assumed that since Gemini was ostensibly working with regulators and they were plastering the safety of GUSD everywhere, I guess I just didn't do my due diligence. I'll accept my share of the blame.

[1] https://www.gemini.com/dollar It still mentioned "FDIC" stuff in small print, but it was much more prominent in earlier stuff.

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But it's precisely that handwaviness that should make you not have to do research at all and smell a rat, as ultimately rate of interest and risk come hand in hand. It doesn't matter whether the instrument is based on crypto, real estate or pokemon cards.

If someone is offering a high interest, very liquid investment with returns so high that you are better off taking a larger mortgage, and putting the extra money into the investment, there has to be a hidden risk component: Otherwise, why would anyone issue mortgages, instead of investing in this very liquid instrument? It's too good to be true.

It's not unlike the people that spent money ordering cryptominers from butterfly labs: The expected return from buying them (pay the whole thing off in two months, and afterwards it's all profit!") just doesn't line up, regardless of the justification. Extraordinary returns exist, but they either require that you discover them yourself, or have to carry significant risks. So when someone is selling the opportunity to you, and you are told there's no risk, you have to know you are being lied to, no due diligence necessary.

I mean, I know. I lost my money. I wrote the post explaining that I feel stupid about it.

Sorry, we all make mistakes. Some people do dumb things with money, others with relationships, some with their health, and others with their time.

It's hard to be successful at everything. Ask the friends of anyone here, they'll point at the things someone did right and the things they messed up to get their.

Glad you're doing better.

Just wanted to chime in and say thank you for sharing. If everyone was too ashamed of sharing past stupidness we would have no guideposts at all for gauging our own inevitable stupidness.

Yeah, honestly I don't particularly care what the people on HN think of me [1], but I think it's important to come out to say that even relatively educated people like me can be duped. I might very well be an idiot, but at least nominally I'm in the "educated" demographic: I have a yuppie job, a college degree, some graduate education, and until Gemini Earn was generally considered somewhat financially responsible. I don't gamble, I don't drink, I don't go out to eat very often, any large purchases are planned out for weeks (if not months), and I try and put at least 30% of my paycheck into some form long-term savings (either something low risk/long-term like an index fund or something super-low-risk like a treasury bill). I feel like if something like this can happen to me, it can happen to nearly anyone else.

If anyone was thinking about "investing" in cryptocurrencies, just try and remember that it's largely-unregulated funny money, and you're probably not going to save the world while simultaneously getting rich from it.

I'm hoping that other people can learn from my mistake the age-old adage: if it looks too good to true, it probably is.

[1] (well, most of the time, admittedly I'm subject to vanity like anyone else)

> if it looks too good to true, it probably is.

And everybody told you, all the time, and you chose not to listen. That's your choice, no worries.

But threatening physical harm to the con man you fell for is just not ok.

Sorry, “everybody” told me? “All the time”? That’s news to me; lots of people seem to get suckered by Gemini Earn. Yes there were a few comments we can look back at in hindsight, but its not like anyone in my friend group told me anything.

Also, it’s hardly a “threat”; it was a bit of hyperbole, which nearly everyone here seems to understand (including you, I think), but let’s just pretend my statement was 100% sincere; what danger am I causing exactly? I very clearly say that I do not want to meet him. What kind of cartoon-like circumstances are going to lead to me meeting this guy if I am not seeking him out?

Actually, threatening physical harm to a con man has a long and storied tradition in this country; but more than that if SBF had mugged this guy I don't think anyone would call a physical response a bad thing, but because he mugged him with words you're going to posture about this is "just not ok"? Come on.

Don’t sweat it. I’ve invested multiple hundreds of thousands in venture-backed startups over the past two decades, and lost all of it. None of the startups was successful. These were all audited venture-backed with experienced founders many of whom I’ve known personally in the Austin tech scene. Losing money is the rule in any kind of investing beyond the prevailing real interest rate. It’s all speculation. By the sound of it your diversification is paying off. Actually you’re quite smart in that regard, you didn’t put it all into startups like me.

It's ok. Don't worry. I lost $250k during Covid because of similar lack of due diligence.

I made most of them back YOLO-ing TQQQ, but like you, I was having cold sweats for several nights.

Thankfully, there is so much money in tech industry that you can still recover from mistakes like this.

Thanks for sharing. You've paid a significant price for a very tough life lesson. It takes guts to be so open about it. Kudos.

