Sam Bankman-Fried, formerly known as the “wunderkind” of crypto, built FTX into a powerful exchange that processes billions of dollars in daily volume. His net worth reached $26 billion by 2022, thanks to rapid growth and celebrity sponsorships. But FTX was really a house of cards. Alameda Research, Bankman-Fried’s trading arm, borrowed money from FTX customers to cover speculative bets. When the market fell, the scheme lost $8 billion. In November 2022, a tweet from Binance, a competitor, triggered a bank run, and consumers withdrew $6 billion in just a few days. FTX went bankrupt, resulting in more than a million ... (full story)