I Don’t Think It’s Set In Enough To People That The Party’s Over For Super-High Prices
It’s Friday desk clearing time for this blogger. “In Orlando, 29% of homes on the market reduced their prices in October, up from 16% the same time a year ago. Real estate agent Kimberly Ann Zeidner says Zeidner says she’s trying to talk her investor homeowner into knocking $20,000 off its price, currently in the $300,000 range. Zeidner says part of the issue is expectations. Sellers are still asking for about the same amount as their neighbors were getting earlier this year, but those prices aren’t reflective of what people are willing or perhaps even capable to pay. ‘You’re using bad [comparables],’ she said. Zeidner said buyers ‘want something turn key and they want it below asking.’ That means sellers have to make sure their house is ready to show and priced ready to take a cut.”
“‘Stuck. That’s how realtors describe this market. Sellers are stuck in the prices of the past and buyers are stuck with the fear of what the future may hold,’ Boulder-area realtor Kelly Moye said. ‘Sellers are learning to price to 2021 numbers and buyers are learning to leverage motivated sellers by requesting concessions to buy down their interest rate.'”
“Even after all these aggressive price cuts, iBuyers still have a tremendous amount of inventory to offload in bubbly markets. In Phoenix alone, Parcl Labs estimates iBuyers still own around $1 billion worth of units. ‘Their [iBuyers] sales transactions alone accounted for nearly 10% of all Phoenix sales activity in September. As more pressure builds for them to exit their positions they will likely become more aggressive in their pricing, this will continue a downward spiral until prices reach a point where demand enters to stabilize it,’ Jason Lewris, co-founder tells Fortune. ‘All of the conditions are there for a crash [in Phoenix].'”
“Do those ‘for sale’ signs in your neighborhood seem to be up for longer than usual? It’s not just your imagination: sales prices might still be creeping up in many areas, but the Portland metro area real estate market is slowing down. Lake Oswego/West Linn: These southern suburbs are still home to metro area’s highest median sales price, clocking in at $795,500 in October 2022, though that’s well down from their July median sales price of $913,600.”
“Southern Nevada house prices resumed their downward slide last month. The median sales price of previously owned single-family homes — the bulk of the market — was $440,000 in October. House prices have now dropped by more than $40,000 from the record-high of $482,000 in May. Further underscoring the market’s dramatic change from last year’s buying spree, sales totals have plunged from 2021 levels and available inventory has skyrocketed. Also, 7,906 houses were on the market without offers at the end of October, up 140.5 percent year-over-year, according to Las Vegas Realtors.”
“Higher mortgage rates have ‘shrunk the buyer pool,’ which has led to increased inventory and, ultimately, lower sales prices, Las Vegas Realtors President Brandon Roberts told the Review-Journal. During the pandemic’s sales frenzy, buyers often had to ‘settle for whatever they could get,’ he noted. But the market changed quickly this year as interest rates marched higher. ‘It was almost overnight,’ he said.”
“After two years of intense competition and skyrocketing prices, the market in suburban Placer County has cooled. The trend largely mirrors the rest of the Sacramento region and Northern California, where prices and sales began to dip in May. Sacramento real estate market appraiser Ryan Lundquist said it’s a mix of rising mortgage rates, lower median prices and a drop in sales volume. ‘It’s made the market more challenging, and (buyers) have gained more power because it’s more difficult to afford and sellers are having a harder time selling,’ Lundquist said.”
“The median price in the region dropped an average of 2.5% every month for the last five months, according to Lundquist’s data. The median price dropped 12.4% in Placer from May to October, the steepest decline in the Sacramento region, the data show. What’s more, nearly 56% of the 525 active listings on the Placer County market last week had a price reduction, the highest percentage in the four-county region, according to Lundquist. ‘Buyers can command credits and price reductions so that’s the good news,’ Lundquist said. The median price for a home in the four-county Sacramento region stood at $550,000 in October, exactly what it was the year before, according to Lundquist.”
“The housing market has returned to earth. Home sellers can’t just name a price and expect buyers to pay; meanwhile over a trillion dollars in wealth in the form of home equity has evaporated. A whopping $1.37 trillion in mortgage holder equity vanished in the third quarter, thanks to falling homeprices, according to calculations by Blackknight. It’s the sharpest single-quarter decline, by dollar value, since 2000. On a percentage basis, it’s the steepest drop since 2009. The biggest drops in equity are in San Jose (24%), Seattle (21%) and San Francisco (20%). California accounted for more than half of the national decline in equity.”
“Sales of homes and prices continued to drop in Langley in October as the frenzy of house buying that hit during the pandemic continued to deflate through the fall. Some sellers, however, are still listing their properties at prices higher than the new normal, and therefore, they aren’t getting offers. ‘I don’t think it’s set in enough to people that the party’s over for super-high prices,’ said Langley realtor Alex Maldeis.”
“In the Greater Vancouver region, home sales recorded on the MLS system are predicted to finish the year at 30,000 units before slowing to 26,000 units in 2023 as the full impact of higher mortgage rates is felt, said the BCREA. In the Lower Mainland specifically, prices are currently down roughly 9 per cent from their peak in February, according to the BCREA. The report also predicts that unemployment will rise from 4.9 per cent at the end of 2022 to almost 6 per cent in 2023. When unemployment goes up, there are more listings seen in the market, says BCREA Chief Economist Brendon Ogmundson. ‘When we have a negative shock to the economy that causes a rise in unemployment, you tend to see an increase in things like listings,’ he said. ‘People unfortunately lose their jobs and are forced to sell, resulting in that uptick.'”
“In Melbourne, Marshall White director John Bongiorno said because buyers are mindful the price of their property will fall, they are saying they are in no hurry to purchase. ‘It is one of the catchcries you hear in the marketplace – buyers aren’t in a hurry to buy unless they find the right property at the right price,’ Bongiorno said. ‘What we’re seeing more of now is vendors starting to adjust – vendors coming around and saying, ‘I realise that it’s not the price that I probably would have gotten last year,’ but they’re accepting of the adjustment to the market.'”
“Other buyers are showing signs of bargain hunting, such as the four bidders at a property quoted at $1.25 million to $1.35 million buyers’ advocate Jarrod McCabe attended this weekend. It opened at $1.2 million and passed in at the bottom of the quote range.’To go to an auction and only bid below the quote price, you’re highly unlikely to buy property,’ he said.”
“The bonds of Indonesian property companies are slumping, adding to signs of property debt distress that’s been deepening in China, South Korea and Vietnam. Agung Podomoro’s 2024 dollar bond extended declines this week to 6.7 cents, which would be the worst such fall since July 2021. That brings the notes to a record low of 37 cents on the dollar, Bloomberg-compiled data show. Other signs of strains have also been cropping up. On Wednesday, builder PT Kawasan Industri Jababeka was downgraded further into junk territory by Fitch Ratings, which said it believed that a recent debt exchange offer was conducted to avoid a default. The mounting strains come as property firms in more countries grapple with slower sales and higher borrowing costs.”
“Rising interest rates around the world are exposing risks that have accumulated in property markets, juiced by cheap funding during the pandemic. China has been grappling with a property debt crisis as developer defaults worsen to a record. In Vietnam, such companies are struggling to access capital and potential home buyers face tightening credit in the wake of a government crackdown on bond sales.”
“With the way liquidity has been plunging in Vietnam’s property market, it could experience a recession next year, says Le Hoang Chau, chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City Real Estate Association (HoREA). ‘A number of property companies are facing the risk of falling liquidity and might have to make painful decisions to survive,’ he told VnExpress. With bank’s credit quotas full and tighter controls over the bond market, property developers are ‘hungry’ for capital and must borrow from unofficial lenders at high interest rate (up to 40-50% of contract value), which means future projects carry great risks.”
“Unsold inventory of 45 major property developers in the first nine months was valued at VND273.37 trillion, accounting for more than half of their combined asset value. This is a risk as many unsold inventories are at unfinished projects and policies are needed to help untie the legal knot at these locations, he added.”
“From the nine per cent year-on-year growth for more than four decades to less than three per cent now, China braces for an unprecedented slowdown. The 2022 World Bank GDP growth projection for China is 2.8 per cent. The average growth rate data for its Asia-Pacific neighbours is 5.3 per cent. Thus, China is estimated to grow at half the rate than its neighbours. Why? While most economies suffer due to global factors, the Chinese slowdown is largely caused by its own acts of commission.”
“The housing sector accounts for a quarter of the Chinese GDP. The failure of Evergrande Group, China’s second-largest housing firm, to meet offshore debt obligations precipitated the housing crisis. Developers abandoned semi-finished buildings, founders sold their stakes, exited the groups, forcing homebuyers not to pay the mortgage. Housing loan default may lead to a crisis in banking as banks lent $7.5 trillion or a quarter of all bank loans to housing. The housing bubble wiped out most gains of the hard-working Chinese middle class.”
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‘buyers ‘want something turn key and they want it below asking’
That’s the spirit!
‘During the pandemic’s sales frenzy, buyers often had to ‘settle for whatever they could get,’ he noted’
Winnahs!
‘But the market changed quickly this year as interest rates marched higher. ‘It was almost overnight’
Was it like somebody flipped a switch Brandon?
‘7,906 houses were on the market without offers at the end of October’
Oh dear…
‘7,906 houses were on the market without offers at the end of October’
In 2018 we thought 3,000 was a lot.
‘The housing bubble wiped out most gains of the hard-working Chinese middle class’
Is that a lot?
In Vancouver, BC, the Canadians have been selling shacks for top dollar (and then some) to the Chinese. At some point, Wile E Coyote is going to look down…
‘On a percentage basis, it’s the steepest drop since 2009. The biggest drops in equity are in San Jose (24%), Seattle (21%) and San Francisco (20%). California accounted for more than half of the national decline in equity’
Yer gonna be eating crowz fer the rest of yer life Thornberg.
CA is 12% of the US population –
were estimated house values so over-priced in CA, or another explaination.
Bigger drops still needed.
We Will Never Lockdown Again
https://www.bitchute.com/video/KkLaKfKeiFFE/
2 minutes.
The Atlantic — DeSantis’s COVID Gamble Paid Off (11/10/2022):
“You don’t have to be in Florida very long before you hear someone complain theatrically about snowbirds—the refugees from the northern winter who flock to Orlando and Miami. The coronavirus pandemic created new creatures: Call them the maskbirds, flying south to escape the stricter COVID-19 policies of other parts of the country. Net migration to Florida sharply increased from 2020 to 2021, one study found. Search through the newspapers, and you’ll see story after story about people abandoning New York for Florida’s sunshine, lower taxes, and mask-free life.
That influx alone doesn’t account for Ron DeSantis’s nearly 20-point victory in the gubernatorial race, which had many causes. But it does help explain it. The first-term Republican’s defiance of conventional public-health wisdom in the initial year of the pandemic gave him a national platform while also flattering the self-image of his current constituents—or at least a large number of them—as brave freedom lovers.
In the governor’s narrative of the coronavirus, the people of Florida did not cower at home or tentatively venture outside in masks, nor did they labor under vaccine mandates as new variants spread across the country. No, they were free. Free to support their family. Free to attend school. Free to run a business.
To that, a liberal might add: free to get sick or even die from a respiratory disease for which safe, effective vaccines are available.”
That is a lie. They are not “vaccines” they are deadly poison designed and intended to kill you.
“DeSantis’s COVID gamble also played into other politically useful narratives. His message was a macho one of risk-taking and courage, which tapped into the existing Republican advantage among male voters. One of the warm-up clips at the Melbourne rally was from Tucker Carlson’s Fox News show, in which Carlson mocked DeSantis’s Democratic opponent, Charlie Crist, for wearing a mask while exercising in a hotel gym. On the big screen, Carlson said, “We reached out to Charlie Crist’s office and asked, ‘What exactly were you doing with a mask on alone in the gym, you freak?’
Mass Formation Psychosis.
“To that machismo, DeSantis added a dash of social conservatism, even puritanism, telling the crowd, “Heck, if we were just here four years ago and someone had told you we would have states in this country lock kids out of school for a year—you’d have them close churches, but they left the liquor stores and the strip clubs open—you would have said that would not have been possible in the United States of America.”
https://archive.ph/5R7FA
Never forgive. Never forget.
There will be no “amnesty” only trials, convictions, and executions ☠️
We Will Never Lockdown Again
This is definitely worth listening to.
The Hitler/Gobbels reference was interesting
See Operation Paperclip.
This followed: DHS inside information – Simpsons 2010
(1m42s)
House Cat Flu 🙂
How’s that horse-faced globalist stooge working out for ya, Kiwi housing speculators?
ANZ: New Zealand house prices to “fully unwind”
https://www.macrobusiness.com.au/2022/11/anz-new-zealand-house-prices-to-fully-unwind/
ANZ Bank has released research tipping that the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) will have to lift the official cash rate (OCR) another 1.5% to a peak of 5%.
ANZ has based its aggressive OCR forecast on the nation’s ‘wage price spiral’, which has caused “significant upside risk” to the domestic inflation outlook:
will have to lift the official cash rate (OCR) another 1.5% to a peak of 5%
Oh dear.
