Submitted by imhergod t3_106zoid in nottheonion
Comments
Alan_Shutko t1_j3jtcte wrote
They asked last month: https://gizmodo.com/ftx-sam-bankman-fried-sbf-politicians-return-donations-1849914373
darkest_irish_lass t1_j3llyr9 wrote
The article says that FTX is going to pursue the political recipients to get the donations back, unless given voluntarily.
Don't get me wrong, I think politicians are scum, but legally how can they force compliance if it's a gift?
Commubot t1_j3mbf7s wrote
Well if the money donated was fraudulently acquired they could possibly seize it
Chaotic-Entropy t1_j3meblh wrote
FTX couldn't, the authorities could.
DFWPunk t1_j3n9l8s wrote
It will end up being handled by the trustee. In the Madoff case they were able to recover $14 billion from people who were in early and had withdrawn more than they invested.
ActionFlank t1_j3jrxoy wrote
NO!
/s
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shashinqua t1_j3lepls wrote
Biden would never let that happen.
SophiaofPrussia t1_j3jnfji wrote
That is some pretty ineffective altruism.
detatedcappa t1_j3k1lz2 wrote
Not sure they understand how donations work
mjtwelve t1_j3k9wg1 wrote
When the funds were customer deposits you didnt have authority to touch, a constructive trust and disgorgement are not ridiculous suggestions, depending on your particular jurisdiction.
[deleted] t1_j3kei0l wrote
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vasya349 t1_j3l79vx wrote
I don’t think anybody is alleging customer funds were used for donations?
S3IqOOq-N-S37IWS-Wd t1_j3l9krh wrote
Isn't the whole thing that ftx accounting was all mangled and didn't separate customer funds from others?
vasya349 t1_j3la7w0 wrote
The big thing was Alameda made money from investing with FTX customer funds, meaning they could lose them if their investments went bust (and they did). But I don’t believe FTX revenues themselves (the source of the donations) were ever the property of others.
S3IqOOq-N-S37IWS-Wd t1_j3lb7r5 wrote
Technically yes the revenues would be FTX's but things were commingled. That FTX dipped into customer funds when lending to Alameda means they didn't distinguish between their funds and customer funds. The new manager has made very clear that their accounting was a shitshow so I'm not sure you can clearly say what money was donated.
Even if they were in separate accounts, I'm sure other arguments can be made based on the liabilities created when lending out customer funds.
> Federal prosecutors and regulators allege that SBF, FTX, and its affiliates, which include defunct hedge fund Alameda Research, stole user funds and poured billions of dollars into risky bets that did not pan out.
Shadefeaster t1_j3la2nw wrote
That's exactly what he did and it is the whole reason he's being tried for fraud as we speak. Dudes going to jail for a long time.
vasya349 t1_j3lai3i wrote
He is not in jail for using customer funds for political donations. He’s in jail for loaning customer funds to his investment group. That’s why he’s being charged with securities fraud rather than theft. It also completely changes the legal dynamic on whose property the donations were.
Shadefeaster t1_j3ldkxb wrote
Among many other things. The SEC accused SBF of personally borrowing more than $1.338 billion from Alameda, using customers’ money for investments, real estate, and political donations before they froze his assets. Many others did the same for multiple billions of customers assets.
egregiouscodswallop t1_j3kbxd5 wrote
Typical! My company did an event for some NFT and they tried to sue us for their money back because their value collapsed after the event. Our part was just making the venue look sexy and, boy howdy, we did. The value tanking likely had to do with wind blowing or the sun rising since that's now NFTs work.
ArkGuardian t1_j3ly5mx wrote
That's annoying but isn't quite the same thing happening here.
The new management is trying to recover the stolen user funds. While this is a fun clickbaity headline, money given to charity as a result of fraud is still fraud.
Theemuts t1_j3l2k1b wrote
I'm sorry you had to waste time and effort on that.
InternetPeon t1_j3jrdq4 wrote
Good fucking luck.
