Who is Sam Bankman-Fried?

Sam Bankman-Fried fidgeted nervously when he was asked about his potential criminal exposure at The New York Times Deal Book Summit in late November of 2022.

“There’s a time and a place for me to think about myself and my own future,” Bankman-Fried said on a video link from his base in the Bahamas as his distinctive mop of curly hair bobbed up and down. “I don’t think this is it.”

Less than two years later, Bankman-Fried found himself in the courtroom of a federal courthouse, facing 25 years in prison, forced to forfeit $11.2 billion for defrauding customers and investors of billions of dollars while enriching himself and a small group of top executives.

Bankman-Fried’s journey from an “effective altruist” who amassed extraordinary wealth while in his 20s to a precipitous fall will be pored over by books, television series and numerous criminal and regulatory investigations for years to come.

At its core, his story is “not“This is just plain, old fashion embezzlement, taking money from others and using it for your own purposes.”