Bankman-Fried used $100M in stolen FTX funds for political donations, US says
reuters.com
reuters.com
Here is the amended indictment.
https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.59...
"9. As noted above, SAMUEL BANKMAN-FRIED, a/k/a "SBF," the defendant, also used misappropriated customer money to help fund over $100 million in political contributions in advance of the 2022 election. At BANKMAN-FRIED's direction, and to conceal the source of the funds used for the contributions, some of the political contributions were made in the names of FTX executives, including Nishad Singh. To conceal the fact that the Alameda account containing FTX customer deposits was a source of the donations, BANKMAN-FRIED directed that money from the Alameda account be wired to these executives' personal bank accounts, and that these executives then make donations in their own names. By directing donations through Singh and another FTX executive, BANKMAN-FRIED was able to evade restrictions on certain types of political contributions, and thereby maximize FTX's political influence. He leveraged this influence, in turn, to lobby Congress and regulatory agencies to support legislation and regulation he believed would make it easier for FTX to continue to accept customer deposits and grow, which would, in turn, allow the misappropriation scheme to continue. BANKMAN-FRIED also used these connections with politicians and government officials to falsely burnish the public image of FTX as a legitimate exchange."
https://www.citizensforethics.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12...
https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2023/01/17/congress-ftx-prob...
>Congress' FTX Problem: 1 in 3 Members Got Cash From Crypto Exchange's Bosses The session began with 196 U.S. lawmakers who took direct contributions from Sam Bankman-Fried and other former FTX executives, and many of them are still trying to get rid of it.
https://www.reellifewisdom.com/proactive_i_ve_always_believe...
If you want to see how a criminal organization can truly become legitimized through corruption of political structures, Uber is a great example. They managed to create a decentralized illegal Taxi company in the most public manner possible.
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2022/jul/10/uber-files-leak...
I think there should be an exception specificity for political donations where the recipient is just as much in trouble for an illegal donation as the party sending it.
Yes the political donation system is horrendous, and yes both parties are as a result corrupt capitalist lapdogs to corporations and the super rich, but given that the system exists, it's hard to legally blame a party for taking a donation from what at the time seemed like a legitimate business(man).
I agree that there could and should be some form of financial retribution though. If a charity received illegal donations, surely they would have to forfeit it?
Sure, in the case of parties, they’d be fine, they can pay that kind of money back, but let’s assume you donate to a charity and that charity spends that money on humanitarian aid. Your stolen 100m are now a (pretty nice, big) school in some country far away. Would it be „the right thing“ to make the charity pay that money back? Is that what the law demands? I guess that would make it even harder to run such a thing, since you always have to plan for the case where you might have to pay back donations you received… how long ago?
But then again, political parties and campaigns may need different treatment. And you also somehow want to recover these funds for the people originally owned that money. Rough call to make.
Both went to MIT and Stanford respectively, then went on to be professional traders (Jane Street Capital); now, one wouldn't think that was all because of who their parents were, right? As in this only possible because of their own merit to be sure. That is how this system works, after all!
Honestly, I went to private school, and these idiots reminded me of the children of the affluent who were so irredeemably stupid that their parents will stop at nothing to hide their shame and just pay to have them have some role in a freinds company just to offload them.
There is an interview of her saying on record that she doesn't use or need anything she learned in her math degree to do what she does and man... did that come back to bite her in the ass!
>"9. As noted above, SAMUEL BANKMAN-FRIED, a/k/a "SBF," the defendant, also used misappropriated customer money to help fund over $100 million in political contributions "
Sure, his money spends, maybe the guy would have done it for anyone who paid enough, but I suspect all these prior donations helped grease the wheel for that kind of thing, a lot.
...because there are not any more coming.
100M isn't that much money for political campaigns in 2023.
If their guilt is glaringly apparent and your stance is interpreted as supportive, the blowback could be even more detrimental compared to promptly creating distance and professing unawareness of their wrongdoing, genuine or not.
The level of risk seems considerably high for an amount of money that, in the realm of campaign contributions, isn't substantial.
Sometimes because the law requires it, but also if they don't, the attack ad for their opponent writes itself.
