Who is Sam Bankman-Fried and What Really Happened at FTX? | Marc Cohodes

In Episode 282 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with famed short seller Marc Cohodes about Sam Bankman-Fried, the recent bankruptcy of FTX, and the bigger story behind the alleged fraud that he and his network of enablers have perpetrated.
Marc Cohodes has famously exposing numerous corporate frauds at great personal expense and risk to himself and his family. So, when Cohodes began raising the alarm earlier this year by publicly calling FTX a scam, while describing Sam Bankman-Fried as a fraudster, many of us took notice. During this time, Sam Bankman-Fried was largely seen as the new golden child of crypto. He spent the last several years cultivating a cultish following and rubbing shoulders with some of the most powerful people in the world. He was the second largest donor to Joe Biden's 2020 presidential campaign behind only George Soros and worked hand-in-glove with politicians and policymakers to regulate the crypto industry in a manner that would favor him, his companies, and his network of financial enablers.
On its surface, this looks like your typical financial fraud case. And in some sense, it is. But there are elements to this story that are uniquely suspicious, like Sam’s own origins and how he developed his wealth to begin with. The origins of his co-founder Gary Wang-who no one talks about-and the backgrounds of other members of his organization including chief compliance officer Dan Friedberg and chief operating officer Constance Wang also raise concerns.
How this otherwise disheveled multi-billionaire who reportedly sleeps on a futon in the Bahamas came to exercise so much political influence and hold so many ownership stakes in companies and venture funds in and outside of crypto remains a mystery. But it’s a story that Marc Cohodes has been working on for almost a year and it is the focus of today’s explosive conversation.
You can gain access to our premium feed and listen to today’s episode by subscribing to any one of our three content tiers at HiddenForces.io/subscribe. This will give you access to our entire episode library which you can listen to on your phone using your favorite podcast app just like you are listening to this episode right now
If you want access to our Hidden Forces genius community, which includes Q&A calls with guests, access to special research and analysis, in-person events, and dinners, feel free to send an email to [e-mail], and Demetri or someone else from our team will get right back to you.
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Producer & Host: Demetri Kofinas
Editor & Engineer: Stylianos Nicolaou
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Follow Demetri on Twitter at @Kofinas
Episode Recorded on 11/10/2022

[@BensonMTG]

16:35 when he said SBF “looks like the inside of a gym shoe”

[@BatmanBoss]

Marc is the man!

[@YamahaC7SRG]

Cohodes is worth his weight in gold and should be Chair of the SEC. The 'regulators' are part of the problem and only someone like this guy can make a difference. Thanks for posting this.

[@pretorious700]

I gotta laugh out loud when people equate people of honesty even being considered for high bureaucratic office. It's so quaint, naive, and just absurd.

[@michaelmoorrees3585]

I know what you mean, but being pedantic He's worth many times his weight in gold. At $1800 per troy ounce, and let's say he's a big guy, and weighs 200lbs, that's only $5.25 million. Bankman bought a good portion of Congress. With that kind of backing, talking to regulators is useless.

[@JakeyMan]

Cohodes is an arbitrage prick Sure he can spot a scam Brian Cornell of Target is a great guy? What a fuckin joke, that whole style is pumping and dumping the Target brand .once Target rep is as bad as Wal Mart , with hateful dirty process, Cornell will be GONE Amazon will claw Wal Target down It's a vibe destroyed, a parasite

[@GenXstacker]

I've never been so happy to have 100% of my portfolio in gold and gold miners.

[@johnpittman7095]

ive never been so happy to have 100% of my portfolio in bitcoin thru cold storage self custody that only I can access. It also gives me peace knowing that we are at 92% of the total supply and the next 8% will come onto the market till the year 2140. We will be at 99% of total supply in 10 years. Gold is a fantastic inflation hedge if you self custody but it will not be the future of finance.

[@Ash__7]

lmao

[@GEB-yy3ud]

@@johnpittman7095 In our lifetimes, do you think central banks will hold more in gold or bitcoin?

[@t.c.s.7724]

Bless you for discussing the corruption and theft.

[@katee3217]

Damn this is crazy. His theory is mind blowing.

[@sunnymoondog]

This is my first time at this channel. Demetri is an excellent interviewer.

[@norasmission7394]

It’s obvious .. Sam and Caroline were groomed by their MIT parents . The patents need to be in prison

[@effewe2]

Agree..I think their parents are Chinese agents.

[@louisehoff]

I agree with you. I cannot believe Sam or Caroline's woke parents are moral individuals to raise these criminals, give them introductions, cover for them or provide excuses.

