Does Sam Bankman-Fried's Fraud Trial Spell the End of Crypto?
Consider This from NPR
NPR
4.2 • 6.2K Ratings
🗓️ 1 October 2023
⏱️ 16 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Now the former face of crypto, Sam Bankman-Fried, who ran the FTX exchange, is going on trial. He's accused of orchestrating one of the largest frauds in history.
As his case gets underway it's as if the whole crypto industry is on trial.
NPR's David Gura speaks with Bloomberg reporter Zeke Faux who wrote the book "Number Go Up: Inside Crypto's Wild Rise and Staggering Fall," and Sheelah Kolhatkar, a staff writer for The New Yorker who has a new article out on Bankman-Fried and his parents.
Email us at considerthis@npr.org.
See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.
NPR Privacy Policy
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | This message comes from a PR sponsor, the Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation, who |
| 0:05.2 | believe high-risk, high-reward research is the best way to make breakthroughs against |
| 0:09.3 | cancer. |
| 0:10.3 | Learn more about Damon Runyon's brave and bold approach at DamonRunyon.org. |
| 0:22.0 | Not too long ago, crypto was being trumpeted as the next big thing. |
| 0:26.1 | Our terms were starting to hear more and more cryptocurrency Bitcoin and NFTs. |
| 0:31.9 | This is Miami, the city that wants to lower tech from Silicon Valley and finance from |
| 0:36.4 | New York, all by embracing crypto. |
| 0:39.0 | Celebrities were getting in on it, including Kim Kardashian, Matt Damon and Tom Brady. |
| 0:43.8 | FTX is the safest and easiest way to buy and sell crypto. |
| 0:46.5 | It's the best way to get in the game. |
| 0:47.8 | At the start of 2022, FTX ran what was one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in |
| 0:53.3 | the world. |
| 0:54.4 | The company was valued at $32 billion. |
| 0:58.3 | That was just three years after it was founded by Sam Bankman Freed, who's better known |
| 1:03.0 | by his initials, SBF. |
| 1:05.1 | He was the king of crypto basically. |
| 1:07.5 | Zick Fox is a former colleague of mine, an investigative reporter for Bloomberg. |
| 1:11.7 | He'd get called in to Washington to testify before Congress about how he thought the industry |
| 1:17.3 | should be regulated. |
| 1:19.1 | Bank CEOs were dying to get his attention because they were hoping that FTX would go |
| 1:24.3 | public and it'd be a big deal for them. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from NPR, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of NPR and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.