Willy_Behinder t1_j3lrt6i wrote
First clawback is Brinkman family and friends, then politicians, then any charity willing to cooperate. Charities cannot be compelled to return gifts of any kind. Many do have bylaws that prohibit accepting (knowingly) any gifts of money or items that were acquired illegally.
Shoddy_Ad_3134 t1_j3k03v6 wrote
Happy cake day
xbactery t1_j3kbgms wrote
Even though it's a comedy, I wouldn't be shocked if some of those Charities were founded by FTX.
If you donate just two euros per day, SBF will be able to eat caviar for breakfast.
Alkalinum t1_j3osveg wrote
Bankman-Fried's brother runs a non-profit charity called Guarding Against Pandemics. He received more than $12.1 million from Alameda in the last two financial years (so may have received more before that as well). Sams' mother ran Mind the Gap a SuperPAC for the democrats, and $1 million was donated to it from Nishad Singh - FTXs' Director of Engineering. Sam had a 'mentor' who worked in Oxford university, and the mentor ran multiple charitable consultancy agencies, the consultancy agencies he owned were pledged about $25-30 million by FTX, and Oxford University was pledged another $10 million or so. Democrat Politicians got $40 million donated to them, and there were also separate donations to Democrat aligned PACs and non profits that seem to be easily upwards of another $50 million+. Sam said he had donated about $40 million to Republicans, although I don't see any specific mention of specific donations or political groups for that. An FTX executive Ryan Salame did donate $17 million to GOP aligned groups.
Someone seriously needs to investigate these non profit organizations. Every rich prick has founded at least one and I can guarantee it's not because of their bleeding hearts to help people. I'd love to see how much money ends up back in the pockets of the founders and 'charity workers' through wages and expenses.
ericfromct t1_j3m3kdx wrote
Wouldn't be surprising, so many large corporations have people on the board of the charities receiving the largest donations or just outright start charities to drop their taxable revenue
not_a_gumby t1_j3nl5vp wrote
effective altruism is such a fucking punchline. If you ever believed in that you're such a chump.
MalumOptimatium t1_j3oemxe wrote
Crypto bros are the same people that like to be stepped on.
lemonadepeachy t1_j3k1840 wrote
SBF is no longer in charge of the business. Additionally, given that the donations were made fraudulently, they ought to request a refund. Moral organisations should find it simple to return funds that have been stolen.
NarrowSalvo t1_j3kmhij wrote
I was with you until the last sentence. Simple to return?
Even though it averages more than 1 million dollars per charity for more than 100 of them? And they seem to be likely be poorly funded ones like one that tutors in rural India and China? You think a charity like that has 1 million dollars on hand? Or hasn't already spent it a year ago.
It might be "moral" to do so, but that doesn't make it "simple".
Alkalinum t1_j3ov8ci wrote
Some of the charities were indeed those sorts of charities keeping orphanages in India open, and it does feel really sour to say they have to refund the money, but much of the donations were to political charities and consulting charities - SBFs mum runs a Democrat superPAC that got $1 million, his brother runs a lobbying charity that received $12.1 million. Democrat politicians got $40 million, and Democrat interest groups got $10s of millions on top of that. Sam's 'Mentor' the leader of the Effective Altruism movement runs several non profit consultancies that got about $30 million, and Oxford university where he works was given about $10 million. I reckon all those organisations won't have too much difficulty raising the funds back to repay the people whose money was stolen.
semtex94 t1_j3ko59m wrote
That's not how accounting works for non-profits, assuming they even have enough money in the first place.
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insideoutcognito t1_j3krxtc wrote
What if they already spent it?
[deleted] t1_j3kqi86 wrote
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vasya349 t1_j3l7sqf wrote
The money wasn’t stolen. The vast majority of company revenue wasn’t derived fraudulently. It is alameda that benefitted, rather than FTX. An FTX without fraud would still have been able to make those donations.
skunkadelic t1_j3jneax wrote
How about the money donated to politicians first?