[@ventarfield7115]

@Louise Hoff they are working with the CCP AND DEMOCRATS to eliminate crypto and replace it with a government run crypto that uses social credit scores and the rest of it. This is absolutely treason to destroy the USA as we know it. They openly brag about it at the WEF.

[@effewe2]

@@ventarfield7115 Of course,,,this was run by a certain group of people who live in small country in the mid east. Follow the money trail. The Democrats are nothing more than a Mafia run organization that launders money and have total control of the Media. The Twitter Files exposed that. The Praetorian Guard (FBI) protects them.

[@northerngirl4666]

What a bloody stupid, simplistic thing to say! Why is that in the old days, you commit a murder you are held responsible. Nowadays, someone commits a crime and it ALWAYS someone else’s fault?

[@davidbarth80]

Is it worth to compile an online list of bad actors that were part of previous scams? See Dan Friedberg for example. If you see that name coming up again for any project, just stay away from it for good measures.

[@eddyrose8596]

Thank you! I am involved in crypto and this always screamed total scam. I recommend people pull up all the tv news pieces on sbf over the past year. So many narratives around this guy from public health, charity, political lobbying, non-profit organizations and climate issues. It's like this guy was being groomed to be a major major figure in the US.

[@terjeoseberg990]

If he was being groomed, why did they let him screw up?

[@mgiblonski4318]

@@terjeoseberg990 That's easy......he's playing his part in torpedoing the crypto currency industry and more importantly destroying the public's trust in it. At that point CBDC's will be thrust forward as a solution to the instability.

[@eddyrose8596]

@@terjeoseberg990 I think the plan was for his front operation to fake it till they made it. It was working too. But like endeavors, sometimes plans fail. In this case, a bigger player hunted ftx and called their bluff. And here we are. Fortune 500 covers no more.

[@terjeoseberg990]

@@eddyrose8596, That makes more sense. Had he gotten lucky and made a profit off the money he illegally borrowed, then we wouldn’t be here. He instead lost money. But this has nothing to do with “grooming”.

[@eddyrose8596]

@@terjeoseberg990 I would beg to differ only because the connections he had are wide and far reaching. Big investment firms were sending this "nobody" lumps of money to his unregulated and offshore operation? Parallel to this are his close associations by means of his own upbringing to academia, legislators and major financiers.

[@mrhood3977]

Everything Marc is saying is spot on 4 months after this interview and and he was one of the only people that raised SVB, Silvergate, SBF its almost as if anything that starts with a S is dangerous

[@hunters215]

Fantastic interview. Modern legacy journalism is a complete joke, this was ostensibly staring everyone in the face for years now and not a single person in the media or in the "professional" crypto community did the slightest bit of due diligence. Unbelievable.

[@sunnohh]

Crypto couldn’t do anything about it, it’s a self organized ponzy scheme

[@jimhen459]

not as surprising as you would think.

[@roc7880]

I remember when MSM were shocked Trump and MAGA attacked the Capitol, while he kept saying this for 2 months already. The same with business media, never ask a decent question.

[@timwalter6795]

Cohodes isn't interested in finding out who is "running" SBF????? No way SBF put all of this together on his own without cover.

[@marcbee1234]

Someone mentioned CeyeA may be tied-in.

[@davidbarth80]

Apparently Dan Fried the legal councillor was involved setting this up. Already part of previous scandals.

[@biscaynediver]

Starts with mommy and daddy. That's where he got his values. That's where he got his direction. Daddy is holed up with him in the Bahamas. Friedberg is a malevolent force.

[@mgiblonski4318]

Completely agree. There's no way SBF carried this off alone. Knowingly or unknowingly he was playing a role in a much grander chess game. It strikes me as odd that Cohodes, a self proclaimed "heat seeking missile" when it comes to fraud and criminality, completely overlooked the possibility that this goes deeper. And isn't it also the case that to date there has been no mention of criminal charges against SBF?? Very curious.....

[@biscaynediver]

@@mgiblonski4318 The silence from FBI, SEC, CFTC, Justice Dept, and White House is deafening. CNBC interviewed CZ this morning, but aside from that, MSM producers and execs have made a conscious decision to block coverage. WaPost article was more like a p.r. piece than journalism. Sad when the best actual coverage of this comes from a private Twitter account named Autism Capital.

[@Welcome2TheUnknown]

Marc is always spot on! Marc should get in touch with Gonzalo Lira.

[@mrhood3977]

Marc has definitely become my new favorite and I totally agree that if you can't explain to a 5th grader in a paragraph please move on

[@brennus01]

Well I respectfully disagree, Mr Cohodes. You say you don't understand crypto? I'd say you understand it perfectly.

