0:15

Push Kim.

0:18

Hello listeners. If you've been enjoying our coverage

0:20

of the trial of Sam Bankman Freed so far and

0:23

are looking to dive even deeper into Sam's

0:25

past, you should take a listen to Wondery in Bloomberg's

0:28

podcast Spellcaster, the

0:30

Fall of Sam Bankman Freed. His

0:33

fall from grace represents one of the most spectacular

0:35

failures of corporate controls in American

0:37

history. Here interviews with Sam

0:39

Bankman Freed himself and his former girlfriend

0:42

and business partner, Caroline Ellison, who

0:44

later admitted something had gone very

0:46

wrong inside their operation. From

0:50

Bloomberg and Wondery comes Spelcaster, hosted

0:53

by Bloomberg reporter Hannah Miller, now

0:56

with an all new bonus episode that takes you

0:58

inside the courtroom at Sam Bankman Fried's

1:00

trial, including expert analysis,

1:02

what to watch for, and more behind

1:04

the scenes reporting. Here's

1:06

a clip from Spelcaster. Follow

1:09

Spellcaster on the Wondery app or

1:11

wherever you get your podcasts.

1:23

The Baja Maar Resort is a gargantuan

1:25

hotel on a gorgeous stretch

1:28

of Bahama's beach front. You

1:30

enter by crossing a Roman style bridge

1:33

over a landscaped lake where

1:35

every night there's a glitzy fountain

1:37

show with pulsing lights and extremely

1:39

loud music. It's like the Bellagio

1:42

on the Caribbean. Take

1:45

In Climb checked into the Baha mar one

1:47

afternoon in April of twenty twenty

1:49

two.

1:50

So you arrive and there's a fish

1:52

tank behind the check and dusk.

1:53

A big vertical tank filled with lionfish.

1:56

To be more specific, there were signs

1:58

for Cryptobahamas everywhere. It really

2:00

felt like the whole island was kind of buzzing

2:02

about this event.

2:04

Tagan was a twenty nine year old crypto entrepreneur

2:06

and influencer. She'd done a lot

2:08

of these crypto conferences before, but

2:10

she didn't know much about this one called

2:12

Crypto Bahamas, other than that it was

2:14

invite only and she'd agreed to speak

2:17

the event.

2:18

It almost had this dark fantasy Disneyland

2:20

Vegas vibe to it, and

2:22

it really felt surreal from the moment that I

2:24

landed.

2:25

She got her badge and was directed toward

2:27

the VIP reception. She

2:29

walked out on the hotel lawn to find a

2:31

small gathering of people surrounded by

2:34

cabanas and giant video screens.

2:36

A local marching band played in the background.

2:39

There was one big table. It was a long,

2:41

rectangular table set for about sixty

2:43

people, So we kind of cull us in the middle

2:45

of that table and we all talked together.

2:48

It was a three course meal, no caviat

2:50

but definitely nice food.

2:52

The guests took turns introducing themselves.

2:55

There were a lot of the usual suspects

2:57

hedge, fun guy, venture capital dude,

3:00

crypto bro. Then a woman

3:02

sat down at the table.

3:03

She came with two guys and

3:06

they were very nice. They apologized for being late to

3:08

the dinner.

3:09

Can recognize the woman right away. It

3:11

was Katy Perry has an international

3:14

pop superstar, Katy Perry. Then

3:16

the guy next to her spoke of.

3:18

He said, I got famous from

3:20

my role playing legalist and Lord of the Rings,

3:22

and it was actually Orlando Bloom.

3:24

But for this crowd, Katy Perry

3:26

and Orlando Bloom weren't the biggest

3:29

celebrities there. The

3:31

next morning, Michael Lewis, the

3:34

world renowned business journalist, sat

3:36

on stage with an awkward looking thirty

3:39

year old guy with a mop of curly

3:41

hair, wearing shorts and a

3:43

baggy T shirt.

3:44

Three years ago, nobody knew who you were, and

3:47

now you're sitting on the cover of magazines

3:49

and you're a gazillionaire and you're.

3:52

This was who people were here to see, the

3:54

co founder and CEO of FTX,

3:57

one of the world's largest crypto

3:59

exchanges. He was a billionaire

4:02

many times over, a prolific

4:04

political donor, a boundary

4:07

breaking philanthropist, and he does

4:09

it all in just a few years.