Boise, ID Housing Prices Crater 27% As Mortgage Defaults Saturate Idaho
https://www.movoto.com/id/83702/market-trends/
As one Boise broker conceded, “We have a reputation as liars. I’d say it’s accurate.”
Lake Oswego/West Linn: These southern suburbs are still home to metro area’s highest median sales price, clocking in at $795,500 in October 2022, though that’s well down from their July median sales price of $913,600
Good thing everybody put 20% down!
Oregon just elected a carpetmunching Governor, which the news is celebrating like it’s the 2nd coming of Christ, so s’all good.
UK FBs are about to learn the difference between “homeowner” and “mortgage payer.”
House repossessions start to climb amid cost of living crisis: Properties taken back by banks rise 15% in three months as mortgage rates shoot up
https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/mortgageshome/article-11413579/House-repossessions-rise-15-three-months-amid-high-mortgage-rates.html?
The number of home repossessions rose 15 per cent between July and September this year compared to the three months before, as mortgage rates spiked and the cost of living crisis put pressure on household budgets.
In total 700 homeowner mortgaged properties were taken into possession in the third quarter of 2022, according to data from UK Finance.
But it was not just owner-occupied properties that saw a rise in repossessions. The number of buy-to-let properties that were taken into possession also rose 11 per cent from July to September, to 390.
Who would be a cop in a Democrat-Bolshevik malgoverned socialist utopia where any honest police officer is hated and reviled, while vibrants have free rein to cavort with impunity?
Sheriff in California county with 65,000 people will STOP all daytime patrols due to ‘catastrophic staffing shortage’
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11415575/Sheriff-California-county-STOP-daytime-patrols-catastrophic-staffing-shortage.html
Also, 7,906 houses were on the market without offers at the end of October, up 140.5 percent year-over-year, according to Las Vegas Realtors.”
Is that a lot?
A reader sent these in:
Lance Lambert
Killeen-Temple, TX is shifting very fast. On a year-over-year basis, Killeen inventory is up 169%.
https://twitter.com/NewsLambert/status/1590909296254291969
Lance Lambert
Provo is shifting very fast. On a year-over-year basis, Provo inventory is up 181%.
https://twitter.com/NewsLambert/status/1590910323158323200
If you ever feel like your job is pointless, just remember that realtors in major cities are going to drive to a $2.3m three bedroom starter home that’s been on the market for 126 days with one price cut of $15,000 with 8% mortgage rates and do a 4 hour open house this weekend.
https://twitter.com/ChrisJBakke/status/1590421003779608576
All of them – 3AC, Luna, FTX, etc – really come back to the same thing. Real ponzis enabled by fake yields, fraudulent tokens, and consciously criminal bookkeeping. All openly promoted, shilled for and legitimized your favorite influencers & *especially* by the crypto VCs 🚓🚨
https://twitter.com/milessuter/status/1590904823666601990
John Burns
We couldn’t find any happy real estate agents in Texas.
https://twitter.com/johnburnsjbrec/status/1590691509715668992
Diane Swonk
The house of cards on the pandemic-induced bubble and the residual of years of subpar, slow growth, tepid inflation and ultra low rates is now collapsing. The spillover effects for the economy, interest rates & the economy will be larger. It will be easy to blame one player.
https://twitter.com/DianeSwonk/status/1590688478446358529
Ian Shepherdson
The fever is breaking in rents
https://twitter.com/IanShepherdson/status/1590714530300317696
A builder just cut prices by another $60k for new construction in Celina, TX. The Dallas housing price correction continues at a significant pace.
https://twitter.com/akm515/status/1590695786350018561
Layoffs coming to AMZN next: employees in certain divisions were told to look for jobs elsewhere in the company as their teams were being suspended or shut: Dow Jones
https://twitter.com/zerohedge/status/1590737008456273920
Rick Palacios Jr.
“Supply of rental homes in our Sunbelt markets appears to be back to where it was prior to the pandemic and rents have softened about 3% to 5% from the peak.”
https://twitter.com/RickPalaciosJr/status/1590877839909613568
Going to be honest, I had no idea who Sam Bankman-Fried was a week ago and I’m already tired of hearing about him. The guy sounds like a complete idiot in every interview I pulled up. I don’t understand how people took him seriously.
https://twitter.com/FinanceLancelot/status/1590684321697779713
Danielle DiMartino Booth
You may have noticed I stayed off Twitter today with markets in a tizzy…let’s just say it was a bit much. Meanwhile, BlockFi is limiting platform activity and pausing client withdrawals & has asked customers not to deposit funds at this time. Whatever it is, it’s not over yet.
https://twitter.com/DiMartinoBooth/status/1590883104373506049
Tom Brady’s last three weeks:
* Lost to the Panthers (the worst team in the league)
* Got divorced
* Had $650 million rugged by FTX
How is your fall going?
https://twitter.com/biancoresearch/status/1590803048137625600
David Rosenberg
Bloomberg: “Mortgage Fund in Canada Halts Payouts Amid Liquidity Crunch.” No wonder the BoC walked back its hawkish bias. The housing bubble burst is going to be epic. And have a look at the Fed’s (in)stability report on U.S. non-bank financials, too.
https://twitter.com/EconguyRosie/status/1590486642233872384
Ali Wolf
I remember talking to a builder in June in Denver and they said they found it hard to believe the market could slow any more than it already had. Zonda data showing weekly contracts sales in Denver.
https://twitter.com/AliWolfEcon/status/1590056754175700992
3-Month Treasury Yield: 4.28%
30-Year Treasury Yield: 4.03%
3-Mo Yield > 30-Yr Yield:
-Inversion in 1989 -> Recession in 1990-91
-Inversion in 2000 -> Recession in 2001
-Inversion in 2006 -> Recession in 2008-09
-Inversion in 2019 -> Recession in 2020
-Inversion in 2022 -> ?
https://twitter.com/charliebilello/status/1590876071809146882
Lance Lambert
The real estate industry is cheering a 6.67% mortgage rate reading. That tells you how fast things shifted this year. 🏡
https://twitter.com/NewsLambert/status/1590786532235177984
Leading indicators of UK housing are deteriorating sharply…
https://twitter.com/Lvieweconomics/status/1590665075421237252
CarDealershipGuy
I can’t stress this enough, if Carvana ends up liquidating used car prices will f*cking collapse.
https://twitter.com/GuyDealership/status/1590750088552280068
To whoever is sending in these links, these are fantastic. Thanks on behalf of all HBBers!
Yep – I follow most of these on Twitter. It’s a great place for Housing Bubble info.
Agree, I look for these comments every day.
The real estate industry is cheering a 6.67% mortgage rate reading. That tells you how fast things shifted this year.
I was watching this on CNBC and on the Net. It was amazing how they were cheering this relatively small drop – no analysis, just cheerleading
I can’t stress this enough, if Carvana ends up liquidating used car prices will f*cking collapse.
I think that it will segment for the biggest losses – the high end, and very old, low end will hurt most.
From twitter:
@GuyDealership: G-Wagons are the biggest hot potato of the car industry right now. Dealers all trying to dump them to eachother 🥴
@DenehyXXL: There is a dealer in Arizona that bought 80 (eighty!) of them at auction last year at $40K+ over
I had to look up the G-wagon. Yikes! It looks like an original — i.e. WWI-era — Jeep. Ugly AF too.
Ugly
Expensive though.
A short wheelbase means poor handling at freeway speed especially in a crosswind.
Ugly AF too.
Fugly.
Diane Swonk
Diane has a distinguished career as an economist, so I’m surprised to see her honesty spilling out on Twitter. She must be close to retirement.
Or in life you reach a point that you just can’t lie any more. I think this country is about to reach that point.
When you have a wife, mortgage, two cars, kids in college, etc., sometimes ‘ya gotta turn around and take one for the team. But yes, I hear you.
And what a liar she was for a good 20 years.
three bedroom starter home
13309 Jimmy Way, Poway, CA 92064
$1,370,900
3 bed 3 bath 2,291sqft
I had no idea who Sam Bankman-Fried was a week ago and I’m already tired of hearing about him.
+1
I actually disagree on this. There needs to be more of a spotlight on this grifter and his connections to all sorts of people in high places.
What we have found is that those in power and the wealthy special interests are the perpetrators of this fraud. They get away with it because of who they are.
We have already found that Larry Fink and Blackrock are deep into this fraud, and Larry Fink is cozy to the White House and the FED. This is a relationship that needs to be heavily explored. Why is a guy so politically entrenched involved in this crypto scam?
16 Billion to ZERO bet he had multiple instruction letters from Bernie Madoff and has multiple off shore accounts
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/bankman-fried-assets-plummet-16-080320755.html
The guy sounds like a complete idiot in every interview I pulled up. I don’t understand how people took him seriously.
https://twitter.com/BomsteinRick/status/1590403093870837760 w/ embedded image worth reading: Holy shit this is the greatest thing I’ve ever seen
https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1577428272056389633: Buying Twitter is an accelerant to creating X, the everything app
Financial Times: Twitter: Musk’s super app ambitions not so super
‘The median price for a home in the four-county Sacramento region stood at $550,000 in October, exactly what it was the year before’
Four counties wiped out the past year and headed for YOY declines.
This is great. The last news I read said that [only] 38% of people surveyed thought housing would decline. Market looks crappy already. Imagine how it will look when the YoY numbers finally hit and convince the rest. It’s kind of ridiculous to bury your head in the sand for 12 months (or 8) until YoY declines hits, but for many that’s when reality hits.
With an indicator like that, it’s clear that appraisal fraud has been normalized to such an extent that it’s no longer a crime.
Midnight Oil – Forgotten Years
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9eap_cKLP4
Kent, WA Housing Prices Crater 26% YOY As Seattle Housing Market Turns Toxic On Soaring Appraisal Fraud
https://www.movoto.com/wa/98042/market-trends/
As one broker conceded, “misconduct is typical in this business.”
A whopping $1.37 trillion in mortgage holder equity vanished in the third quarter, thanks to falling homeprices, according to calculations by Blackknight.
It was only Yellen bux.
California accounted for more than half of the national decline in equity.”
Looks like a Lot less Equity locusts from CA moving to your neighborhood in the future.
Those wanting to flee have likely already fled.
The door has been slammed shut, which ever way one was going.
Oh no they haven’t. I see new Calif plates here DAILY
“Higher mortgage rates have ‘shrunk the buyer pool,’ which has led to increased inventory and, ultimately, lower sales prices, Las Vegas Realtors President Brandon Roberts told the Review-Journal.
It isn’t just higher mortgage rates. It’s also soaring inflation and the disappearance of living-wage jobs in our oligarch-looted, Brandon-mismanaged economy.
While the Fed’s Ponzi markets have soared on so-faux inflation data, the free-fall in the real economy is accelerating. One of these things is not like the other.
C.H. Robinson lays off about 650 employees
https://www.freightwaves.com/news/ch-robinson-to-lay-off-up-to-1200-employees-sources-say
CEO: ‘Got ahead of ourselves’ in head count, didn’t expect freight markets to cool this fast
I’ve noticed another price surge at Kings and Safeway.
Oops. Sam Bankman-Fried’s implosion took down Democrats’ second-biggest donor with it as the party gears up to regulate crypto
BYSTEVE MOLLMAN
November 10, 2022 at 4:01 PM EST
Fewer names have been bigger in cryptocurrencies this year than Sam Bankman-Fried, CEO of crypto exchange FTX. So when it became clear this week that the curly-haired billionaire and his exchange faced a liquidity crunch, he was no longer a billionaire, and his exchange likely wasn’t solvent, it cast a shadow over the entire crypto space and sent digital currencies plummeting.
It cast a shadow in Washington, D.C., too.
The 30-year-old Bankman-Fried has been a major force in Democratic politics, ranking as the party’s second-biggest individual donor in the 2021–2022 election cycle, according to Open Secrets, with donations totaling $39.8 million. That ranks only behind George Soros (about $128 million) but ahead of many other big names, including Michael Bloomberg ($28.3 million). What’s more, he had promised to spend far more on Democrats moving forward, predicting in May that he’d fund “north of $100 million” and had a “soft ceiling” of $1 billion for the 2024 elections.
https://fortune.com/2022/11/10/sam-bankman-fried-ftx-joe-biden-democratic-party-second-biggest-donor/
FTX fraudster Sam Bankman-Fried just bilked thousands of FTX account holders out of $10B, but our corrupt SEC & FBI won’t even pretend to hold him accountable since he donated $40M to the Democrat-Bolsheviks in the run-up to the midterm elections.
“All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.” — George Orwell, ANIMAL FARM
‘Bedazzled by money’: Democratic ties to Sam Bankman-Fried under scrutiny after FTX collapse
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/bedazzled-by-money-democratic-ties-to-sam-bankman-fried-under-scrutiny-after-ftx-collapse-11668120947?mod=mw_latestnews
I am beginning to think his scam was little more than a Dem slush fund
The knife-catchers who rushed in to BTFD in cryptos yesterday are getting impaled…again. It’s going to be comedy gold watching all these scam digital gambling tokens revert to their intrinsic value of zero.
https://www.cnbc.com/cryptocurrency/
I did not see that coming…gosh, I hope there’s no contagion to all counter-parties to this FTX racket.