OK, now you're moving from the realm of genuine curiosity and into the realm of victim blaming.

Before the collapse, FTX and crypto had a veneer of respectability. They had ads everywhere and the mainstream press treated them like legitimate financial investments.

The failure here isn't of the individuals who get suckered with crypto bullshit, it's a failure in our ability to regulate and tamp down that kind of crap. Shame on the press, government institutions, and of course tech sector VCs, for either shilling for, investing in, or looking the other way while these frauds were taking people to the cleaners.

I talked to a lot of people at the time. You could say things like:

* There is no free money. Why would there be free money?

* It isn't FDIC insured. Look, it is a lie

* It has ponzi economics, etc

And it would get hand waved away. Agree that authorities dropped the ball, but the way a good con works is the mark wants to get conned, they want to believe there is something too good to be true.

This is not aimed at OP, who opened up, admonished themself, etc.

Yes, it often boils down to recognizing that "this person is telling me what I want to hear" because we're very vulnerable to that.

The world is full of liars, something one learns as one gets older.

> Yes, it often boils down to recognizing that "this person is telling me what I want to hear" because we're very vulnerable to that.

This also explains all the hype and starry eyes for LLMs.

And yet the top comment here starts with:

> I sincerely hope that I never meet Sam Bankman Fried, because if I did I do not know what I would do but it certainly wouldn't be legal.

Why is this statement not condemned? Of course it's terrible that SBF was a fraud. But insinuating that physical harm is justified is just not ok. They were the naïve ones who bought into the BS, waived away all the warning voices, and now they are threating violence? Not ok.

I was engaging in a bit of hyperbole because I very much dislike SBF. I wouldn’t actually hurt him if I met him in person, but even if I would, I find it exceedingly unlikely that I will meet him in person, so it’s really a non-issue regardless. It would be kind of cool if he stubbed his toe or something on my behalf those though.

I feel like you know this, and you’re pretending to not understand this to take some moral high-ground.

> There is no free money. Why would there be free money?

When interest rate is below inflation, we do have free money, it's just not for everyone.

When the "victim" was planning to grab free money at the expanse of the next guy in the ponzi scheme, I think it's fair enough to blame them.

I didn’t know it was a Ponzi scheme. I thought they were using GUSD as collateral for high-interest loans.

> The failure here isn't of the individuals

Nope, the failure is of the individuals. Sure, regulators deserve some of the blame but nobody forced the individuals to put their money into such ridiculous schemes.

They know this. Why are you trying to make them feel worse? I really don’t like the culture around finance issues where everyone is treated like an irredeemable fool.

It’s better to treat people like the redeemable fools we are.

Sure, but fraud is illegal lol. They're the victim of criminal activity at their expense.

That’s the redeemable fool part. I was a fool to fall for this obvious fraud. I am redeemed by now being less of a fool.

But it doesn’t change the fact that I was once a fool.

> there was some hand-waviness claiming that GUSD was FDIC insured

This should be piercing-the-veil fraud if true.

They're actually being sued by the SEC over this, claiming it's an unregistered security.

> being sued by the SEC over this, claiming it's an unregistered security

Good, but insufficient. Misleadingly using the FDIC’s brand should open a criminal investigation.

There were people in the comments here 11 months ago who thought the same thing: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31434052

You know, it's very possible that I read this exact thread when it was fresh. I should have listened to you!

10 months ago when Voyager blew up, I've pleaded with people not to believe the FDIC status these crypto firms were claiming [1]. The misrepresentation by these firms was straight fraud.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31954115

It's really unfortunate so many VC's and people in the tech industry lent credibility to such naked fraud. It made (and continues to make) regulation politically untenable. One of our political parties _continues_ to insist the crypto industry is "innovation!" and it'd be a mistake to stifle such incredible innovation. It's all bs.

I'm sorry you fell victim to this. It's a shame the regulators, meant to protect consumers from this exact thing, weren't able to do their jobs. Don't take it as a personal failure. This was systemic, and you were served up by lots of deeply monied interests.

I mean the VCs literally make their money from pump and dump schemes. There are a ton of startups in the valley that have ludicrous valuations. VC can do the initial investments then recoup their capital even before companies are profitable as we see with examples like Uber.

Or you could take personal responsibility for having ignored everybody who said for years that it's all BS. This was not a secret, unforeseen, some higher natural power. It was delusion, and if you choose not to listen then it's up to you. Don't blame it on regulators.