[@jamesfrench4337]

If a guy at this level says it doesn't make sense, it might be because it doesn't make sense!

[@brennus01]

@@jamesfrench4337 you do truly have a dizzying intellect.

[@Kawiboy]

Boom! ✌️👍

[@balapillai]

Mr Cohodes: you are precious. Let’s team on the rootmost cause of this racket fraud - #over_financialization starting with the mysterious fall of uber successful #SpiceTradeAsia. Instead of a superior system taking over. The banishing of #Evolutionary_Emergence and human symbiosis along with tbe rise of #uncurrent_currency capitalism. Sense the corollary of Min 20 of kzbin.info/www/bejne/hKa9pp2uYrGAnMk

[@nosuchthing8]

Almost no one completely understands how bitcoin works.

[@saattlebrutaz]

You don't need FTX to 'run money through crypto'. I don't see any leverage for the CCP here.

[@PinballBob1]

FTX was hacked & about $1 billion disappeared. Don't think it didn't end up in the CCP ?

[@nimnimlight]

getting hacked right when when they find themselves in trouble is obviously an insider job. Gary Wang worked for google before FTX apparently

[@geoffgjof]

It was definitely an inside job. It did two things for them. They were able to get money out of the company, and it made people hesitant to withdraw money before everything was frozen.

[@victorsperandeo3609]

Marc -your the best ! The “Colombo” of Wall St !

[@ford88sw]

Great interview

[@clareheasly5554]

The best update to fully understand that I’ve heard on this.

[@mrkickback2010]

God bless you Marc and your efforts exposing these shitheads. Thank you Demetri for another excellent interview.

[@marcogiste9765]

Great work sir. Wish I can hear more in depth information about this saga. Thank you.

[@humungus3]

This is the best picture of the guy you could get??

[@humungus3]

great interview though!

[@drdontpassone8164]

great listen,,,,,,,thanks ddp1

[@backwoodsbungalow9674]

9:07 interview starts

[@testpattern701]

Good interview.

[@lizh4933]

Wow!! Bernie Madoff, Elizabeth Holmes and now Sam Fried. Amazing how suckered in people are with a persona.

[@marie-louiseleroux828]

These past few days watching my crypto portfolio decline is very disheartening... Holding doesn't really profit much. Any ideas on how to earn better on the short run!??

[@charlesthomas2735]

Short term trading is much preferable considering the current market fluctuations.

[@hrafnhjorleifsson7916]

Same, I hold Mr Michael Marcus in high esteem because of the weekly profit I'm receiving trading with his strategies

[@jonassturluson5273]

I gained more knowledge and a better understanding of trading with his strategy. *2.05* BTC. And I'm still expecting much more

[@allisonmoore5712]

@Jae Diana  agreed, I know a lot of people who were smiling in the crash because of Michael Marcus

[@oneeleven9832]

Don’t give your currency to these jokers there’s some advice 🤷‍♂️

[@roc7880]

rather Big Cojones, I am happy that the kids who only talked about crypto before now they have more wisdom.

[@madamlakwatsera5674]

Thanks

[@robbylafont]

Anytime someone says they are vegan….red flags go up!

[@nosuchthing8]

Remember, Jobs had an eclectic diet

[@sunnymoondog]

Marc thinks very highly of himself. But I would still listen all day lol

[@pretorious700]

His arrogance and self congratulation gets tedious.

[@Ernster86]

Lol shutup and listen to a genius for God sake..

[@johnpittman7095]

you could not short the token on FTX. which was the only token you could not short.

[@bradynields9783]

31:58 I believe it is your opinion on DeFi that's bs. The lure of fast cash or lottery tickets brings people to crypto. Whether they understand the technology or not is up to them.

[@abdel57quaddi80]

We need more guys to Come out to speak up that how we became more stronger than those scamers

[@victorsperandeo3609]

I know of you and have a great deal of respect. Question is why didn’t short FTT and if possible FTX?

[@luckystrikeluke]

Not a publicly traded company so you can’t short it

[@elskacave3235]

Cohodes mentioned that he’d have to put collateral on FTX exchange for the short bet and he didn’t want to risk losing it all. Plus he’d look complicit if he did make $$$ from shorting and then exposing FTX as a fraud. Integrity

[@edblair5253]

Do you touch on the political ties and the secret money for Ukraine?

[@RB-qg1qx]

Very interesting.

