There’s a big difference between “we should have seen this coming” and “we should have taken steps to mitigate possible disaster.”
The fact that EA had more to lose in some ways from the FTX bust in no way provided information to predict that bust. “If professional investors missed this…” holds true whether EA had $1 or $1 billion on the line.
But there are steps EA could have taken to mitigate the fallout even without having been able to predict fraud.
For example, we could have invested in legal clarity and contingency plans in case of FTX going bankrupt or being revealed as fraudulent. It’s like wearing your seatbelt. Nobody wears a seatbelt because they predict they’re going to get in a crash. They do it because it’s a cheap and potent form of risk mitigation, without making any effort to predict the outcome on their specific trip. EA risk management should look like installing seatbelts for the movement.
I strong upvoted the comment, but I think the decentralization of the community is a real challenge as far as communicating legal matters (and to a lesser extent, certain types of contingency plans) either before or after a disaster.
Before: Suppose a leading organization in EA had commissioned a legal opinion on the effects of a major donor’s insolvency. Although the opinion is generic, it isn’t hard to figure out who is in mind. What does the organization do with the opinion? If you think the optics are bad now, imagine a world in which it got out that a major EA organization had commissioned an opinion in advance of the fraud’s discovery, shared it with FTXFF grantees, and discussed in advance what to do if there was fraud. Also, many of the actions one could take or prepare in advance to mitigate damage from a fraud or insolvency would not qualify as “cheap and potent.”
After: Suppose a leading organization in EA now commissions a legal opinion on the legal effects of the FTX insolvency and potential strategies. That’s going to be protected by attorney-client privilege. But sharing that with other organizations and grantees may be difficult to do without waiving privilege or at least jumping through some hoops.
If we had commissioned a report on contingency plans for FTX fraud (w/o predicting fraud, just saying what we’d do to mitigate the fallout if it happened) I think that would make us look prudent? Because it would have been prudent.
I’m no financial risk manager, but the point of having one is to figure out the set of things that are cost effective. I will bet a buttcheek that the number of common sense cost effective risk mitigation steps we could have taken is greater than zero.
There’s a big difference between “we should have seen this coming” and “we should have taken steps to mitigate possible disaster.”
The fact that EA had more to lose in some ways from the FTX bust in no way provided information to predict that bust. “If professional investors missed this…” holds true whether EA had $1 or $1 billion on the line.
But there are steps EA could have taken to mitigate the fallout even without having been able to predict fraud.
For example, we could have invested in legal clarity and contingency plans in case of FTX going bankrupt or being revealed as fraudulent. It’s like wearing your seatbelt. Nobody wears a seatbelt because they predict they’re going to get in a crash. They do it because it’s a cheap and potent form of risk mitigation, without making any effort to predict the outcome on their specific trip. EA risk management should look like installing seatbelts for the movement.
“Legal less murkiness” anyway!
I strong upvoted the comment, but I think the decentralization of the community is a real challenge as far as communicating legal matters (and to a lesser extent, certain types of contingency plans) either before or after a disaster.
Before: Suppose a leading organization in EA had commissioned a legal opinion on the effects of a major donor’s insolvency. Although the opinion is generic, it isn’t hard to figure out who is in mind. What does the organization do with the opinion? If you think the optics are bad now, imagine a world in which it got out that a major EA organization had commissioned an opinion in advance of the fraud’s discovery, shared it with FTXFF grantees, and discussed in advance what to do if there was fraud. Also, many of the actions one could take or prepare in advance to mitigate damage from a fraud or insolvency would not qualify as “cheap and potent.”
After: Suppose a leading organization in EA now commissions a legal opinion on the legal effects of the FTX insolvency and potential strategies. That’s going to be protected by attorney-client privilege. But sharing that with other organizations and grantees may be difficult to do without waiving privilege or at least jumping through some hoops.
If we had commissioned a report on contingency plans for FTX fraud (w/o predicting fraud, just saying what we’d do to mitigate the fallout if it happened) I think that would make us look prudent? Because it would have been prudent.
I’m no financial risk manager, but the point of having one is to figure out the set of things that are cost effective. I will bet a buttcheek that the number of common sense cost effective risk mitigation steps we could have taken is greater than zero.