Although obviously it depends on how much time has passed and whether the money should already be considered "spent". Because even if the politician wants to repay it, new donors want their money going to re-election activities, not going to repay FTX. After a period of time, you might as well be asking the television stations to return the money they received for running the campaign ads, which... isn't gonna happen.
Politicians should be made to pay out of their own pockets or have an insurance for this type of situation.
We don't want to create a system where only the rich can afford to be politicians ... or at least we don't want to make that any worse than it already is
But I would be all for labelling the entire crypto industry as illegal and ensuring any donations are immediately returned. Maybe just to be safe we should add anything AI related to the list as well.
Why stop at politicians, though? Shouldn't everyone who accepts large sums of money be held accountable if it turns out the money was stolen? At least to some degree?
The sums sure are substantial. You can argue they know their employer was no angel, too. OK to claw back paychecks, or do we draw the line somewhere closer to actually participating in a criminal act?
As a straightforward instance that arises periodically, if a bank were to erroneously deposit funds into your account you’re under obligation to return the funds.
Unless there's compelling evidence to definitively demonstrate their awareness of the funds' misappropriated source, it seems challenging to establish grounds for substantial punitive action in this situation.
Does this even matter anymore? Seems like people are so tribal that they'll vote for their party no matter what, combined with lots of voter apathy makes it seem like it doesn't matter.
If that was true, there would be no such thing as swing states.
The PACs should have to return it and if they can't they're declared bankrupt and everyone associated with running them should be barred for 10 years from involvement in political donations in all forms.
Why are PACs lawless relative to the rest of us, do you think?
I was surprised how many returned the checks.
I was expecting wheelbarrows of cash not having to set up a foundation!
Absolutely, I lived in E. Europe for a significant amount of time; and I almost respect them more for making it as obvious as they do. At least there isn't an air of goaded legitimacy, and everyone knows that if you just pay the bribe you can just go and live your life on as normal. Whereas in the US you are pressured to pretend it's not all that, and that questioning such a system makes you a heretic of the best system ever devised.
Seriously, it's pathetic and I just don't have the patience anymore; this is exactly what happens when Corps, Banks and Wall Street lobby to create legislation that favors them.
Lobbying/donations are a fundamental part of governance in almost all countries.
Bribery is illegal in almost all countries but enforcement is mixed.
You give someone with political power money in order to buy their support and/or influence the way they spend government money/efforts. That's what bribery is. That's what lobbying is.
That technically would be lobbying but you define that was also bribery.
That's lobbying.
Jon Stewart supporting politician X with $1M for his re-election campaign in exchange for a 9/11 bill... that would be bribery. But in the US, this bribery is called lobbying.
Then one day the bribe money is under scruteny, this hits the news and within less than a day he's in actual jail for the first time.
Are you suggesting that They made him leak a witness’s diary so they could arrest him for witness tampering?
Sad to see this conspiracy stuff leaking into HN. Unfortunately I need to make fun of this wildly misinformed cruft to help prevent it taking root here.
...right?
/S
The way the judge’s biases lie and how they might affect their decisions is essentially a random unknowable variable, unless you have good information on this particular judge to support your claim.
Bankruptcy law from other countries aside from maybe the Bahamas wouldn’t really be relevant to FTX.
> Most of the recipients have already pledged
"Most" have "pledged"...that does not give me as much comfort as it gives you.
> Some have already done so.
To who? Do those politicians perhaps have relationships with the orgs they donate to?
I wouldn't trust a politician as far as I can throw one. Especially in this case where they could have easily returned the money to the bankruptcy trustee.
Understand yet?
Additionally, money is fungible, so the politicians can't claim the money is "gone" after being donated, since presumably they're not bankrupt and have other money FTX can claw back.
Though I'm not sure if most of the straw donors are 3rd parties, since the ones I knew about were officers of the company.
Either way, I feel that the moral action is clear, but some politicians want to still use the ill-gotten gains for their political purposes while claiming to act morally. An act which is unfortunately fooling some people.
US political donations used Bankman-Fried for stolen $100 mln in FTX funds