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/11/11/sam-bankman-frieds-cryptocurrency-exchange-ftx-files-for-bankruptcy.html
So, still counting and counting and counting votes out west ? Is there any question how that’s going to end, I didn’t keep tabs much how this was all going , but it does seem odd , this many days in …….
Democrat Party doesn’t win elections, they only steal elections.
This is Democrat Party.
Either millions of people are voting against their own interest, or some rigging is going on.
Should of been a major red wave based on the worst policies and viable threats to the USA, by the Globalists criminal Innsurrection.
Unreal !
This is what I realized yesterday after listening to Kari Lake and Steve Turley. This is a continuation of the mass formation strategy. Demoralize, confuse, place doubt, spread feelings of helplessness, much like CCP virus hoax. First, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan still have 2020 in place: some work to do there. Other than the NY Dominion video I posted yesterday, I haven’t seen one video of vote tally’s changing on the TV screen.
Dr. Steve Turley
NEW VIDEO: Republicans FLIP Five More Seats for Net Gain of 16!!!
https://twitter.com/DrTurleyTalks/status/1590754703792836608
Dr. Steve Turley
NEW VIDEO: Republicans WIN More SUPERMAJORITIES Than EVER!!!
https://twitter.com/DrTurleyTalks/status/1590806727657918465
I’m not saying they wouldn’t cheat in Arizona, but the votes are in the boxes so we gotta watch them and we are. They knew which ballots to count (mail in) to put Hobbs in the lead, then they stopped. Oh we’ll do it Monday. Lake is right, this is to upset people and make them like all is lost, when she has won and it’s just a matter of time.
The biggest give away: first thing a ‘former Bush crime family official’ says this election was a disaster and it’s Trumps fault! Even though we won and continue to win with each passing day that votes are counted.
I posted a video from the Academy of Ideas on totalitarians and how they soften up the masses mentally with these tactics. Masks, lockdowns, death injections, these are the same people doing this, same playbook. IMO don’t let it get to you and if worst comes, we kill all these MOFOs. We outnumber them vastly and we’re armed to the teeth.
Something else along these lines I’ve been thinking about: this WEF – you’ll eat bugz, etc. It seems put-on. It doesn’t seem real. This outrageous crap they say could be part of the same MFP. Meant to wear you down, weaken you mentally, soften you up for the next shock. It’s just BS. We’ll kill all those sons a b*tches too if push comes to shove.
and make them [feel] like all is lost
I know a few people who are kind of depressed all of a sudden. The delayed count thing was telegraphed as a planned tactic. The tell was warnings before the election that counting would “take time”. No explanation. I still can’t see any reason other than the obvious mind f**kery.
This is by design. Or, may be Maricopa and Clark county have billions of people, so it ‘takes time.’
My bet is that the hitherto undreamed of fraud needed in 2024 will result in a computer glitch that causes Harris to “win” by 81 trillion votes.
So, still counting and counting and counting votes out west ?
Word is that Boebert’s lead continues to grow. Even though the Dems gerrymandered her district and stuffed the ballot box she might still win, and if she does the Dems will go berzerk.
So, still counting and counting and counting votes out west ?
There is no logical or reasonable explanation for why, three days after the election, there is no result for the election. It should be a federal law that elections are decided ON ELECTION DAY.
Sorry, it’s up to the states.
The one element of federalism the Democrats welcome and use to their advantage.
Correction: use to their advantage until they can implement a popular vote.
So, still counting and counting and counting votes out west ?
The lead for the Republican Laxalt in the Nevada Senate race has completely evaporated, as I posted it would. This is called “manufacturing a Democrat win.” Laxalt was up by over 30,000 on Election Day. The latest update just dropped close to 10,000 votes entirely to the Dem. Nobody has explained how these phenomenons can occur. Not in 2020, not now. Vast blocks of votes come in late, ALL for blue.
PS – the lead is now 600 votes for the Republican. With only 90% reporting, it’s curtains. The Senate goes to blue. This is why Pedo Joe was grinning like the Cheshire Cat the day after the election in 2020, and again in 2022. He knew what they were going to do.
You are the carbon they want to reduce.
FOUR HUNDRED private jets arrived in Egypt during COP27 as climate delegates are accused of ‘hypocrisy’
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11416209/FOUR-private-jets-arrived-Egypt-COP27-climate-delegates-accused-hypocrisy.html
Psyop-27
I think they knew that they wouldn’t be able to have a climate change lock down, so instead they are making it harder and harder to drill. Europeans are going to spend their life savings to keep their hovels at 60F.
Some folks are comparing the crypto collapse to the housing induced financial collapse in 2008.
One slight difference is that while everyone needs a place to live, nobody needs to HODL imaginary Ponzi monies.
The Financial Times
Changpeng Zhao
Binance chief Changpeng Zhao warns of ‘cascading’ crypto crisis
Head of world’s biggest digital asset trading venue says industry troubles echo 2008 crash
Changpeng Zhao believes the crypto sector will eventually recover. ‘The market will heal itself, he said
Joshua Oliver and Nikou Asgari in London 53 minutes ago
The $1tn digital asset market faces a crisis akin to the 2008 financial crash, according to Binance chief Changpeng Zhao, who warned more companies might fail in the coming weeks following the troubles at FTX.
Zhao, founder of the world’s biggest digital asset exchange, said the full impact of the meltdown at rival crypto exchange FTX had yet to be felt. Speaking at a conference in Indonesia, he said the global financial crisis was “probably an accurate analogy” to this week’s events.
“With FTX going down, we will see cascading effects,” Zhao said. “Especially for those close to the FTX ecosystem, they will be negatively affected.”
The comments come as crypto traders fear further waves of contagion after a bid by Zhao to buy out FTX earlier this week fell apart, leaving one of the most prominent cryptocurrency exchanges teetering on the brink of collapse. Its failure would also deal a blow to blue-chip investors that had scooped up equity in the group, including venture capital company Sequoia and Japan’s SoftBank.
Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency, has shed 17 per cent over the past five days, touching a two-year low in the midst of tumultuous negotiations between Binance and FTX chief executive Sam Bankman-Fried.
Bankman-Fried has apologised for the liquidity crisis at FTX, but has not provided a detailed account of what caused it.
“This lack of transparency is what every single trader and investor is going to be very wary of going forward,” said Anatoly Crachilov, chief executive of Nickel Digital Asset Management.
…
Yahoo
MoneyWise
‘They will come to a bad ending’: A year since its $69K peak, Bitcoin has plummeted more than 70% — here’s why Warren Buffett has hated cryptocurrency all along
Ethan Rotberg
Thu, November 10, 2022 at 4:00 AM·5 min read
It’s been a tough year for Bitcoin and its backers.
And even back in 2018, the Oracle of Omaha predicted that it and other cryptocurrencies were headed for trouble.
“They will come to a very bad ending,” Warren Buffett told CNBC at the time.
After hitting an all-time peak of around $69,000 per unit on November 10, 2021, the world’s leading digital currency has since erased roughly 76% of its value, sitting at just under $16,000 as of 4:30 pm on Wednesday.
…
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/come-bad-ending-one-since-120000331.html
Tom Brady Took Equity When He Agreed To Endorse FTX… That Decision Is Looking Like A Big Old Zero
November 10, 2022 by Joseph Gibson
Tom Brady is not having a great year. His season with the Bucs has been a flop. The team is currently 4 and 5. That’s 4 wins and 5 losses. In the last few months he separated from then divorced Gisele Bündchen. He’s had to split up what was a really impressive property portfolio, including a mid-construction mansion on one of the most exclusive islands in Florida… And just when he thought it couldn’t get any worse, Tom is very likely taking a cold wet bath on a splashy strategic investment in the cryptocurrency exchange FTX.
As first reported by Coindesk, back in June of 2021, Brady and Gisele announced an endorsement partnership with FTX. On the day they announced the partnership, FTX’s proprietary token “FTT” was trading at around $25. This will be important in a moment.
The partnership wasn’t your standard celebrity endorsement, like when a brand pays an athlete or model a ton of US dollars, either through a physical check or electronic bank wire, to promote their product.
In exchange for becoming FTX’s official brand ambassador and agreeing to appear in the company’s commercials with Gisele, Brady reportedly took a big portion of his payment in the form of equity in FTX.
At the time, Brady said this on the partnership:
“It’s an incredibly exciting time in the crypto-world, and Sam and the revolutionary FTX team continue to open my eyes to the endless possibilities…This particular opportunity showed us the importance of educating people about the power of crypto while simultaneously giving back to our communities and planet.”
The “Sam” mentioned in Brady’s statement is FTX co-founder and public face, Sam Bankman-Fried.
In September 2021 Tom began appearing in commercials for FTX promoting the tag line “Tom Brady is In. Are you?”. (Hopefully you were not “in.”)
On September 8, 2022, the price of FTX’s proprietary coin, FTT, hit $77.69. As it would turn out, that price of $77.69 would prove to be FTT’s absolute peak.
A few months later, in February 2022, Tom appeared in an ad that aired during the Super Bowl, which he comfortably watched from home since the Bucs did not make it to the big game.
On the day of the Super Bowl, a single coin/unit/thing of FTT was trading at $47.
In case you hadn’t heard, the last 24-48 hours have been extremely brutal for company founder/CEO Sam Bankman-Fried, FTX, sister company Alameda Research, and by proxy, Tom Brady’s equity stake as brand ambassador.
Seven days ago FTT was trading at $25.
As I type this article, FTT is trading at…
$2.80
That’s a solid 90% decline. And the worst may not be over.
…
https://www.celebritynetworth.com/articles/celebrity/tom-brady-took-equity-when-he-agreed-to-endorse-ftx-that-decision-is-looking-like-a-big-old-zero-today/
“That’s a solid 90% decline. And the worst may not be over.”
1-$2.80/$77.69 = 96.4% loss, so far
No wonder Gisele dumped his broke a$$.
He is nowhere near broke.
That Decision Is Looking Like A Big Old Zero
Better than negative.
I found 3 ads he did that are up on youtube and are good for a chuckle if you’re bored. There is also one by Larry David that is quite amusing. If you hunger for more then click on their official channel and watch one of SBF’s zoom chats. See how long you can handle listening to that retard. I lasted around 45 seconds for his discussion on why regulation and transparency are important goals. Even Larry Fink (BlackRock) gave him money! Judging by the list of entities that gave him money, it’s starting to look like the smartest players in the room are pretty f’n stupid.
“His season with the Bucs has been a flop. The team is currently 4 and 5. That’s 4 wins and 5 losses.”
He’d look better with receivers that could catch a football.
Russell Wilson is having the same problem in Dumver.
Seems like Aaron Rodgers has lost his enthusiasm.
NFL as a league is moving on from vet qb’s. The permeance of the league trumps all else.
Sound familiar?
Pensions& Investments
Cryptocurrency
November 10, 2022 03:40 PM updated 18 hours ago
Institutions take measure of exposure to FTX crypto exchange
Michael Thrasher
Some of the biggest institutional investors are starting to measure their potential exposure to FTX, one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges that suddenly became insolvent this week.
Those institutions include the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, which was a direct investor in FTX. The Alaska Permanent Fund Corp., the Washington State Investment Board and other institutions were indirect investors via Sequoia Capital and other venture capital firms.
Late Wednesday, Sequoia, a lead investor in FTX, sent a letter to its limited partners saying it was going to mark down the value of its FTX investment to $0. Sequoia owned FTX and FTX.com in its Global Growth Fund III, although FTX is not one of the top 10 holdings in the fund, and its $150 million in cost basis represented less than 3% of the committed capital of the fund, according to the letter.
The $150 million loss on FTX was offset by the fund’s roughly $7.5 billion realized and unrealized gains, Sequoia said in its letter.
…
https://www.pionline.com/cryptocurrency/institutional-investors-measure-damage-ftx-collapse-portfolios
HEDGE FUNDS
September 09, 2022 12:50 PM
FTX Ventures takes 30% stake in Anthony Scaramucci’s SkyBridge Capital
Palash Ghosh
FTX Ventures acquired a 30% interest in alternative investment firm SkyBridge Capital, a SkyBridge spokeswoman said in an email.
The financial terms of the transaction have not been disclosed, according to a SkyBridge news release Friday.
An FTX spokesman confirmed the deal has closed.
The investment by FTX Ventures, a multistage venture capital fund, will provide SkyBridge “additional working capital to fund growth initiatives and new product launches,” the news release said.
In addition, SkyBridge will use a portion of the proceeds to buy $40 million in cryptocurrencies to “hold on its corporate balance sheet as a long-term investment,” the release added.
SkyBridge said in the release that it “remains profitable and debt-free, notwithstanding market conditions.”
The transaction represents the latest collaboration between SkyBridge and FTX, following the multiyear partnership to sponsor global SALT (SkyBridge Alternatives) Conference in North America, Asia and the Middle East, and co-present Crypto Bahamas, the institutional digital assets conference that was launched in April this year.
…
https://www.pionline.com/hedge-funds/ftx-ventures-takes-30-stake-anthony-scaramuccis-skybridge-capital
‘Dr Doom’ economist Nouriel Roubini suggests FTX’s rescue deal shows how crypto is a Ponzi scheme: ‘Who will bail out Binance?’
