Hmm, wonder what he knew, how and when…
Smells of insider knowledge a couple of those initial exchanges were going to have the wheels come off. That is one month before Terra/Luna popped the bubble. Mighty convenient…
… And now Bitcoin is at $22k. This doesn’t smell fishy at all!
jpinard
4440
Greed on both sides made it easy to steal from people.
Seems like at first they used customer USD deposits as collateral to borrow and by CEL tokens to offset sales by their CEO, but eventually they dispensed with the middleman and bought the tokens directly with customer funds. All the while saying to each other hey this doesn’t seem very legal, dude.
Aceris
4443
But none of them went to the media.
It’s like they expected the fraud to be more subtle, and then once they were on the inside were like “what, we’re just using customer money to boost our token price? I thought we were at the forefront of modern financial fraud, this Ponzi shit is so last century! The regulators and lawyers might actually be able to catch us!”
Whistleblowers get blacklisted. Not officially, but anyone googling an applicant and seeing that is going to pause and wonder if they should think about other candidates. I’m sure there were a lot of contemplation on the part of employees as to whether they wanted to transition from respectable tech careers to burger flipping, and the people did the correct (numerically - not morally) calculation.
Aceris
4446
I think there are many many places in tech which would see someone whistleblowing blatant financial fraud at a crypto-Ponzi as a positive thing.
Someone who spoke up about dodgy sale of user data - now that’s the kind of thing that can end a career in tech.
Well, they went ahead and helped perpetrate a fraud instead. I’m not sure that was, on balance, the safer career choice.
My buddy whistleblew on his old company, UBiome, and they fired him for it. The owners are now fugitives hiding in Europe, and my buddy lives in Maui and has a great job. So… crime doesn’t pay, kids.
Well, it pays for a little while, then you go to jail or hide from the feds in another country.
I used to tell my staff that one of the top, perhaps the top, ambitions I had for my career was to never, ever find myself uttering the words Senator, I have no clear recollection of that matter. And of course similar words in even more dire circumstances.
I assume that’s citing the FT’s very entertaining longread. It’s paywalled, but some of you may be able to use this gift link.
I’ll wait for the TikTok outline
KevinC
4453
Thanks for the gift link. Crazy to think that this goofball was getting people to give him billions of dollars. What a shitshow.
Given his other public utterances, it’s probably safe to categorize it as a 1,000 page confession.
Craig Wright’s very silly lawsuit about allegedly hacked bitcoin is being allowed to proceed to trial:
https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2023/83.html
sharaleo
4456
Oh man, I really want him to win this! It would be hilarious!
The problem arises in this way. Tulip Trading Limited, a company associated with Dr Craig Wright, claims to be the owner of some bitcoin with a very high total value (the value in $ expressed in April 2021 was about $4 billion). The bitcoin is held at two addresses on the blockchain called 1Feex and 12ib7. However the private keys have been lost in a hack, likely stolen. Without its private keys Tulip cannot access its assets or move them to safety. However, Tulip contends, the developers named as defendants in this case control and run the four relevant bitcoin networks, and it would be a simple matter for them to secure Tulip’s assets, e.g. by moving them to another address which Tulip can control. Tulip contends that the role the developers have undertaken in relation to Tulip’s property (the bitcoin) and the power this role gives them, and all the circumstances (discussed below), mean that the developers should be recognised as a new ad hoc class of fiduciary, owing fiduciary duties to the true owners of bitcoin cryptocurrency, including in this case Tulip as true owner of the bitcoin at 1Feex and 12ib7. The fiduciary duties owed should extend to implementing the necessary software patch to solve Tulip’s problem and safeguard Tulip’s assets from the thieves. Tulip also alleges the existence of certain duties in tort. The developers deny they owe fiduciary or any other duties to Tulip. They contend that they have nothing like the power or control Tulip alleges and that duties of the kind Tulip contend for would be highly onerous and unworkable.
I guess his VPN is his emotional support animal.
