[s28l]

Against better judgement (and advice of counsel, presumably), this guy is still running his mouth to the media. If you had a disgraced former crypto CEO who was still willing to speak at your finance conference, wouldn't you keep him on the docket? I certainly would.

[colpabar]

Fair point. I guess we’ll have to see how it goes. I imagine it’s going to be him saying how this was all just a big oopsie doodle in excel because he was too tired from playing LoL, and everyone around him will laugh and not ask any real questions, like who his parents are.

[fallingknife]

Absolutely. Sucks for everybody else speaking, though, because this conference has now, for all practical purposes, been renamed "The SBF Shitshow Conference"

[hotpotamus]

Matt Levine says he's a fan, and that makes sense to me - Levine was pretty well respected as a journalist before he interviewed Fried, but it probably gave him a huge bump in interest when he did and even more now.

[vba616]

>but it probably gave him a huge bump in interest when he did and even more now

Nobody listened to or remembered the interview until a couple of people pointed out how prophetic it was with hindsight.

Levine found SBF pleasant to talk to and he's amused by financial chicanery.

At the time he said it sounded like a Ponzi, and SBF agreed, but after FTX blew up, it turned out to be so much more.

They didn't have an accounting department. Reporting makes it sound like they didn't even know what real accounting is. SBF was quoted as rejecting the concept of books. As Levine wrote more recently, their alleged balance sheet was mostly "magic beans" and cobwebs. None of this was part of the interview.

[hotpotamus]

I listened to it at the time because although I'm not a regular listener to the Bloomberg Oddlots podcast, I've actually been subscribed for years and pick out the occasional episode and saw that Levine was on it. I had zero idea who Bankman-Fried was at the time, and was very amused by the whole thing. I assumed he was some sort of fringe ne'er do well who was willing to come on and talk about how scammy the whole ecosystem was, and I didn't actually realize that he was a big deal until some time later and I was shocked at how matter-of-fact he was about the whole thing.

So that is to say, I heard it, but I didn't realize the significance. And Levine is probably the best explainer and journalist in the financial space today.

[JamesianP]

I saw a couple highly-viewed youtube channels that made a big deal of it at the time. Either skeptics of crypto or contrarian types generally.

[actionablefiber]

Are you referring to Levine defending Bankman-Fried's answer on yield farming?

I think Levine was just saying, "this is a sensible answer to give as a trader operating an exchange where you want a healthy dose of cynical thinking like this instead of pure idealism".

[largepeepee]

Credit when credit is due.

Matt did call him out months ago on about how cynical his take on crypto was.

Saying he was describing a scam.

And that raised many red flags for others on SBF's ethos.

SBF prolly noticed his error and took efforts to cozy up to Matt afterwards. Hard to resist liking a billionaire who spends on you. It's a superpower that few are immune to in this capitalist world.

[schintan]

Matt Levine said he 'liked' him, liking someone is very different than being a fan.

[hotpotamus]

Ah, then whoever I'm quoting from HN who said that was mistaken, or I've remembered it incorrectly. I don't think it changes the point - he's good for Levine professionally; he'll never run out of material for his column at this point.

[vba616]

Saying that the mess is good for him to write about now is completely different than insinuating he was promoting FTX this spring, especially while simultaneously taking the position that he exposed it (which is mostly hindsight).

He's always talked about criminal and unethical behavior in an understated and humorous way in his column, and as a private individual, should be exempt from the slimy methods of character assassination used on politicians.

[hotpotamus]

I'm sure I could have said it better. I listened to the Bankman-Fried episode of Oddlots when it aired not because I had any idea who Bankman-Fried was, but because it was an episode with Levine on it. I think he's the best financial writer working today bar none. So I'm not trying to cast aspersions on Levine.