Let's get now to Laura Davison Bloomberg Wealth Reported joining us from Washington, d C. She wrote a pace titled Sam bankmun Freed's red Flags were seen in all corners of the Empire. Before we get to those, Laura, just curious to get your thoughts on what we heard from Sam bankmun Freed speaking virtually at the New York Times deal book summish because he did admit to many mistakes,
but he's denied here trying to perpetrate any kind of fraud. Yeah, it was a really incredible interview, almost an hour long, and really he was quite contrite and and sort of had this air that he's had on on Twitter that we now saw him you know in uh, you know, in the Fleshness video feed UM talk about how sorry and how he made mistakes, UM, but also that he didn't He said that he didn't know a lot of
these things that were happening. And so that's really going to be the questions that regulators are going to be asking, that congressional committees are gonna be asking, and you know, potentially the d o J might be asking, um, as you know, is he liable and responsible for some of these things that happened. So you share a Byeline Laura with Sophie Ella Xander on a piece that's being featured
on the terminal. Sam bankman Fried's red flags were seen in all corners of Empire, and you highlight to nonprofits in particular. What do you think they picked up on? So it's not clear they didn't say exactly why they declined to take some of these grants from the f t X UH Philanthropy wing, but um, they clearly picked
up on on something. And uh, this has really been really kind of a parallel story to what we saw happen at f t X, what we saw having at the ft X Future Fund, which was their you know, their foundation, and that you know, records were not so clean. There were entities who weren't expecting money who got money, or entities who were expecting a certain amount and got more.
But there were also people who were expecting some grants that just never got fulfilled about uh, you know, ninety million or so that just you know, they had said, hey, we're coming through this money never got paid out. Um. But really the real thing here that's probably going to be the most focused on going forward in the bankruptcy case is there were you know, people who received millions
of dollars. You know, several entities received millions of dollars uh from entities that were listed in the bankruptcy and that means that some of those funds could be clawed back. Uh. And some of these are bigger nonprofits that might be able to afford to do so. But a lot of these people are you know, individual researchers. You know, PhD students, college students that you know, we're given twenty dollars. They may not have that money, you know, if creditors come
to to recoup it. I like a pace that you UM quoted a partner with us saying that, you know, if some of these big companies like Tiger Global Management, Sequoia Capital, we're backing the exchange, why would some of these smaller nonprofits and academics do due diligence Because basically they can't, but they should have also, I guess had faith that that what was happening here was was all
above board. Yeah, and that's really um, you know sort of what is incredible about some of these um, you know organizations, they you know, apply for grants or they receive grants, and they do. You have teams that you know, relatively small compared to you know, what would be a due diligence team, um, you know at a hedge fund, but you know said, hey, we see some red flags here.
We're just not going to associate ourselves, um, you know with this organization, which is which is really uh, you know, not typical in the nonprofit world. If someone comes and say, hey, we want to give you, you know, several million dollars, most nonprofits you know are not looking for a reason to say no. They're looking for reason to say yes. So what do we know about the way in which regulators are going to step in and kind of prosecute this case. So we don't know, uh, for sure, exactly
how this is going to play out. But there's a couple of things in the next couple of weeks that are that are gonna be really crucial to watch here. Um. One is there's several different congressional committees that want to have hearings, uh about the collapse of f t X. We've got one scheduled for December thirteenth in the House.
Um they Sam Bank and free tonight, in his interview with The New York Times said he wants to cooperate in these We'll see if he actually comes back on New y so or on you know, us soil to do this. He's still in the Bahamas. Um. You know, that does open him up to you know, some potential liability, if he has criminal liability, you could see, uh, you know, this could have some exposure for him. Uh. There's there's a lot happening and a lot that regulators and different
enforcement agencies are being quiet about right now. But you know, as this case builds, and you know, frankly, he's been talking a lot, uh, you know, more so than would be expected in a situation like he's in. So uh more is is likely to come and very quickly. And what sort of the crypto contagion are we expecting to see here too? I mean, so this is really kind of the question we saw, you know, Larry Think and others say today that you know, this is really not
not the end of this. You know, we've seen other firms block five example file for bankruptcy. UM. You know, just f t X had um tentacles in uh in a wide and far in crypto world and just just been a real loss and confidence in in crypto as well as you know, sort of the loss of evaluations across the board. Uh, this is not over yet. What about regular Do we have a sense that there's going to be much much more strict regulation in this space?
This has really been UM. A kind of an interesting point is you know, you would think kind of the natural reactions after sort of there's a big calamitous event that you would have people saying, yes, we need to regulate. Um. Congress has been slow on this. Part of that is the Congress doesn't really understand how crypto works, uh, and that they're a little bit slow to react. We're starting
to see more of that today. The chair of the Banking Committee in the Senate, uh, Senate Finance or sorry, Senate Banking Committee sent a letter to Yellin's saying, Hey, we need to work on this together. We need to get to speed on this, but it's gonna take some time months, if not years. Yeah. Indeed, great reporting, Thank you, Laura, Laura Davis and Bloomberg Wealth reporter joining us from Washington, d C. A great pace on the terminal to Sam
bank Man. Freed's red flags was seen in all corners of Empire