[@antslife1089]

Awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[@govindagovindaji4662]

10:34 i know nothing about markets and very little about finance in general. However, Sam talking in what Marc calls "a figure 8" and I call a circle is something I've always thought about SBF when I've listened to any of his interviews pre or post his troubles. Sam's way of discourse reminds me of Theranos-speak. I heard him talk about 'giving away money' once on a Sam Harris podcast and he tried to make charity itself sound like it was a new concept under the sun. I kid you not. He uses many words and many of the same words to make absolutely meaningless statements. If you were to write them down verbatim, you'd observe this and also observe a pattern of his own ''catch phrases' - which I guess ultimately 'caught' a lot of investors up in his hype. I'm thinking there is a play book out there where people learn this manner of discourse.

[@penghunter4565]

You know the other rich Chinese guy from Canada? CZ.. CEO of Binance

[@meowmeow1733]

Secrecy, dishonesty/lying, weird stories, no morals or ethics. This has Chinese written all over it.

[@frankdattilo1836]

Semite front man? it’s always about ‘THEM’….

[@damouno]

Yes CCP connections. Mr Gary W. Hmmm

[@jimhen459]

Not a pot to piss in. This is common sense, partly, but talented guys with billions have backgrounds.

[@islesofshoals3551]

Put John Carreyrou on it

[@jimjackson1087]

o relevant information at all

[@Truth5eeker33]

Who. Is. Gary. Wang?

[@jarretedotio]

Literal inmates running the asylum.

[@kentwoodard2877]

Crypto IS trackable.

[@harambetidepod1451]

is the interviewer regarded or just not listening?

[@johnlovelace2568]

I stopped listening at 28:00 when he makes the comment the average person in China doesn’t have a pot to piss in.

[@nosuchthing8]

The same is true in america

[@relbik66]

Cohodes says no way to short FTX stock, but he could have shorted the FTT token - would have made a fortune 😉

[@joaopraia8464]

You’re obviously an amateur, shorting in size requires liquidity on the other side to close the trade and in this case counterparty risk was too high.

[@relbik66]

@@joaopraia8464 thanks for your professional response

[@k14pc]

@@joaopraia8464 there were other places to short FTT besides FTX

[@upstandingcitizen3877]

@@k14pc there is still counterparty risk, especially considering how dominos fall in crypto.

[@albundy7623]

Gary Tuttle Wang

[@seven8n235]

This is Mr Wang.. no offense...

[@otto1630]

zixiao wang aka gary wang

[@nevadascaredme7436]

Crypto is trackable, this gentlemen is not savvy for the topic.

[@nosuchthing8]

Some is. There is a way to make it tough to trace.

[@kunalseth6437]

👍

[@ifh4030]

You took too long to post this.

[@user-vh6bn2gd5b]

no offence but are you serious about target, if i knew how to short stock, when they came out with the sickening child wardrobe i would've short target london to a brick but with sbf you were bang on from the start

[@lukejones7366]

Lol.. The disclaimer of credibility has been given by blue-tube

[@TheDirtydingle]

Old ftx scammers exit stage left, new defi scammers enter stage right. LOL Blow toarch, napalm and regulate this whole sector so that retail money has no mainstream on ramp or off ramp for these scammer liars to steal from.

[@rudolfsanchez9855]

too bullish can you imagine;)

[@SYNERSTAR]

It was good to finally get to this interview, it helps to expose and TEACH people about being discriminate, discerning and decisive about who or what you trust when it comes to investing... and your spot on, these mf's need to go down, and it will be very interesting to watch the dominos fall... hard times are coming

[@cosmemonot]

Ftx Bank man fried a true jewish tale

[@pretorious700]

This guy spends 50% of his time stroking his own ego.

[@AndreAndFriends]

BeijingBiden !!!

[@AndreAndFriends]

Any questions?

[@benetaue]

Black Opps simple

[@thesilentgeneration]

If this Marc character gave the second-largest donation to Joe Biden I want nothing to do with him or this channel.

[@northerngirl4666]

You need to open your ears. Marc sad Sam made the huge donation. You must be a trump lover … another criminals.

[@AbuAfakski]

Not worth the time listening to this. Marc babbles and repeats himself.

[@nosuchthing8]

Strange, agree.

[@davebarbetta]

I’m guessing Demetri didn’t realize how little content Cohodes would have besides insults and conjecture when inviting him on the podcast.

[@gcsalzer]

He doesn’t get any credit for being right about this 6 months before everyone else?

[@davebarbetta]

Sure he gets credit, I didn’t say that he doesn’t. But the episode itself is just him repeating a few weak red flags over and over. I would’ve liked some real content instead of an angry rant that wasn’t informative.

[@brendann6848]

@@gcsalzer There were other people out there killing SBF and FTX, Marc wasn't alone on that. The problem is he really doesn't have any proof, and it's all just circumstantial details.