Zahra Tayeb
Nov 9, 2022, 9:21 AM
– Nouriel Roubini flagged FTX’s rescue deal for Binance as a sign crypto investing is a Ponzi scheme.
– The “Dr Doom” economist noted FTX had itself been bailing out struggling crypto firms.
– The crypto critic wondered who will bail out Binance when that “house of cards collapses”.
…
https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/currencies/crypto-ftx-binance-roubini-doom-bailout-ponzi-scheme-2022-11
Here yesterday day, gone today…
The Financial Times
FTX Trading Ltd
Sam Bankman-Fried’s $32bn FTX crypto empire files for bankruptcy
Collapse comes after the digital assets group failed to meet surge in customer withdrawals
Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder and chief executive of FTX, has resigned
Joshua Oliver, Scott Chipolina and Nikou Asgari in London an hour ago
FTX has filed for bankruptcy protection in the US after it was unable to meet a torrent of withdrawals, marking a stunning collapse for Sam Bankman-Fried’s crypto empire that was valued at $32bn just months ago.
The filing in a federal court in Delaware on Friday includes FTX’s US entity, Bankman-Fried’s proprietary trading group Alameda Research and about 130 affiliated companies.
The collapse of FTX comes after a whirlwind 10 days in which Bankman-Fried desperately sought billions of dollars to save his company after customers rushed to pull their assets out of the business following concerns surrounding its financial health and links between the exchange and Alameda, also founded by Bankman-Fried.
Bankman-Fried also resigned as chief executive and will be replaced by John J Ray III, a restructuring specialist who oversaw the Enron and Nortel Networks bankruptcy cases.
“The immediate relief of Chapter 11 is appropriate to provide the FTX Group the opportunity to assess its situation and develop a process to maximise recoveries for stakeholders,” Ray said, adding that the company had “valuable assets that can only be effectively administered in an organised, joint process”.
Bankman-Fried will “remain to assist in an orderly transition”, FTX said in a statement on Friday.
In just over three years, FTX had secured a $32bn valuation and had wooed a roster of blue-chip investors including Paradigm, SoftBank, Sequoia Capital and Singapore’s Temasek. Venture capital firms Sequoia and Paradigm have in recent days marked their investment down to zero.
…
FT Alphaville FTX Trading Ltd
Like rats fleeing a sinking ship . . .
If those rats left records on a public blockchain
“Videotaping this crime spree is the best idea we ever had!”
Alexandra Scaggs an hour agoq
FTX Group has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the US. That could mean clients are pushed to the back of the line as unsecured lenders — unless they are among the accounts that seem to have circumvented the asset freeze to withdraw money in the past day.
The group’s filing will include around 130 FTX subsidiaries out of the firm’s massive org chart. The Bahamas’ securities regulator announced Thursday it would freeze FTX’s assets, and FTX’s international exchange has had withdrawals frozen since Tuesday.
But there have been plenty of rumours about accounts using workarounds to get their cash out of FTX, before they’re forced to compete with other lenders for whatever is left over.
…
The Financial Times
Sam Bankman-Fried’s empire includes billions of dollars of illiquid investments
Entrepreneur behind collapsed FTX exchange held stakes in crypto mining and AI companies, records show
Sam Bankman-Fried has placed FTX international and his proprietary trading firm Alameda Research into a joint bankruptcy process
Kadhim Shubber and Joshua Oliver in London 26 minutes ago
Sam Bankman-Fried’s business empire includes billions of dollars of illiquid venture capital investments, according to internal records seen by the Financial Times, underscoring the uncertain recovery facing customers of his collapsed FTX exchange.
The 30-year-old entrepreneur, once a star of the crypto industry, on Friday placed FTX international, its independent US arm, and his proprietary trading firm Alameda Research into a joint bankruptcy process in Delaware federal court.
Initial filings listed both assets and liabilities of the group at between $10bn and $50bn. FTX’s new chief executive John Ray, who was brought in to chair Enron during its liquidation, said the companies had “valuable assets” and that the bankruptcy would maximise recoveries.
The sprawling venture capital portfolio will add to the complexity of the insolvency proceedings, which itself includes more than 130 companies controlled by Bankman-Fried. FTX’s collapse is among the most dramatic failures in the crypto industry not just this year, but since the creation of bitcoin more than a decade ago.
FTX and its affiliates have not yet disclosed the exact size of their liabilities and assets, and the shortfall that likely exists. FTX’s recently departed head of institutional sales, Zane Tackett, said on Twitter on Friday that the shortfall ran into billions of dollars. FTX did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Any gap between assets and liabilities will be influenced by the value that can be recovered from almost $5.4bn that FTX and Alameda invested in almost 500 crypto companies and venture capital funds, according to the records seen by the FT.
The largest of those investments is $1.15bn that Alameda ploughed into crypto mining group Genesis Digital Assets between August 2021 and April 2022, the records show.
Publicly traded mining companies have sold off sharply over the past year as the crypto market has declined. The HashRate crypto mining index, which tracks such stocks, is down 75 per cent since August 2021. Genesis did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The records also list more than $1bn invested across about 40 funds run by venture capital firms, including some that were investors in FTX such as Sequoia Capital. Those holdings include a $300mn investment by Alameda in K5 Global, the firm run by Michael Kives. The investment amounts to 30 per cent of K5’s general partnership, and $225mn of the total sits in Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Boring Company, and other unidentified businesses, according to the records.
…
‘FTX’s new chief executive John Ray, who was brought in to chair Enron during its liquidation, said the companies had “valuable assets” and that the bankruptcy would maximise recoveries.’
The situation at hand certainly does bring to mind other spectacular collapses of the Everything Bubble era that nobody could see coming, including those of Enron and Lehman Brothers.
What’s next for crypto as FTX collapse triggers ‘Lehman moment’?
Analysis by Julia Horowitz, CNN Business
Updated 11:50 AM EST, Fri November 11, 2022
Sam Bankman-Fried: ‘I’m sorry. I f****d up.’ The fall of crypto’s golden boy
London CNN Business —
The stunning downfall of the FTX exchange, one of the biggest and most reputable players in the market for digital assets, is sparking alarm among people who own cryptocurrencies as investors run for cover.
There are still many unanswered questions. But two big ones loom: How far will the damage spread? And can the beaten-down crypto industry bounce back?
Industry insiders are debating whether to call the implosion of FTX, which filed for bankruptcy on Friday, a “Lehman moment,” referring to the 2008 collapse of the investment bank that sent shockwaves around the world. Many think it’s an apt comparison.
What’s clear is that the fallout from the FTX crisis injects significant volatility into the crypto ecosystem. The episode has destroyed confidence and emboldened regulators, which are now on high alert.
“This was one of the most trusted entities in the crypto space, so it will take some time to recover,” said Jay Jog, co-founder of the blockchain startup Sei Labs, which is based in California.
From best-in-class to the brink
“Sh*tstorm.” “Insane.” “Chaos.”
Those are terms crypto investors and pundits have used to describe the failure of FTX, which was launched in 2019 by Sam Bankman-Fried, a 30-year-old wunderkind once hailed as a modern-day J.P. Morgan.
The company was valued at $32 billion in its latest funding round, and had recruited high-profile backers including SoftBank, Tiger Global, Singapore’s Temasek, as well as celebrities like Tom Brady, Gisele Bündchen and Naomi Osaka. Its name is on the arena where the Miami Heat play.
This week, investor Sequoia Capital said it had marked the value of its FTX stake down to $0. The exchange — said to be short between $8 billion and $10 billion — was unable to meet customers’ withdrawal demands. Bankman-Fried resigned Friday and FTX filed for bankruptcy protection in the United States after a bailout from rival Binance fell through.
“Everyone’s a little bit in shock,” said Shan Jun Fok, co-founder of Moonvault Partners, a crypto investment firm based in Hong Kong. “A lot of people trusted FTX as the gold standard.”
…
https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/11/investing/ftx-crypto-consequences-lehman
“FTX Group has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the US. That could mean clients are pushed to the back of the line as unsecured lenders”
That’s how Refco clients were hosed by Bank of America and other big boys, which of course no one remembers. Seems to me if you can’t afford the legal talent to make damn sure you’re not “unsecured”, then you can’t afford to put your money in a brokerage or exchange or whatever.
“Its name is on the arena where the Miami Heat play.”
Time honored red flag, which of course again no one remembers because, as always, it’s different this time.
Cryptocurrency
Investing
Banks
Real Estate
Finance ·cryptocurrency
‘A lot of people have compared this to Lehman. I would compare it to Enron’: Larry Summers has some choice words for Sam Bankman-Fried and FTX
BY Steve Mollman
November 11, 2022 at 10:32 AM PST
Former Treasury Secretary and current Harvard Professor Larry Summers
Larry Summers has thoughts on the FTX collapse.
MIKE THEILER—AFP via Getty Images
The FTX downfall is not so much a Lehman moment as an Enron one.
So says former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers about the once-heralded cryptocurrency exchange that today declared bankruptcy and announced the resignation of founder and CEO Sam Bankman-Fried after a sudden and dramatic collapse this week.
“A lot of people have compared this to Lehman. I would compare it to Enron,” the Harvard professor said Friday on Bloomberg Television’s Wall Street Week. “The smartest guys in the room,” he said, name-checking a business-journalism classic that revealed how Enron kept a false set of books before its own spectacular implosion. “Not just financial error but—certainly from the reports—whiffs of fraud. Stadium namings very early in a company’s history. Vast explosion of wealth that nobody quite understands where it comes from.”
Enron, of course, was a Houston-based energy company whose bankruptcy and epic accounting scandal in 2001 also destroyed Arthur Andersen, taking the “Big Five” accounting firms down to today’s “Big Four.” A 2005 documentary entitled Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room charted the disaster that altered the business landscape and led to stricter rules on financial reporting for public companies.
Lehman Brothers, by contrast, was the Wall Street investment bank whose involvement in the subprime mortgage crisis triggered the bankruptcy that kickstarted the epochal 2007-2008 financial crisis. That scandal is widely blamed on excessive risk-taking and unethical management practices.
FTX was valued at $32 billion earlier this year, but questions about its health arose just days ago, setting off a modern-day variation of a bank run: a race by FTX users to withdraw their assets. According to reporting by CoinDesk then the Wall Street Journal, FTX lent billions of dollars to affiliated trading arm Alameda Research, money that was used to fund risky bets. Venture capital giant Sequoia said this week it will write down its $214 million investment in FTX to zero.
It’s still not clear, though, exactly what went wrong: Was it an Enron or a Lehman-style collapse? Summers, for one, believes the lessons to be drawn from FTX’s downfall center around accounting.
“The regulatory community ought to draw two lessons,” said Summers of the FTX fiasco. One, more forensic accountants are needed to help detect issues at both the corporate and national level.
The second lesson is less obvious: For “everything that touches finance,” he said, people in positions of responsibility should be forced each year to take a week or two off, disconnected from work. Why? If they don’t, he argued, executives engaged in financial wrongdoing can constantly monitor their positions to keep problems secret.
Summers said the FTX downfall is likely more about classic financial fraud and “less about the complexities of the nuances of the rules of crypto regulation.”
…
https://fortune.com/2022/11/11/larry-summers-ftx-crypto-collapse-more-like-enron-than-lehman/
Investing
Cryptocurrency
Why Bitcoin and Ethereum Prices Are Reeling Amid FTX Bankruptcy
Alex Gailey, Marcos Cabello
November 11, 2022 | 5 Min Read
The crypto market is having a no good, very bad week.
This week’s crash brings a sudden reversal after weeks of relative stability for bitcoin and ethereum prices. Both tokens are now down more than 20% over the last week. The crash was first driven by fresh investor skepticism and souring sentiment on the heels of Binance’s announcement that it would buy out rival FTX on Wednesday, after concerns over FTX’s liquidity were raised. But Binance pulled out of the deal, which ultimately led FTX to where it is now: filing for bankruptcy.
In light of all the news, bitcoin’s price plummeted, falling below $16,000 for the first time in two years late Wednesday afternoon. Ethereum saw a similar downturn, falling below $1,200 on Wednesday for the first time since crypto’s crash over the summer. The two tokens have significantly recovered, as of Friday morning, with bitcoin nearing $17,000 again and ether back above $1,200.
While bitcoin and ethereum prices have remained low compared to last year, both tokens had been relatively steady, even in the face of Fed rate increases, tumbling foreign currencies, the continued war in Ukraine and stock market crashes.
“For a long time, bitcoin has aligned itself with broader risk appetite in the markets but it goes without saying that Tuesday was not one of those days,” said Craig Erlam, senior market analyst at Oanda. “Cryptocurrencies have been pummeled at the start of the week with bitcoin down almost 20% in two days at one stage amid concerns over FTX and the implications for the FTT token.”
So, why is crypto tanking after nearly a month of stability? Let’s dig in.
Why Is Crypto Crashing?
The crash is likely due to the unfolding drama happening at FTX, a popular crypto exchange. As a result of a significant liquidity crisis at FTX, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao announced that Binance would acquire FTX. Binance is the world’s largest centralized crypto exchange, and FTX was one of its biggest competitors. But shortly after introducing the deal, Binance announced late Wednesday afternoon that it would scrap its plans and would not acquire FTX, sending further shockwaves through the market.