Hey, I was one screaming at everyone about how silly it all was. I’ve got a nice decade of HN comments to demonstrate. BUT I also have a decent interest in personal finance and understand that world better than your average bear. It sucks that predators are just allowed to scam less informed people, and this is the response they have to deal with.

We’re all getting older, and there’s a good chance we’ll lose some of our faculties along the way. I’d prefer to live in a place that does something to help protect me from outright scams, and not have to take “personal responsibility”, and constantly be on guard against every potential bad actor.

GUSD holders never lost a cent. Only people who deposited their GUSD in Gemini Earn, where they made it clear it was a loan to Genesis, have their money encumbered.

But that’s so simple to validate. I mean, I have funds in a few accounts and every one of them shows up in FDIC’s bankfind tool and “member fdic” is advertised by the banks.

The link you posted does mention fdic but it says Gemini’s deposits are fdic insured (probably true as what kind of a crazy company keeps cash in uninsured accounts). Definitely shady of them to word it like that as it’s likely meant to confuse and mislead. But again, pretty easy to validate and disprove before sending any funds.

I hope you get something back and I guess the good news is that you only make this mistake once in life and teach everyone in your family how to avoid.

> But that’s so simple to validate.

Simple to who? Simple to you? I didn't invest in Gemini and also thought these returns were obviously bunk, but I've never heard of "FDIC's bankfind tool" before your comment.

The guy already said he accepts his share of the blame for not doing DD, but I'm not sure why you're so insistent that it's entirely his fault when SBF was clearly committing fraud.

Simple to anyone with significant sums of money to invest.

Either someone is competent enough to earn thousands to hold with FTX or competent enough to inherit win and not have it wasted away.

Either way, if I have $10-100k or whatever and this isn’t simple for me then the issue isn’t FTX, it’s me and I’m going to eventually lose it.

I’m saying it is OP’s fault because he invested in magical thinking. Of course it’s also SBF’s fault for committing fraud. But this is an entirely avoidable fraud as it’s not a complicated con.

If I buy magic beans from a traveler whose fault is it? It’s certainly the traveler’s fault for claiming they will grow into a beanstalk to heaven, but it’s also my fault for believing such a tale.

> Simple to anyone with significant sums of money to invest.

Remember Bernie Madhoff?

Hedge funds are quite different than cash accounts. And Madoff at least had a story with fake statements and whatnot.

FTX was patently impossible.

Genesis was claiming that the Earn program was effectively using cryptocurrency as collateral on high interest loans. I knew how high the interest was on credit cards and auto-loans and payday loans, so it didn’t seem ponzi-like to me.

To be clear, I didn’t ever directly do anything with FTX, at least not knowingly. I was unaware of the cross-mingly that was happening with SBF, Genesis, and Alameda, so no matter how “impossible” FTX seemed, it wouldn’t have saved me if I didn’t know FTX was involved.

That said, 7% when banks and bonds are are offering 0.1% should have more directly set off my bullshit alarm.

Yep, no argument that I should have checked the FDIC's bankfind tool, which I do make liberal use of now. I guess I just made the mistake of thinking that Gemini wouldn't have been able to do this for so long if it were a scam, especially since they repeatedly claimed they were working with regulators.

I'm also reasonably sure that the FDIC insurance stuff was more prominently displayed on their site, though I'm having trouble confirming that so maybe I'm just misremembering.

And indeed, I have helped a few people avoid these scams now. When friends of mine ask me about investing in crypto now, I tell them "I think you should buy Treasury Bills directly from the government for safe short term stuff, and probably just find a good low cost index fund from a registered broker for longer term stuff".

You're not crazy that it used to[1] be less clear what exactly FDIC insurance applied to.

Originally:

> Gemini is a U.S. company regulated by the New York Department of Financial Services. GUSD reserves are eligible for FDIC insurance up to $250,000 per user while custodied with State Street Bank and Trust.¹

Later:

> Gemini is a U.S. company regulated as a limited purpose trust company by the New York State Department of Financial Services. Each GUSD corresponds to a U.S. dollar held by Gemini in accounts at U.S. FDIC-insured bank accounts and money market funds holding short-term U.S. treasury bonds and maintained at a custodian. The cash portion of these GUSD reserves may be eligible for FDIC “pass through” insurance for Gemini customers, in the event of the failure of a bank holding the U.S. dollar deposit portion of the GUSD reserves.

[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20211201224824/https://www.gemin...

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