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Comment by verteu | Hacker News Reader

> any exchange in such close company with a hedge fund should always be suspected of front-running

Indeed -- I knew several professional traders who used FTX. At the time, their consensus was:

1) "Probably Alameda has an unfair latency advantage, because they are the designated market-maker, and owned+operated by the same people who run the exchange." This could be called 'front-running' depending on how you define the term.

2) "However, SBF probably won't steal all our money because he is well-known, extraditable by USA, and would go to prison."

Needless to say, assumption 2) was incorrect.

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The premise of 2) is entirely correct, they just underestimated how irrational people can be.

Exactly.

SBF was a sociopath who would (acdg to sworn testimony of his GF) actually go ahead and toss the coin if the outcome was one side results in the world getting twice as good and the other side causes the world to be destroyed, and he DGAF that he was also making the bet for everyone on the planet.

They didn't count on the fact that this mentality would also mean that in real life, he would also do all kinds of risky crimes, and even go to trial instead of taking a plea deal, because there's a non-zero!! chance he could get away with it.

Bad bets all around

> SBF was a sociopath who would (acdg to sworn testimony of his GF) actually go ahead and toss the coin if the outcome was one side results in the world getting twice as good and the other side causes the world to be destroyed, and he DGAF that he was also making the bet for everyone on the planet.

It could be true he's probably a sociopath, but having an edgy philosophical talk with your girlfriend is just that. It could say something about his character but it's nothing more than a fantasy.

Much more damning is stealing all those billions to become rich and famous.

I'm pretty sure it was more than just one 'edgy talk' with his GF, but one of many concrete examples of his attitude towards taking risks and especially taking risks that affect others who did not sign up for the risk.

I saw an article that implied that SBF confirmed on the stand his willingness to do the coin-toss, but I couldn't find it to confirm.

Perhaps the biggest evidence is that he went to trial instead of taking a plea deal. At the very least, he put his parents and family through an awful and unnecessary ordeal, just because he thought there was a chance he could convince a jury. But, in reality, it was not even close.

You're "pretty sure"? Unless it was stated from himself under oath is largely useless.

I'm commenting based on the reporting that I read indicating that he ALSO said confirmed it under oath, and other reporting indicating that his GF and others have long indicated that this was his overall attitude, i.e., that SBF taking any risk was OK as long as the possible outcome was positive, regardless of whether the more likely outcome was harm to many other people who did not agree to take the risk.

The "pretty sure" caveat is that I cannot offhand recite chapter and verse of all the citations.

Number 2 is half correct.

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