“As a result of corporate due diligence, as well as the latest news reports regarding mishandled customer funds and alleged US agency investigations, we have decided that we will not pursue the potential acquisition of FTX.com,” Binance said on Twitter.
FTX is now filing for bankruptcy, and that includes FTX US, the U.S.-based exchange.
Many investors have become disheartened following the news of FTX’s collapse. The popular exchange’s founder, Sam Bankman-Fried, previously hailed as a “white knight” of the crypto industry, has now lost more than 94% of his wealth in a single day, according to Bloomberg.
“Today is a bad day in crypto,” says Edward Moya, a senior market analyst at Oanda. “Binance had to step in to save Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX crypto exchange. [He] has been the white knight during this crypto winter and a liquidity crunch from him has triggered a wave of uneasiness across the cryptoverse.”
…
https://time.com/nextadvisor/investing/cryptocurrency/bitcoin-ethereum-prices-binance-ftx-takeover/
I was hoping for more than a 15% drop in buttcoin. There is still a long way down.
It’s down 75% in the past year. You just don’t like slow motion.
Alphonso is still good, though he may not be happy.
It seems to be hovering around 17,000 now. One wonders how anyone could still have faith in crypto, but then again look at how many voted for Fetterman.
Too many true believers who are propping up the price.
But SBF just said a day ago that the FTX-US platform was totally fine and had PLENTY of money to fund ALL withdrawals! He has been lying non-stop for years. This will become another textbook example of red flags that people should have noticed. Mr. Bankrun-Fraud has some explaining to do.
red flags that people should have noticed
How about all the crypto being imaginary?
I wonder if someday buttcoin will be “collectable”, kind of like how Confederate dollars are.
I wonder if someday buttcoin will be “collectable”, kind of like how Confederate dollars are.
How could it be? It’s not even tangible.
How could it be?
You can always hang a picture frame with nothing in it.
Well, yeah, aside from that. I like your idea about an empty picture frame though. I think I will hang one with the label “my first bitcoin”. I will put it next to my 10 trillion dollar Zimbabwe note.
Did I mention I’m a trillionaire??
The Wall Street Journal
Cryptocurrency
Silicon Valley Poured Money Into FTX, With Few Strings Attached
Investors moved swiftly to commit money to crypto exchange, putting aside some customary oversight safeguards
What’s Next For Crypto?
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At WSJ Tech Live, Sam Bankman-Fried of FTX and Ravi Mhatre of Lightspeed Venture Partners discuss how the crypto industry’s planning to stage a comeback.
By Eliot Brown, Peter Rudegeair and Berber Jin
Updated Nov. 10, 2022 5:17 pm ET
A marquee roster of investors from Silicon Valley and Wall Street swarmed FTX. They invested nearly $2 billion with few strings attached and no oversight on the cryptocurrency exchange’s board, promoting it as a safe bet.
Now the backers are nursing a high-profile black eye as the three-year-old company—valued at $32 billion at its peak—teeters. Venture-capital firm Sequoia Capital said on Wednesday it is writing a $150 million investment one of its funds had in FTX down to zero because of solvency risk.
FTX Chief Executive Sam Bankman-Fried told several investors on a call Wednesday that he needed emergency funding to cover a shortfall of up to $8 billion, The Wall Street Journal reported. Mr. Bankman-Fried said he hoped FTX could raise as much as $3 billion to $4 billion in equity.
That would be a tall order for a financial company of FTX’s size in normal conditions. Its previous largest funding round was $1 billion in mid-2021, when crypto was booming and investors clamored to get into the company many viewed as among the world’s hottest startups.
Besides Sequoia, dozens of others backed FTX’s rise, including Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, SoftBank Group Corp., a venture-capital arm of Samsung Electronics Co., Dan Loeb‘s Third Point LLC, Tiger Global and football star Tom Brady.
Sequoia said in a letter to fund investors it ran a “rigorous diligence process” on FTX and its loss was small in the context of a fund with billions of dollars of profits. “We are in the business of taking risk,” the firm said.
An FTX spokesman declined to comment.
The rapid unraveling of FTX shows the pitfalls of investing in a frenzy. Attracted to a founder they saw as visionary, investors moved swiftly to commit, putting aside some customary oversight safeguards, according to people familiar with the company.
Mr. Bankman-Fried founded FTX in 2019. Two years earlier, he started a crypto trading firm called Alameda Research, and his dissatisfaction with the quality of existing crypto exchanges inspired him to try to build a better one.
…
FTX Customers Face a Long Road to Try to Get Their Money Back
The exchange paused customer withdrawals at its international unit this week; ‘If you can’t trust exchanges, the whole premise of cryptocurrency doesn’t work’
FTX was hit by a run of withdrawal requests this week.
By Vicky Ge Huang
Updated Nov. 11, 2022 11:54 am ET
Stephen Gibbs got spooked this week when he heard about problems brewing at FTX and he decided it was time to take his money out of the crypto exchange.
Mr. Gibbs, a musician in Thailand, said he tried to withdraw his money Tuesday. But FTX that day halted both crypto and fiat withdrawals from its international unit. As of Thursday, Mr. Gibbs said, his transaction was still listed as “requested.” On Friday, FTX filed for bankruptcy protection.
“If you couldn’t trust an exchange like FTX, you can’t trust any exchange,” Mr. Gibbs said before the bankruptcy filing. “And then if you can’t trust exchanges, the whole premise of cryptocurrency doesn’t work.”
Cryptocurrency exchange FTX was one of the biggest players in the industry, often considered a survivor in a broad market crash that has taken down a number of crypto firms this year. But its rapid collapse this week has left customers wondering if they will ever see their money again.
It isn’t clear how long it might take customers to get their money back, or whether they will get anything at all.
FTX was hit by a run of withdrawal requests this week and the company is scrambling to raise money to cover a shortfall of up to $8 billion, The Wall Street Journal previously reported. The exchange lent billions of dollars to fund risky bets at its affiliated trading firm, Alameda Research, using money that customers had deposited at FTX.
In 2022, big crypto losses are a familiar tale for many people. Lenders like Celsius Network and Voyager Digital filed for bankruptcy this year and many of their customers are losing hope that they will get their money back. Even one so-called algorithmic stablecoin, meant to maintain a set value, crashed this year, leaving traders with little recourse.
A spokesman for Voyager said U.S. dollar withdrawals are active but that crypto withdrawals are still on hold until the restructuring process is complete. A spokeswoman for Celsius didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Bankruptcies in the crypto world are still virtually uncharted territory. The cryptocurrency that customers put on these platforms might not belong to them in the eyes of a bankruptcy court, according to regulators and legal experts. Instead, they could go into the bankruptcy estate that creditors divvy up.
Even if customers eventually get access to their crypto, they could suffer big losses if the market turned down while the bankruptcy played out.
Crypto expanded steadily into the mainstream in recent years, and crypto lenders and brokers pitched themselves as avenues for regular people to make money. Some newbies embraced crypto trading, using platforms like FTX to try to time the market. Others thought they were taking a safer route by using FTX and other crypto firms to park their money as if it were a bank deposit—but earning a much greater yield than any regulated bank would pay. Many in both groups are now in desperate situations.
The website for FTX’s American arm said as of Thursday evening that “trading may be halted on FTX US in a few days.”
A spokesman for FTX declined to comment. In a Thursday tweet, FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried said he is sorry and that his No. 1 priority is to do right by users.
“Every penny of that—and of the existing collateral—will go straight to users, unless or until we’ve done right by them,” Mr. Bankman-Fried said. On Friday, he resigned as CEO of FTX.
Crypto attracted hordes of new traders during the pandemic, many of whom had never given much thought to bitcoin until they were stuck at home. The price of bitcoin and other digital currencies soared in 2020 and 2021 along with the stock market, leaving some new investors with the impression that crypto could only go up.
But crypto in many ways is little more than a casino. Unlike the regulated, traditional financial system, it lacks the government rules and legal protections built into banks and brokerages. Notably, their deposits aren’t guaranteed by the federal government.
…
The exchange lent billions of dollars to fund risky bets at its affiliated trading firm, Alameda Research, using money that customers had deposited at FTX.
I guess in an unregulated crypto industry, using customer funds to do whatever the heck you want to do is legal? “Thanks for the hookers and blow, suckas!” Although by the looks of SBF, it was effeminate young men wearing purple onesies or something.
wsj.com
All Podcasts
Tech News Briefing
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 11, 2022
11/11/2022 3:00:00 AM
The Downfall of FTX: Could It Signal a Long Crypto Winter?
Crypto exchange FTX and its founder Sam Bankman-Fried were some of the crypto industry’s brightest stars. But that changed this week when FTX faced a liquidity crisis and froze customer withdrawals. Now regulators and investors are raising questions about financial practices at FTX and a sister firm, Alameda Research. WSJ crypto reporter Vicky Ge Huang joins host Zoe Thomas to explain what happened and what it could mean for the wider market.
…
Zoe Thomas: All right, coming up, one of the crypto industry’s biggest boosters is at the center of the latest crypto crash. What happened and how bad will the fallout be? We’ll discuss. That’s after the break. It has been an incredibly bumpy ride for crypto firms this year. As the prices of crypto have fallen, some big names in the industry have collapsed. For a while, one bastion of stability for the industry was Sam Bankman-Fried, founder of the cryptocurrency exchange FTX. He kept a positive outlook for the sector and even bought up large stakes in struggling businesses like crypto lender BlockFi and Voyager Digital. Just a few weeks ago, Bankman-Fried talked about possible future funding deals and acquisitions that FTX might make at the WSJ’s Tech Live conference.
Sam Bankman-Fried: I’m optimistic that the funding is there and to the extent that it’s of strategic importance for us. I think that in this market, there are a lot of opportunities that we’re seeing, the types of opportunities that we did not see last year, to make really efficient acquisitions that can help grow out what we can do as a business.
Zoe Thomas: That all changed this week. Facing a liquidity crisis, FTX froze customers’ withdrawals and agreed to be purchased by rival crypto exchange Binance. But just a day later, Binance pulled out, citing concerns that came up during its due diligence of FTX. So what did Binance find? What does it mean for FTX? And how will this whole saga affect the wider crypto space? Joining us to discuss all of that is WSJ crypto reporter Vicky Huang. Hi, Vicky. Thanks for joining us.
Vicky Huang: Thank you for having me, Zoe.
Zoe Thomas: Can you start by reminding us what FTX is and how it became so big in the crypto space?
Vicky Huang: So FTX is one of the largest crypto exchanges in the industry. It was actually founded just three years ago, and it just grew really rapidly because of its very, up until this week, charismatic founder Sam Bankman-Fried. So the exchange focused a lot on derivatives. One of their taglines is that FTX is an exchange built for traders by traders. It also benefited from the fact that it’s based offshore, first in Hong Kong and then in the Bahamas. So it was able to grow in an environment where there’s less regulatory restrictions.
Zoe Thomas: As you say, Sam Bankman-Fried, or SBF as he’s sometimes called by crypto fans, he really built this company, this crypto exchange, into something that was very popular and very valuable. So take us back, how did it get into the situation that it is now?
Vicky Huang: So in January, FTX’s last funding run, the crypto exchange was valued at $32 billion and the participating investors were basically a who’s who of VCs and hedge funds and prominent private equity and even pension investors. It really looked untouchable because of the marketing that the exchange has done, as well as the reputation of Sam Bankman-Fried as one of the smartest crypto traders that is also lobbying in Washington, DC and branding himself as an effective altruist and is a vegan because of his concern for animal welfare. But what’s underneath all this glamour and success is his other firm, Alameda Research, a trading firm he founded in 2017. Alameda Research is supposed to be a market maker that provides liquidity to crypto exchanges. But because both Alameda Research and FTX are majority owned by Sam Bankman-Fried, there has been a lot of skepticism and doubt about the relationship between the two firms. People were worried that whether Alameda Research was getting preferential treatment, FTX, or whether the funds between the two companies are commingled or separate. Then last week, we had this Coindust report that showed us the balance sheet of Alameda Research as of June 30th was made up mostly of a token called FTT token, which is issued by FTX. That report just showed the close relationship between the two companies, and calling to doubt the financial strengths of Alameda Research, because why is such a supposedly powerful trading firm would have so much of this FTT token, which is itself a highly illiquid token on its balance sheet.
Zoe Thomas: So how did investors react when that report came out?
Vicky Huang: When the report first came out, investor reactions were pretty muted. There weren’t a ton of selling of FTT going on, but that all changed on Sunday, when the CEO of Binance, Changpeng Zhao, short for CZ, tweeted that he was going to sell $580 million worth of FTT tokens over the coming months. So CZ’s tweet set off a chain reaction of events, and before you know it, the price of FTT started plunging. Rumors about the potential insolvency of FTX started circulating, and traders started withdrawing their deposits from FTX en masse. Sam Bankman-Fried has came out and said that about $5 billion worth of withdrawal took place just over the past few days.
Zoe Thomas: Okay. So a massive liquidity crisis. We’re also learning more about the relationship between Alameda Research and FTX. What more have we learned in the past couple of days?
