Sam Bankman Fried will attend a New York Times summit in NYC despite what happened with FTX

Sam Bankman Fried, the notorious CEO of FTX crypto exchange is poised to appear in New York for a summit organized by the New York Times. Yes , you read that right. Instead of being behind bars or looking for ways to make his customers whole, Sam will casually appear in New York City and be one of the keynote speakers of the Dealbook summit like nothing has happened.

Let's unpack this. By filing for bankruptcy FTX and subsidiaries customers have lost more than $10 billion. People lost billions. Despite that SBF remains free in the Bahamas, a tax shelter island, where FTX International was registered.

After the FTX crash, we have seen legacy media trying to whitewash SBF by writing puff pieces about how the noble plans of a vegan philanthropist (sic) who wanted to fight COVID and poverty were halted by his company's insolvency. Nothing about the fraud he committed and how people lost their life savings.

The event where the disgraced FTX CEO will be a speaker is planned to be held on November 30th and is hosted by columnist Andrew Sorkin of NYT. The focus of the Dealbook summit is to bring together the most important actors in business, tech and policy making. Andrew Sorkin, defended his decision to not rescind the invitation of SBF by stating that "nothing is off limits" in terms of question attendants can ask Sam.

Other participants in the event include; CEOs of major tech platforms and investment firms, policy makers, heads of states, and actors. Some of the most notable include Mark Zuckerberg of Meta, Shou Chew of TikTok, Reed Hastings of Netflix, Andy Jessy of Amazon, NY Times CEO Meredith Kopit Levien, Larry Fink of BlackRock, Eric Adams Mayor of New York, Mike Pence 48th VP of the United States, US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, Volodymyr Zelensky the Prime Minister of Ukraine, & Benjamin Netanyahu former Prime Minister of Israel. The fee for those who want to attend the business summit is a whopping $2,500.

Thus, the NYT is giving Sam Bankman Fried a platform to amplify his message. I cannot fathom how he will be able to board a plane, land in NYC, attend the summit, and law enforcement agencies will do nothing and let him walk. Embezzlement, theft, and fraud are not crimes when they are done by those who have friends in power and know how to buy influence through donations, charities, and bribes.

The timing of the summit, the invitation, the media coverage of the whole FTX fiasco, and the white gloves treatment for someone who committed the biggest financial fraud since Maddof or Enron is utterly bizarre.