[@crouchhill]

Dan Friedberg is a conjecture, is it???

[@akshaysubramaniam8963]

@@davebarbetta Same i liked the ep and mark seems interesting and granted he was told some things in confidence, but was hoping for a lot more meat

[@yongwoo1020]

I continue to be unimpressed by Cohodes.

[@wjebel]

SBF? Is that you?

[@poptart3598]

His rant about Gary Wang shows he is paranoid and nonsense. He tells Gary's whole life trajectory and then says there is nothing at all on him just because he's not going on MSNBC interviews? Then later he randomly gets triggered about how Sam dresses so clearly there's a strong subjective bias. Disappoint

[@nosuchthing8]

"Consensus narratives" i.e. the truth. Versus conspiracy theories

[@nomadcorporatist]

an hour of nothingness

[@andrewm6786]

This guy has got to be the most dissapointing guest I've ever heard on here. Don't get me wrong, I completely get why you invited him, it seemed like he had an interesting story to tell. But this guy is 90% just throwing out ad hominems and talking trash

[@brennus01]

It's not ad hominem to say that -Fried stole customer funds. FTX and Alameda stole customer funds & used those funds to pay influencers, buy ads, and make money loosing bets in the crypto space. Alameda front ran crypto listings on the FTX platform and STILL COULD NOT MAKE MONEY!! Are you serious? Let me run crypto hot money...I'll turn that into a profit for you.

[@alexisaac3227]

A salute to this pro *LOATEDCYBER* Your act of kindness and services, so how big of heart you have for others, thanks for the recovery, I always appreciate..........

[@factsdonthavefeelingsbeawa2953]

MARK: "I'm not going to talk about me or my past or who I am. You can find a lot good & bad about me on the internet. There is lots of articles, interviews, videos, etc... about me that you can find." 2 MINUTES LATER MARK: "Me, Me, Me. KZbin KZbin on the Wall... whose the greatest of them all. ME- ME- ME! I saw red flags. Scam. CCP. Money Laundromat. I tried to warn others. I didn't do this for myself. MY BOOK! Pullitzer Prize Winner! MY BOOK = (in the tone of Amber Turd when she mocks Johnny Depp about his book). BUY MY BOOK! Bahamas. CCCZ. Scam. 10th grader. My Twitter. My past. I'm well known. I didn't contact them... but others did... because I told them to. I'm too well known." 🎵"When I talk about me I touch myself... OHHH-OHH-OHHH" 🎵 (🎵Sung in the tune of When I think About You I TOUCH MYSELF by DIVINYLS🎵) 🙉🙉🙈🙈🙈😅🤣😅😅 This was 10% about FTX, SBF, those involved, what he's come across, other things that we have all read/heard about from other sources. And 90% of this guy talking about himself... having a war between himself & his ego... while he went all Jeffery Tobin stroking himself at the computer screen... only the cameras weren't actually on for others to see... However... he probably had it on Mirror Mode so he could look at himself while he stroked himself. 🙈😅🤣😅🤣☝️

[@factsdonthavefeelingsbeawa2953]

"I didn't get paid for this. I haven't made money off exposing this SBF guy. I haven't made money shorting it. I didn't make money at all. I did it all for the good of people & for satisfaction." "OH Yeah... I've got a Pullitzer Prize author who is going to help me write a book. I'm going to write a book explaining all this & all the dirt & pieces I have on this SBF & this scam. So BUY MY BOOK. Because I didn't make any money. And I see an opportunity to make money from this because so many people were affected by this, the information is all there to gather about it all... so I'll just gather it all & hire a guy to write it into a book format. So because I didn't make money off this yet. Make sure to buy my book so that I can make money off this. Either way I've found a way to grift money from all this. BUY MY BOOK. Cause that seems to be the new grift all sorts of people are doing the last few years especially that seems to make them a lot of money. For some reason books have been around for a long time... but the last few years they seem to make a ton of money compared to 10 years ago even. So I'm hoping on the gravy train... to grease my pocket books & wallets"

[@aminubadamasi8866]

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[@MOVINGCYBER]

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[@textloatedcyberoninstagram]

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[@alexisaac3227]

A salute to this pro *LOATEDCYBER* Your act of kindness and services, so how big of heart you have for others, thanks for the recovery, I always appreciate..........

[@MOVINGCYBER]

👆I'm pretty sure *LOATEDCYBER* is the only person here who can actually do this without any complaints, I'm very grateful to him because if it wasn't for him I wouldn't have been able to recover. give me my money back.. thanks loatedcyber..........

[@aminubadamasi8866]

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[@textloatedcyberoninstagram]

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