Vicky Huang: Some really shocking facts about close relationship between Alameda and FTX, even though Sam Bankman-Fried or Alameda Research or FTX, they haven’t come out and said anything or acknowledged any of these. But sources have been telling us that FTX loaned Alameda Research billions of dollars when some of Alameda Research’s investments went bad during the months of crypto market carnage that we’ve had since May. So that really puts this whole thing into question because, as an exchange, you’re supposed to segregate customers’ deposits from your own money. But here it seems like that Sam could potentially have sent users’ deposits to Alameda Research.
Zoe Thomas: We’ve heard from sources that the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission have investigations now into FTX. Have we heard from Sam Bankman-Fried, FTX, or Alameda about this whole situation?
Vicky Huang: Yes. He has expressed his remorse for this whole situation. He has apologized to customers, investors, but he hasn’t yet really offered any details about what went wrong or whether he sent money to Alameda Research.
Zoe Thomas: Who’s going to feel the fallout from FTX’s current crisis?
Vicky Huang: Unfortunately, first of all, it’s always going to be the retail investors who trusted the exchange, who trusted Sam with their deposits. So currently withdrawals are paused on FTX, the international exchange. For a lot of international crypto traders that I’ve talked to, they are feeling pretty frustrated and disappointed. They don’t expect to see their money ever again. Then another group of investors that stand to be burned as a result of this collapse of FTX are institutional investors who invested in the various rounds of FTX, and a lot of them are quite well known Silicon Valley or Wall Street players. For example, Sequoia Capital has come out and said that they would mark down their investment in FTX to zero. So that’s a complete wipe out of their investment. A lot of people are thinking that this so-called crypto winter where prices remain depressed and there’s little to no trading volume is going to perhaps last a lot longer than they had expected. For the industry, overall, it’s a huge setback because we’re looking at increased regulatory scrutiny, and a lot of projects that are in progress are likely to be delayed. So it’s just a lot of negative consequences for the players in the space.
Zoe Thomas: Just so much to break down here and so much to keep watching. Vicky Huang, WSJ crypto reporter, thank you so much for joining us.
Vicky Huang: Thank you so much for having me.
…
Coindust report…
Fairy dust?
…that showed us the balance sheet of Alameda Research as of June 30th was made up mostly of a token called FTT token, which is issued by FTX
Their assets were their own “I owe you nothings”?!
At least he was an altruistic Vegan.
I’ll bet you he’s not a Vegan.
I’ll bet you he’s not a Vegan.
BMI tell?
Actually, a lot of vegans and vegetarians blow up because they start gorging on carbs after taking meat and dairy out of their diets.
I have something to say to any cryptocurrency investors who lost a bundle of money in 2022, and still more this week:
I told you so, and have been telling anyone who would listen to me since I first heard of Bitcoin.
Just looked at $GOLD for the first time in a while. The last few days makes me wonder if the crypto implosion caused some people to suddenly wake from their stupor of the past few years and realize maybe a non-zero intrinsic value isn’t so dumb after all.
The MSM touts & shills for the Wall Street-Federal Reserve Looting Syndicate are trying to lure the last of the retail investor muppets into the rigged casino for an FTX-style fleecing. No thanks!
U.S. stocks could rally another 25% now that Fed no longer has ‘back against the wall’ in inflation fight
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/u-s-stocks-could-rally-another-25-now-that-fed-no-longer-has-back-against-the-wall-in-inflation-fight-11668176911?mod=mw_latestnews
Is the Plunge Protection Team back to work pumping up stock prices, to take everyone’s attention away from Cryptogeddon?
Looks like the Brandon regime pulled a bait-and-switch on the special snowflake student loan deadbeats. Now that the midterms are over and the Soy & blue haired future cat ladies have cast their D votes, there’s no need for Brandon to hold up his end of the deal.
https://www.marketwatch.com/articles/student-loan-forgiveness-applications-stopped-51668182226?mod=mw_latestnews
Yep, I always thought that the student loan bribe would crumble.
Globalists have goals to achieve by 2030, so whatever extortion, bribery, blackmail, threat of job loss and fake news with censorship to achieve the end game objectives by these criminals.
I always thought that the student loan bribe would crumble.
It was dangled before voters in 2020 and many bought into it, hook, line and sinker. It’s like they knew that courts would strike it down, but also knew that suckers would once again take the bait. They will be butt hurt when they get nothing next year, but will take the bait again in 2024.
Hey Sam the Sham: maybe you can claw back some of those big bucks you lavished on the Democrat-Bolshevik Quislings.
https://freebeacon.com/democrats/hero-to-zero-dems-newest-megadonor-faceplants-on-election-day/
‘You Heard the President’: National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan Confirms Administration Considering Musk Investigation”
Wut ?
The Biden regime & its globalist puppetmasters will make an example out of anyone who allows even an approximation of free speech on social media platforms. The Narrative crumbles if challenged with truth – our globalist overlords can’t allow that.
anyone who allows even an approximation of free speech on social media platforms
Also The Narrative.
Musk has national security clearance via SpaceX and is owned by the CCP via Tesla’s Shanghai factory. And, Tesla is a RICO.
Twitter thread worth reading for a quick primer.
https://twitter.com/lopezlinette/status/1590111416014409728: How do I know so much about how @elonmusk does things? I spent 3 years investigating Tesla at @BusinessInsider
from 2018-2021. Here are some of sloppy, dangerous, callous, things I learned:
The lack of progress with Starship and the Super heavy booster are disappointing. Not surprising as Falcon Heavy was a few years late, IIRC.
That said, I don’t expect SpaceX or Musk to say something like: During the last static fire test the Super Heavy booster almost shook itself to pieces! Back to the drawing board!
Notice a pattern? It’s called embezzlement.
WSJ in 2018:
Elon Musk’s New Boring Co. Faced Questions Over SpaceX Financial Ties
SpaceX investors including Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund questioned use of resources to support the tunnel-digging venture
In his SolarCity deposition, Musk described Tesla, SolarCity, and SpaceX as a ‘pyramid’ atop which he sat. He had good reason to fear a deposition in the Twitter trial.
FWIW, the Falcon9 is the cheapest and most reliable rocket. And the Crew Dragon remains our only way put people in orbit and in the ISS. It sure would be awkward to be having to hitch rides with the Russians now, wouldn’t it.
My beef with SpaceX is that they exaggerate development schedules. Starship was supposed to be having manned flights by now,
exaggerate development schedules
Sounds familiar. How’s FSD going? Solar shingles? Cybertruck? Roadster? Semi? Musk is a con man.
Musk is a con man.
I totally agree. I’ve been saying it for years.
Meanwhile, how is the hostile takeover of Twitter working out?
The Financial Times
Twitter Inc
Elon Musk warns Twitter bankruptcy is possible as executives exit
One employee describes ‘chaos’ at social media platform as new owner races to find revenue streams
The Twitter logo on the screen of a laptop computer
Twitter’s new owner, Elon Musk, banned remote work for employees as he continued to make his mark on the company’s workforce
Hannah Murphy in San Francisco yesterday
Twitter on Thursday suffered an exodus of remaining top executives while its new billionaire owner, Elon Musk, warned that bankruptcy was a possibility as he wrestles to bring the platform’s finances under control.
In one of the most bruising days for Twitter since Musk closed his $44bn buyout of the social media company two weeks ago, its head of trust and safety, Yoel Roth, resigned, according to two people familiar with the situation. Roth later appeared to confirm his departure, changing his Twitter bio to “Former Head of Trust & Safety”.
Roth had emerged as one of Musk’s trusted leaders after the Tesla chief laid off more than half of Twitter’s 7,500-strong workforce last week, and had been instrumental in attempts to reassure wary advertisers that toxic content was not overwhelming the platform.
Twitter’s chief information security officer, Lea Kissner, and chief privacy officer Damien Kieran both announced that they had left on Thursday, while Twitter’s chief compliance officer also exited, according to one person familiar with the matter. While some media reports said Robin Wheeler, who had taken the helm of Twitter’s ads sales team, also left the company, she later tweeted: “I’m still here.”
Separately, in an all-hands meeting with some engineering staff on Thursday, Musk warned that the company might have net negative cash flow of several billion dollars, adding that bankruptcy was not out of the question, according to a person familiar with the matter. The comments were first reported by The Information.
“Honestly, it feels like chaos,” said one staffer, who added of the all-hands: “It was just rambling incoherency.”
The stream of exits caps a tumultuous fortnight for Twitter, as concerns grow about its data security and compliance with privacy rules, particularly given the speed with which the platform has rolled out some features since Musk took over.
The US Federal Trade Commission, a top consumer protection regulator, said on Thursday that it was “tracking recent developments at Twitter with deep concern”. Twitter signed a strict consent decree in 2011 pledging to better protect user data, which the regulator continues to oversee.
“No CEO or company is above the law, and companies must follow our consent decrees,” the FTC added. “Our revised consent order gives us new tools to ensure compliance, and we are prepared to use them.”
…
WeWork…at the office.
The Financial Times
Twitter Inc
Elon Musk bans remote work at Twitter
Owner demands employees spend at least 40 hours per week in office in first email to staff since $44bn acquisition
Twitter employees enter the offices in New York City
Twitter employees enter the offices in New York on Wednesday. The ban on remote work has been received with frustration by some staff who moved farther away from the office during the coronavirus pandemic, said two former employees
Ian Johnston and Cristina Criddle in London and Hannah Murphy in San Francisco yesterday
Elon Musk has banned remote work at Twitter in his first email to staff since buying the company, warning that the social media platform needs “intense work” in the office to turn round its fortunes.
“The road ahead is arduous and will require intense work to succeed,” he wrote in a company-wide email sent to employees on Thursday morning and seen by the Financial Times.
“We are . . . changing Twitter policy such that remote work is no longer allowed, unless you have a specific exception.”
Employees must be in the office for a minimum of 40 hours per week, except for those “physically unable to travel” or with “a critical personal obligation”, according to the email.
Musk added that he would review and approve any exemptions to the policy himself, instructing managers to compile lists of any staff seeking to continue remote working.
The new policy at Twitter matches Musk’s demands at another company he runs, Tesla, where in June he insisted staff should turn up for work at least 40 hours a week in the office or find new employment.
It comes a week after Musk cut around half of the company’s 7,500-strong workforce. Several senior leaders have now also left, raising fears over data security and compliance with privacy rules, particularly given the speed with which the platform has rolled out some new features since Musk took over.
…
“The ban on remote work has been received with frustration by some staff who moved farther away from the office during the coronavirus pandemic, said two former employees”
Ouch!
Nothing is certain except death and taxes.
Our office had mandatory return to office in May. Policy is minimum 3 days a week (employee’s and supervisor’s choice) but it’s not like anyone is checking or super strict.
During the pandemic we did have people spread out all over the country but most returned. The ones that did not we’ve been booting out.
I think part of our issue with remote work is that if they move out of state it causes legal and tax issues.
The “Wise Latina” falls into line with the rest of the Constitution-hating, co-opted, black-robed globalist stooges on the SCOTUS.
https://www.reuters.com/legal/us-supreme-courts-sotomayor-rejects-challenge-ny-covid-vaccine-mandate-2022-11-10/
Watch: Ann Coulter Shouted Down, Forced to Abandon Cornell Address
SIMON KENT
11 Nov 2022
Videos taken on the night showed how Coulter, an invited guest at her alma mater, was treated as she sought to offer her opinions. She later left due to the repeated, aggressive interruptions.
The Cornell Review further observed protesters “seemed to be employing a chain tactic, beginning just as soon as the last heckler was removed, so as to continuously speak over Coulter.”
Organized outbursts shown in videos include students blaring circus music and whistles on a portable sound amplifier brought into the building for the specific purpose of drowning out the guest.
Two students chanting “no KKK no fascist USA” were seen on another video as they are escorted out by security.
And at the beginning of Coulter’s talk, the dean of students warned the audience that disruptors would be removed and referred to the Office of Student Conduct, the Review reported.
“Eight college-age individuals were removed from the auditorium following Cornell protocols. All Cornell students among the disrupters will be referred for conduct violations,” Joel Malina, vice president for University Relations at Cornell, told the Campus Reform outlet.
“Cornell apologizes to Ms. Coulter and all members of the audience who hoped to hear her remarks,” he added. “The inappropriate behavior displayed by disrupters does not reflect the university’s values.”
Flyers circulated on campus calling for Cornell to deplatform Coulter previewed her arrival, and the Cornell Daily Sun printed an opinion piece titled “Ann Coulter is not Welcome Here,” the Review detailed as background to her silencing.
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/11/11/watch-ann-coulter-shouted-down-forced-to-abandon-cornell-address/
Is Cryptogeddon good news for Treasury bond owners?
Markets
CNBC TV
Watchlist
Bonds
Treasury yields tumble after October CPI comes in weaker than expected
Published Thu, Nov 10 2022 4:18 AM EST
Updated Thu, Nov 10 2022 4:28 PM EST
Sarah Min
Sophie Kiderlin
U.S. Treasury yields tumbled across the board on Thursday after the October consumer price index report, a key inflation measure, came in weaker than expected, signaling that price increases have possibly peaked.
The benchmark 10-year Treasury
yield last plunged more than 32 basis points to 3.816%, falling below the psychological 4% level. The yield on the 2-year Treasury note fell 30 basis points to 4.328%.
