This is Planet Money from NPR.

If you are like most people, the world of cryptocurrency just sort of exists in the periphery.

Every once in a while though, you spot a glimpse.

Like do you notice how all the Super Bowl ads this year were celebrities hawking crypto

startups?

Or have you noticed that your friend got really rich off Bitcoin and bought a mansion in Puerto Rico?

Hold up.

So parked in the handicap spot without a placard really have the vanity plate by NFTs.

But honestly, this is a fine relationship for you to have with crypto.

It is fine to avoid dipping your toes into the crypto space because, quite frankly, for

now at least it has existed outside of our everyday economy.

One man was set to change that.

A 30 year old with kind of big goofy hair.

Who in the last five years made billions in crypto and became the face of respectability

in an industry usually associated with less than respectable characters.

His name, Sam Bankman-Freed, the founder of a company called FTX.

And even if you were actively trying to ignore crypto, you probably heard of him because

Sam was the crypto nerd who broke through into popular culture.

He and FTX were everywhere.

On the rooftops of stadiums on TV, on billboards, on magazine covers.

Until last week.

How fast could you lose 15 billion dollars?

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