4:11

These are world This is your

4:13

breaking land speed records, and

4:15

I don't think people are really noticing what's

4:18

happened, just how dramatic the

4:20

revolution has become. There's a status

4:22

of people that's going on in the financial world, and

4:24

you're sitting right in the.

4:25

Middle of it. Sam Bankman

4:28

Freed.

4:29

Yeah, I mean basically, And I think

4:32

the way that sort of I approached it was

4:34

like, what should the

4:36

product be like?

4:38

You know, Lewis has written some of the definitive

4:40

business books of the past forty years,

4:43

Moneyball, Liar's Poker, and The

4:45

Big Short. He has spent

4:47

a lifetime sorting businesses,

4:49

good guys from the Charlatans, and

4:52

on stage at least he sounded impressed

4:55

by what Sam Bankman Freed had accomplished.

4:58

And Sam didn't just sit with Michael Lewis.

5:01

He was everywhere. He shared

5:03

the stage with former President Bill Clinton

5:05

and former British Prime Minister Tony

5:07

Blair. He had an intimate heart

5:10

to heart with Tom Brady, and

5:12

then another with the quarterback's then wife,

5:15

Giselle Bunschin, the Brazilian supermodel.

5:17

Oh that's just done, you

5:20

know, I mean, ultimately, the

5:23

scale of impact you can have on

5:25

the world is just really, really large.

5:28

Sam was beyond awkward. His leg

5:31

bounced wildly as he spoke, his

5:33

eyes darted around the room, and.

5:36

You know, that's I think what really sets

5:38

it apart.

5:39

His audience didn't seem to care. His

5:42

awkwardness came off as a kind of charm

5:45

like he was totally indifferent to what

5:47

people thought about it, and they

5:49

lapped it up, especially

5:52

when he talked about his driving motivation

5:55

doing good. Sam

5:57

had promised to give all of his wealth away,

6:00

all twenty six billion dollars

6:02

of it.

6:02

The Ftech Foundation's recent announcement

6:05

to give up to one billion dollars this

6:07

year alone to high impact chair parties

6:09

show how Sam is transforming corporate

6:12

governance and becoming the modern day CEO

6:14

that the world needs today.

6:16

We'll discuss on stage with Giselle.

6:19

Salmon bailed a new ad showing him

6:21

standing with his arms crossed with

6:23

a calmly confident, even virtuous

6:26

expression on his face. He wore

6:28

a hoodie and shorts. The quote

6:30

on his ad said, I'm in on crypto

6:33

because I want to make the biggest global

6:35

impact for good.

6:47

Taigan Klein had never seen anything

6:49

like it.

6:50

I think a lot of people were kind of in awe.

6:52

The crowd was captivated by Sam's

6:55

good intentions, by the celebrities

6:57

and world leaders he kept company

6:59

with, and the sheer scale of

7:01

his promises.

7:02

And this is where I realized that it

7:05

was kind of the Sam Show.

7:07

The Sam Show. The spring

7:09

of twenty twenty two, Crypto

7:11

was booming and Sam Bankman Freed

7:14

was the star. At one point,

7:17

FTX said it was processing on average,

7:20

twelve and a half billion dollars

7:22

worth of transactions each day, and

7:25

it was all Sam claimed in the name

7:27

of one day giving his fortune away

7:29

to save the world. Then,

7:32

not long after his star turn in the

7:34

Bahamas, The Sam Show

7:37

began a very different season.

7:40

Competitors and regulators began

7:42

to circle Crypto prices

7:44

were falling. Behind the scenes,

7:47

Sam's closest advisors were

7:49

abandoning him. At the same

7:51

time, my colleagues at Bloomberg

7:53

started poking at the myth of Sam

7:56

Bankman freed, and we published

7:58

stories about it. We weren't the only

8:00

ones, but even we couldn't imagine

8:02

the full scale of what was wrong inside

8:05

Sam's empire. By

8:07

year's end, FTX was bankrupt,

8:10

eight billion dollars were missing, and

8:13

Sam was in handcuffs. Investors,

8:16

prosecutors, lawyers, and crypto

8:18

fans were all left to figure

8:20

out what was real and what

8:23

wasn't.

8:31

Bingja episodes of Spellcaster ad

8:33

free right now by joining Wondery

8:36

Plus in the Wondery app or

8:38

on Apple podcasts.