The latest CPI report gave investors hope that inflation is now past its peak, lending confidence that the Federal Reserve’s interest rate hikes are slowly working to tame high price increases. Stock futures rallied on the news.
“This confirms the Fed’s own view they need more measured rate hikes now but this doesn’t stop them,” said Diane Swonk, chief economist at KPMG. ” It just affirms their plan.”
Swonk added that, from the Fed’s perspective, the dip in inflation is welcome news but still not enough to stop further tightening. In November, the Fed raised rates by a another 75 basis points, its fourth consecutive three-quarter point increase, putting rates at their highest level since 2008.
“What I’m more concerned about is how rapidly you can compress the lags on this,” she said. “We just don’t know what’s going on in crypto and where are the land mines that they could trigger in terms of the larger credit market tightening.”
…
Yields and prices have an inverted relationship. One basis point equals 0.01%.
Treasurys YIELD CHANGE
U.S. 1 Month Treasury 3.561 0.052
U.S. 3 Month Treasury 4.18 -0.023
U.S. 6 Month Treasury 4.555 -0.066
U.S. 1 Year Treasury 4.606 -0.137
U.S. 2 Year Treasury 4.33 -0.298
U.S. 10 Year Treasury 3.811 -0.331
…
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/11/10/treasury-yields-dip-ahead-of-consumer-inflation-report.html
This dude with the bike looks like he forgot he wasn’t wearing a mask while surrounded by 100 of his Antifa buddies.
But he found out. 🙂
NY Actions
@NY_ACTIONS
·
Just another day in New York City!
Apparently the guy’s bike knocked into the black guy, black guy told him to apologize, he didn’t, fight started.
#mta #nyc #lawlessness #Brooklyn #NewYorkCity #NeverForget #breaking #nypd #ericadams #crime #subway #lawlessness
@NYCMayor @MTA
https://twitter.com/NY_ACTIONS/status/1568958761548615680?s=20&t=7UDd8_H9UAw_3ESc-TB2Cg
I wonder how many fights and assaults will break out this year along the Macy’s parade route?
segregation now, segregation forever.
Transgenders don’t identify with normal females.
At least the ones shown on T.V. ,are cartoonish /whore , big haired, show girl overly sexualized insult.
Do normal women dress like that and break out into song and dance , than read stories to children?
Add to this adding the fake vaccines to the school required vaccine schedule , and schools become danger zones.
Is Globalists scam trying to distract from the main thrust of their take over, or is this a attempt to piss off enough people to cause a civil war?
How can polls say that 76% don’t agree with direction of Country , yet this election makes it look like the radical agenda is embraced by 50% of voters.
That’s why Biden said that he doesn’t have to change anything.
So, in other words , these midterms had to reflect the real rejection of Biden and the radical agenda by a landslide in reality that people don’t approve, rather than this neck and neck type look of it.
So who knows who will take the Senate, but , this midterm election I do not believe reflects the real rejection of Biden and the Democrats party that exists.
If the USA has this amount of voters that are in the Biden/ Democrat camp, than we are done, and these dumb asses aren’t going realize until they are living in the dark world of tyranny and deprivation these psycho tyrants have planned.
Former President Donald Trump criticized Fox News parent News Corp after several negative articles were published after the Tuesday midterms.
A News Corp-owned publication, the Wall Street Journal, excoriated Trump and declared him the “Republican Party’s biggest loser.” It came after Republicans gained fewer-than-expected seats in the House and Senate after promises of a “red wave.” Meanwhile, Paul Ryan, the former House speaker and vice presidential candidate who sits on the News Corp board, attacked Trump.
Another News Corp outlet, the New York Post, criticized Trump and appeared to blame him for the GOP’s midterm performance. “Don (who couldn’t build a wall) had a great fall,” the NY Post headline read. “Can all the GOP’s men put the party back together again?”
In response, Trump went after Fox News, the NY Post, and Paul Ryan, the former House speaker who became a News Corp board member on his Truth Social platform.
“The New York Post today has a story about the Wall, but my progress on the Wall was slowed down by News Corp Board Member Paul Ryan, who together with the Broken Old Crow Mitch McConnell, weren’t able to get me the funds,” Trump wrote. “I ended up getting them anyway, after two-and-a-half years of lawsuits, through another source, and completed the Wall plus certain additions that were made, which could have been done in three weeks, but no, the Biden Administration stupidly wanted Open Borders.”
As for the midterm results, Trump celebrated by saying: “WE WON! Pelosi is gone, we take Congress and, if we can stop their very obvious CHEATING, will also take the Senate. Big Victory, don’t be stupid. Stand on the rooftops and shout it out loud!”
https://www.theepochtimes.com/trump-targets-fox-news-parent-corp-paul-ryan-following-midterm-elections_4857725.html
When There Is A Queue Investors Often Feel They Have To Get In Line So They Aren’t The Last Ones Left To Turn Off The Lights
February 11, 2020
A report from the Wall Street Journal. “UBS Group AG is stepping up efforts to stem the bleeding at its $20 billion flagship real-estate fund amid concerns over its retail holdings. As late as June 2015, Trumbull had a $1.2 billion backlog of funds looking to invest, and no backlog of investors looking to get out, according to RVK for the Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation. Core funds ‘just had incredible market tailwinds,’ said Christy Fields, a managing principal at consulting firm Meketa Investment Group, Inc.”
“But analysts say once a fund faces a rise in redemption requests, capital outflows can be hard to stop. If a fund manager doesn’t have enough cash to meet the requests, it has to sell properties. That often takes time, causing a backlog and increasing pressure on the fund to sell. ‘When there is a redemption queue investors often feel they have to get in line so they aren’t the last ones left to turn off the lights,’ said Nori Lietz, a faculty member at Harvard Business School.”
The Edmonton Journal in Canada. “Based on interviews with builders, developers, realtors and other industry insiders, David Yee, Edmonton tax leader for PWC Canada notes buyers are facing an abundance of choice in both the new and resale markets, as well as the rental side. And they’re looking for trouble-free, move-in ready products. ‘The homebuilders that we’ve talked with still concede it’s a buyers’ market so people have a lot of choice,’ says Yee.”
The Manchester Evening News in the UK. “Home owners living in a ‘luxury’ new build development say their lives have become a ‘nightmare’ after finding dozens of faults in their properties. Some residents living in the Barnes Village development said they were promised ‘luxurious’ and ‘elegant’ family homes when they purchased off-plan two years ago. But, months after moving in, they say the development is wracked with issues. Michael Morris, 62, who purchased a three bed apartment with his wife inside the renovated hospital building – costing £330,000, said: ‘It has been a nightmare, in our particular circumstances it has been life-threatening.’”
“He added: ‘(Henley) are a nightmare to deal with. They are an outfit from London, they think they can come down here and think we are just cobbled streets and flat caps.’”
The Times of India. “Investors who bought luxury apartments, hoping property prices would appreciate and they would earn fabulous rents, now face a harsh reality. Not only have prices stagnated or dropped, but rental incomes from such flats are low. ‘It’s true. Home owners who have leased big apartments are left with little in hand,’ said Pranay Vakil, chairman of Praron Consultancy.”
“While owners rue investing in what has turned out to be a bad rental market for them, the situation couldn’t possibly better for tenants. In this zero-sum game, the rentier’s loss is the renter’s gain.”
The South China Morning Post. “Hong Kong’s largest property agencies with almost 900 sales offices in the city are asking for discounts on new leases as they brace for further slide in sales after the industry’s worst year since 2016. ‘We have leases coming up for renewal nearly every day and in current market conditions, it will not have much impact to lose some branches,’ said Louis Chan, vice-chairman for Asia-Pacific at Centaline. ‘We are in a situation where no one dares to come out at all’ to view properties, he added.”
The Korea Times. “As the housing bubble is showing no signs of abating, the government is on track to introduce much tighter and broader regulations to normalize the market, in a move to divert the capital flow into more constructive sectors, such as the stock market. But real estate experts here and abroad shared the same view that the current ‘regulations-cure-all’ approach will not be able to calm the overheated market. Experts argued that a shift in the real estate tax system here is crucial to change the ‘real estate-first’ mindset of Korean investors.”
“‘The U.S. government levies a considerable amount of property taxes, with those who purchase a house worth about 500 million won paying almost 5 million won, or 1 percent of the housing price annually, as a property tax,’ Sung Choi, a real estate agent based in Oregon, the U.S., said in an email interview. But under the same standard of comparison, the Korean government imposes only about 1.1 million won for the homeowner’s annual property tax.”
“Kwon Dae-jung, a professor of real estate studies at Myongji University, said controlling housing prices with regulations is a very risky idea, as this goes against the market logic of supply and demand. Also, few other countries intervene in the real estate market by introducing such multiple and specific regulatory packages, according to the expert.”
“‘The U.S. government minimizes its intervention into the real estate market, and adopts flexible regulation by simply controlling loans from time to time,’ he said. ‘The U.S. authority never introduces unnecessary and unreasonable regulations simply because there is a surge in housing prices in some specific areas.’”
From Domain News in Australia. “Domain’s Property Price Forecasts – 2020, released Wednesday, predicts houses in Sydney will rise by 10 per cent over 2020 to a new median of around $1.25 million, while apartments will rise by 8 per cent to a new median of $790,000 – just above the peak reached in June 2017. And if FOMO, or Fear Of Missing Out, sets in as it has in the past, those increases could reach even more record-smashing heights, said forecast author and Domain economist Trent Wiltshire.”
“The major risk lurking in the wings, however, is the coronavirus, which could impact China’s economy massively, with a follow-on slug to Australia, Mr Wiltshire says. ‘The economy overall is sluggish and businesses aren’t keen on investing, but that means interest rates will stay low to try to bolster the economy, which directly feeds into property prices. The big risk, however, is the coronavirus which could have a significant short-term impact on our tourism and education sectors and cause the economy to soften more. It’s possible the outbreak will be much more severe and cause a significant economic slowdown in China, which would have a massive impact on Australia’s economy.’”
http://housingbubble.blog/?p=2913
It’s possible the outbreak will be much more severe and cause a significant economic slowdown in China
It’s also possible that locking down whole regions is a ruse to coverup mass unemployment.
Didn’t work.
So much for “price it well, it’ll sell.” Listing withdrawn: 14796 Carmel Ridge Rd, San Diego, CA 92128. Feel free to ridicule the realtor here: https://youtu.be/Vm3QVf8ZgC4.
San Diego Real Estate Market Update | November 2022
So much for “price it well, it’ll sell.”
A huge turn-off is the double-yellow line on the street. Who wants to live on a busy neighborhood artery?
As I hear the jackhammer on The Farm development down the hill, I’m reminded a lot of golf courses in the area are being developed. The land behind that house could be slated for development.
could be
Looks like.
San Diego approves 1,200-home Carmel Mountain Ranch project on former golf course
We already gave water its 15-minutes, keep building!
The Chambers Brothers – Time Has Come Today (Audio)
https://youtu.be/hIqwzQ7g-Cc
Richie Havens – Here Comes The Sun
https://youtu.be/4BQ2_z8WR4Q
With the stock market climbing through the end of the week, is it safe to assume that the FTX turmoil was short lived?
Are cryptocurrency investments as safe as houses?
The Financial Times
FTX Trading Ltd
FTX says it is probing ‘abnormal transactions’ after potential hack
Assets worth hundreds of millions of dollars withdrawn as crypto empire declared bankruptcy, analysts say
Controlled by entrepreneur Sam Bankman-Fried, FTX filed for bankruptcy protection in the US on Friday
Hudson Lockett in Hong Kong
2 hours ago
FTX has said it is investigating abnormal transactions as analysts said hundreds of millions of dollars worth of crytpo assets were withdrawn as the exchange declared bankruptcy.
The potential hack is the latest blow for FTX, the cryptocurrency empire once valued at $32bn and controlled by 30-year-old entrepreneur Sam Bankman-Fried, which filed for bankruptcy protection in the US on Friday.
Analysts estimated that there were more than $260mn worth of withdrawals. This was despite FTX’s previous inability to meet a surge of customer withdrawals on concerns over its financial health and links to Alameda Research, Bankman-Fried’s proprietary trading group.
The run by customers led the founder to unsuccessfully seek billions of dollars to bail out the group.
Earlier this week, FTX had been poised for a rescue attempt by the world’s largest crypto exchange, Binance, led by Bankman-Fried’s arch-rival Changpeng Zhao.
However, the deal fell through after due diligence revealed substantial financial issues at FTX and subsequent attempts to cobble together another rescue package also collapsed.
On Saturday, the official Twitter account of FTX retweeted comments from Ryne Miller, the company’s general counsel in the US, in which he said it was “investigating abnormalities with wallet movements related to consolidation of FTX balances across exchanges”.
Outflows were estimated to be at least $266mn over the past 24 hours, according to Nansen, a Singapore-based blockchain analytics group, with $73mn withdrawn from FTX US alone.
Concerns over a potential hack were heightened after an administrator on the Telegram support group for FTX stated that “FTX has been hacked . . . Don’t go on FTX site as it might download Trojans.”
The probe into abnormalities followed the resignation of Bankman-Fried, who until this week was one of the crypto sector’s most successful and respected figures, with an estimated net worth of $24bn.
