Sam Bankman-Fried, FTX paid out millions to buy political influence

You wish. While I do not think that Biden should run for reelection in 2024 his popularity or lack thereof has hit bottom. He will have a much higher approval rating come 2024.

 

Dude the election is in 2 years. Settle down.

 

I'm pretty sure you can edit the title yourself. Can you see 'Thread tools?'
Meanwhile, you've been told this since Thursday. Three days and almost three dozen posts and you finally realize this?

 

Right-wingers love crypto. A totally unregulated electronic currency. What could possibly go wrong?

 

What documentary?

I think there are multiple reasons why the SEC ignored it. First off, bitcoin was the only player for a long time and it wasn't worth much for several years, so it wasn't really on their radar. Also, it's unstoppable. It's decentralized. No one really even knows what country it originated from, or who started it. Also, it's debatable that bitcoin isn't a security and therefore isn't subject to SEC regulations. So the SEC did ignore it.

Now we have 100,000 shitcoins, 1000 exchanges, hedge funds, Bitcoin ETFs on the stock market, Market caps in the Trillions, and it's impossible to ignore. The SEC has gone after companies that operated their coins like securities, or used their coins to raise money like a stock offering, and the like, so they haven't completely ignored it.

I don't think the FTX execs cared much about which side of the political spectrum they were on, they wanted influence on both sides, and spread their money pretty evenly, so when the regulation comes, they'll have access to the lawmakers. But that's no different than what every other industry does...

 

Bumping this for new info…. Apparently he is now under investigation for funneling dark money to GOP candidates, a “serious violation of election laws” by SBF and the GOP candidates….

• 
  
• An ethics watchdog group asked the Federal Election Commission to investigate former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried for alleged “serious violations” of election law.
• The complaint by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, or CREW, cites Bankman-Fried’s admitted contributions of “dark” money to Republican election efforts during the 2022 primary season.

“All my Republican donations were dark,” Bankman-Fried went on to say, the complaint noted. “The reason was not the regulatory reason.”

“It’s because reporters freak the f--- out if you donate to a Republican because they’re all super liberal. And I didn’t want to have that fight,” he said. “So, I made all the Republican ones dark. But, whatever, [indiscernible] the second or third biggest Republican donor this year as well.”

• 
  

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/12/08/ftx-ceo-sam-bankman-fried-hit-with-campaign-finance-complaint.html

 

He has been charged. And it's worse than previously thought. They were not just illegal donations, he was stealing customer's funds to give to politicians ... (both democrats and Republicans, fairly equally, about $40 million each party) ... and engaged in a straw man donor scheme to funnel other people's money and avoid campaign finance laws.

• Federal authorities charged FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried with using tens of millions of dollars of misappropriated customer funds to make illegal political donations to both Democratic and Republican candidates.
• Prosecutors said one of the reasons he made those contributions was to influence the direction of policies and laws affecting the cryptocurrency industry.
• He diverted customer assets held by cryptocurrency exchange FTX to his crypto hedge fund, Alameda Research, the Securities and Exchange Commission charged in a civil complaint.
• A private ethics watchdog last week asked the Federal Election Commission to investigate Bankman-Fried for his alleged admissions of donating dark money to groups linked to Republicans.

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/12/13/ftx...inance-violations-in-criminal-indictment.html

 

Money well spent! Hopefully he saved a little for a lawyer.

 

Really hope they make an example of this guy.

 

Wonder how much he gave the stroke patient.

 

He’s basically crypto Madoff. I guess in theory his lawyers can make it seem legally complex and hope they can muddy the waters enough for some jurors to get lost in the weeds. But at the end of the day the guy stole client funds. Fundamentally no different from Madoff or other pyramid-like schemes where they spend lavishly using client funds. The only difference here is the guy didn’t even need to fake stock trades, he was peddling vaporware. But at the end of the day that vaporware were his clients assets, not his to repurpose/steal.

 

He and that pharma boy should be cellmates.

 

Funny how this is finally a big deal since there is proof he gave to the pubs too. You all didn't care until now!!

 

There were 85 posts on this the thread the day it began which was almost a month ago. 110 posts before it was revived yesterday with the charges.
It seems like there was interest in it before now.

 

Did you bother reading them??
Mostly about no big deal until pubs can be challenged also!!!