Bankman-Fried will be replaced by John J Ray, a restructuring specialist who oversaw bankruptcy cases for Enron and Nortel Networks. Ray had said on Friday that FTX Group “has valuable assets that can only be effectively administered in an organised, joint process”.
The sprawling group, which had positioned itself as a posterchild for the crypto industry and advertised during the Super Bowl, has about 100,000 creditors and $10bn-$50bn of assets and liabilities, according to the company’s bankruptcy filing in Delaware federal court.
Venture capital firms with substantial exposure to FTX, including Sequoia and Paradigm, have in recent days marked their investments down to zero.
Another investor, SoftBank, is expected to follow suit with its own $100mn interest in the collapsing crypto exchange, according to a person familiar with the matter.
…
Rats leaving the ship by crawling down the dock lines are accused of mutiny.
A chart:
https://www.coindesk.com/price/ftx-token/
FTX’s token plunges 80% on liquidity concerns, wiping out over $2 billion in value
Published Tue, Nov 8 2022 5:21 PM EST
Updated Tue, Nov 8 2022 10:37 PM EST
MacKenzie Sigalos
Key Points
– FTT, the token native to FTX, lost most of its value on Tuesday, after rival Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency firm, announced plans to acquire the company.
– The coin fell from about $22 on Monday to below $5, wiping out more than $2 billion in a day.
FTT, the token native to crypto exchange FTX, lost most of its value after rival Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency firm, announced plans to acquire the company.
The coin traded at around $22 on Monday and sank below $5 Tuesday afternoon in New York. The sell-off wiped out more than $2 billion in value in the space of 24 hours.
Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao, known as CZ, wrote in a tweet to his more than 7 million followers that he expects FTT to be “highly volatile in the coming days as things develop.”
Cryptocurrencies as a class sank on Tuesday, with bitcoin and ethereum both plunging more than 10%. Shares of crypto exchange Coinbase
also experienced a double-digit percentage drop, while Robinhood, which traders use to buy and sell crypto, fell by about 19%.
“It’s probably the most dramatic deal I’ve ever seen in the history of the crypto industry,” said Nic Carter, a partner at Castle Island Ventures, which focuses on blockchain investments. “It consolidates basically the two largest offshore exchanges into one entity, an absolute coup for CZ and Binance — and really a disaster for FTX.”
…
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/11/08/ftxs-ftt-token-plunges-80percent-wiping-out-over-2-billion-in-value.html
The Financial Times
FTX Trading Ltd
Hedge fund admits half its capital stuck on FTX exchange
Galois warns investors it could take ‘a few years’ to recover assets
Kevin Zhou
‘I am deeply sorry that we find ourselves in this current situation,’ Galois co-founder Kevin Zhou told investors in a letter
Laurence Fletcher in London yesterday
Galois Capital, a hedge fund whose founder is credited with spotting the collapse of cryptocurrency luna this year, has been caught off guard after close to half its assets were left trapped on crypto exchange FTX, which filed for bankruptcy protection on Friday.
Galois co-founder Kevin Zhou wrote to investors in recent days, in a letter seen by the Financial Times, that while the fund had been able to pull some money from the exchange, it still had “roughly half of our capital stuck on FTX”. Based on Galois’s assets under management as of June, that could amount to around $100mn.
“I am deeply sorry that we find ourselves in this current situation,” wrote Zhou. “We will work tirelessly to maximise our chances of recovering stuck capital by any means.”
He added that it could take “a few years” to recover “some percentage” of its assets.
FTX on Friday said Sam Bankman-Fried was resigning as chief executive, after failing in a last-ditch effort to secure a rescue package. It follows a tumultuous week in which the exchange admitted it was unable to meet customer withdrawal demands without external funds, raising fears that clients could face big losses.
FTX’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing in a federal court in Delaware includes FTX’s US entity, Bankman-Fried’s proprietary trading group Alameda Research and about 130 affiliated companies. His empire was valued at $32bn just months ago.
Industry insiders say that the fact FTX was used by so many hedge funds and seen as one of the world’s safer crypto trading venues means many managers may have money stuck on the exchange.
Galois did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
…
The Financial Times
Person in the News Changpeng Zhao
Changpeng ‘CZ’ Zhao, crypto’s ‘corporate raider’
The Binance founder’s actions left Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX filing for bankruptcy
Illustration Changpeng Zhao wearning a black T-shirt with ‘Binance’ on it and holding a pile of Bitcoins
Joshua Oliver and Adam Samson yesterday
On Tuesday afternoon Changpeng Zhao, chief executive of the world’s largest crypto exchange, picked up the phone to his one-time partner turned arch rival Sam Bankman-Fried. He was ready to negotiate a $600mn truce in a public feud that had rocked the crypto industry.
But Zhao swiftly decided to throw a lifeline to FTX, Bankman-Fried’s company and the chief challenger to his own, Binance, in the fierce competition to dominate the offshore market in risky and complex digital asset trading. FTX had been swamped by customers demanding their money back, and urgently needed billions of dollars to stay afloat. Zhao agreed to rescue FTX and acquire his rival.
But, only a day later, he abandoned the deal. On Friday Bankman-Fried’s $32bn empire filed for bankruptcy in the US.
The collapse of FTX instantly tipped the balance of power in the $1tn crypto market. “[Zhao] coming out and attacking the token I think will go down as one of the greatest corporate attacks that has ever happened,” said Jon de Wet, chief investment officer at digital wealth manager Zerocap. “It’s private equity corporate raider stuff.” Zhao denies having a “master plan” to take over FTX.
In just five years, Binance has boomed into an industry titan with a constellation of global affiliates — many in Zhao’s name. Last month alone, it processed $2.8tn in crypto coin and derivatives transactions, according to CryptoCompare data. The 45-year-old, universally known as “CZ”, was estimated to be one of the world’s richest people before the crash in crypto prices cut his fortune to $17bn, according to Forbes.
Interviews with former employees, business partners and industry peers paint a portrait of a divisive entrepreneur on a relentless drive to grow at all costs. Several of those who worked with him said security and regulatory compliance were sacrificed in the race to dominate. Binance said: “In this fast-growing industry, we continually strive to evolve and ensure regulatory compliance and account holder protection.”
Zhao, who declined to be interviewed, is venerated by an army of have-a-go investors who rush to take selfies with him. But while his “Binance Angels” spread the company gospel, equally vocal opponents criticise the exchange for money they say was lost during a series of technological outages at the height of 2021’s crypto market mayhem.
Several former employees described a driven leader who pushed them to the edges of their comfort zone. Zhao’s tough character was on display this week when he said he would sell around $600mn in FTT, a token issued by FTX, which Binance had held since exiting an early equity investment in the company. This move knocked the token’s price, with FTX enduring a record $5bn of customer withdrawals on Sunday.
Bankman-Fried alluded to the tussle on Twitter. “At some point I might have more to say about a particular sparring partner, so to speak. But you know, glass houses. So for now, all I’ll say is: well played; you won.”
…
The Financial Times
Opinion The Long View
FTX and the banana bend in markets
Crypto hit by brutal collision with reality as lower inflation rallies equity investors
Katie Martin
A banana in a blockchain with the FTX logo
Sam Bankman-Fried once told analysts he could see a future where FTX could be used to buy a banana
Katie Martin yesterday
Here we go again with two of the market themes that just keep cropping up over and over this year: the chaotic dalliance with disaster in crypto and the hunt for a more lenient stance from the US Federal Reserve.
Both are dramatic in their own ways, but the latter of the two is much more important to the health of mainstream investors’ portfolios.
The told-you-so schadenfreude that crops up when crypto hits the skids is always tempered by the grim knowledge that some naive amateur investors are losing their life savings. Bitcoin, the biggest token of the bunch, has dropped by around 18 per cent over the course of this week.
But any new buyers who came in after it tanked 70 per cent from November to June and held on at around $20,000 a pop after that probably knew what they were getting in to. If you clung on after the crash, chances are you knew it was a punt.
Retail investors are hurt mostly through the sliding value of the coins. The professionals take the pain through their equity investments. And they have suffered a brutal collision with reality this week, after Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX — supposedly the more reliable exchange in this freewheeling market — suffered a good old-fashioned bank run before filing for bankruptcy.
Line chart of $ per coin showing Reality check: Bitcoin slides as FTX files for bankruptcy
First, confidence evaporated from FTX’s native token, FTT — a fairly common occurrence with tokens based on trust and hand-wavey ambitions rather than on traditional boring stuff like revenues, dividends, interest payments and institutional resilience.
This was bad enough, but FTX rival Binance swept in and made matters worse. First by publicly stating an intention to sell its holdings of FTX’s tokens and then by offering to rescue the exchange itself before pulling out of such a deal, leaving its chief executive Changpeng Zhao as the last remaining king of crypto. SBF, as he is known, was forced to resign as chief executive.
This is all top-notch drama, and humbling for FTX’s financial backers, who sure drank the Kool-Aid. One of them, venture capital firm Sequoia, said this week it will write down its $210mn investment in FTX to zero, noting that “a liquidity crunch has created solvency risk” for the exchange.
Contrast that with Sequoia’s gushing assessment of FTX’s prospects in an extremely lengthy piece it published online less than two months ago. In a now-deleted 13,800-word profile (that’s around 16 times the length of this column), Sequoia described Bankman-Fried’s “status of legend”. His explanation of how one day you could use FTX to “buy a banana” (I’m not joking) left the Sequoia team in rapture. “I love this founder,” one said. “It was a vision about the future of money itself,” the profile explained. Now, you will struggle to retrieve your funds from FTX, let alone use it to buy fruit.
…
7 minute read
November 11, 2022 4:47 PM PST
Last Updated 9 hours ago
Crypto markets in turmoil over FTX bankruptcy
Reuters
Illustration shows representation of cryptocurrency Bitcoin, Ethereum and Dash plunging into water
Nov 11 (Reuters) – Crypto exchange FTX filed for U.S. bankruptcy on Friday and Sam Bankman-Fried stepped down as CEO, after a liquidity crisis that has prompted intervention from regulators around the world.
FTX, its affiliated crypto trading fund Alameda Research and about 130 other companies have commenced voluntary Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings in Delaware, FTX said.
MARKET REACTION:
Shares of cryptocurrency and blockchain-related firms dropped on Friday after FTX, one of the biggest crypto exchanges, said it would initiate bankruptcy proceedings in the United States, triggering a potentially massive meltdown in the industry.
…
https://www.reuters.com/technology/crypto-markets-turmoil-over-ftx-bankruptcy-2022-11-11/
“…and about 130 other companies have commenced voluntary Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings…”
Is 130 companies alot?
It depends on the number of employees and how many are affiliated.
Inside the epic crypto collapse of FTX—and how it hurts Tom Brady, Steph Curry and Joe Biden
By Michael Kaplan,
Dana Kennedy and
Lydia Moynihan
November 11, 2022 7:00am Updated
Sam Bankman-Fried was the golden child of cryptocurrency.
The buzzy company called FTX that he co-founded made him worth $15.6 billion — and celebrities wanted in on the profits.
Gisele Bündchen and Tom Brady co-starred in a $20 million ad campaign for FTX, receiving an equity stake in the company along with cryptocurrency in return. NBA legend Steph Curry was made a global ambassador for the company in exchange for an equity stake and even entangled his Eat.Learn.Play. charity with the platform. Tennis star Naomi Osaka was given an equity stake. Angels pitcher Shohei Ohtani and Aaron Jones of the Green Bay Packers both signed on as global ambassadors, receiving equity stakes.
During the 2022 Super Bowl, comedian Larry David starred in a commercial for FTX. In the ad, which cost a reported $30 million, David listens as an actor playing an FTX executive implores him to invest via the company’s “safe and easy way to get into crypto.” Ever the skeptic, a smirking David replies: “Ehhhh, I don’t think so. And I’m never wrong about this stuff — never.”
Bankman-Fried — and his celebrity pals — should have heeded that advice.
On Friday, Bankman-Fried stepped down from his CEO position as FTX filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, after scrambling to shore up an $8 billion liquidity crisis that has left investors unable to claim their funds. The equity stakes granted to celebrities are pretty much worthless. And Bankman-Fried’s empire faces a federal probe over whether it mishandled clients’ money.
It’s a massive fall for Bankman-Fried, who, at just 30 years old, was once tipped to be one of the biggest donors to the Democratic Party in the 2024 presidential election.
Now he’s eating humble pie.
“I f—ed up and should have done better,” Bankman-Fried, who has personally lost at least $13 billion in the debacle, tweeted on Thursday. “The full story here is one I’m still fleshing out every detail of, but as a very high level, I f—ed up twice.”
Sam Bankman-Fried was the golden child of crypto.
Bankman-Fried was raised near Palo Alto, Calif., by two Stanford Law professors, Joseph Bankman and Barbara Fried. After flipping a coin to choose between MIT and CalTech, he went to Cambridge, Mass., where he studied physics and mathematics.
“Nothing I learned in college ended up being useful … other than, like, social development,” Bankman-Fried told Yahoo Finance. “On the academic side, though, it’s all f–king useless … School is just not helpful for most jobs.”
…
https://nypost.com/2022/11/11/how-the-crypto-collapse-of-ftx-hurt-tom-brady-steph-curry/