Welcome to the EA Forum! I appreciate you sharing your thoughts and using this forum to engage with the EA community.
I’ll use my own number system separate from yours so it doesn’t get too confusing if you want to respond.
1. To summarize my personal thoughts, it’s plausible that people should return unspent money (I’m mostly unsure but lean towards disagree). But if what you’re saying is that people should return FTX Future Fund money that they’ve spent (and therefore go into personal debt), I disagree.
2. Regarding your #5, could you give examples of people giving “zero empathy for the individuals who put money/crypto on the FTX exchange and then were criminally defrauded by FTX”? And could you give examples of “Those people do not seem to count to the EA community”? I feel like most posts I’ve read about this have mentioned people feeling terrible about the effects on innocent people who lost money to FTX. I agree that the harm suffered by them is far greater than any harm to the EA community.
For some examples off the top of my head, there’s the Future Fund team’s post (“Our hearts go out to the thousands of FTX customers whose finances may have been jeopardized or destroyed.”), Michel’s post (“people’s lives got ruined...”), Will’s post (”… that may cost many thousands of people their savings...”), evhub’s post (“People’s life savings and careers...”), Rob Wiblin’s post (“Most importantly FTX’s depositors… may lose savings they and their families were relying on...”), and Rethink Priorities’ Leadership Statement (“many customers are unable to retrieve funds held by FTX”).
3. It would help if you could spell out your exact logic here. The next few questions are sub-questions/specifics I fail to understand. Feel free to answer them specifically or just spell out your logic cohesively if you think that would answer all my questions.
3a. I (and every EA I’m aware of) agree that depositors in FTX who’ve lost their money are victims here. If FTX Future Fund recipients paid back all their money (including spent money), most would be in financial problems and be victims as well. What good would that do? And why should the recipients pay back the money and not the organizations that they paid their money to?
3a. How does this apply to money that had been spent before the FTX news came out? Many individuals or organizations would need to pay back thousands (or tens of thousands) of dollars that they don’t have. FTX grantees who would face financial ruin as a result would also be victims here.
3c. Would you then agree that all organizations and celebrities that were paid by FTX should pay back whatever money they got? Including sponsorships like the Miami Heat, TSM (the e-sports team), and Stephen Curry? And the electrical company and janitors in the Bahamas paid by FTX? And other employees of FTX (uninvolved and unaware of the scandal) who received a salary?
3d. If your answer to 3c is that some parties shouldn’t have to pay back money, then why? I really encourage you to think about why this should apply to the people and organizations who used or are using the money they received to fund charitable causes. Why is the financial burden on them?
3e. Is your logic affected by how the amount of money FTX grantees received compares to the amount of money owed to depositors? By my best findings, it seems like over $8 billion is owed back (New York Times, “The run on FTX...”), and the FTX Foundation gave away $140 million (New York Times, “as recently as last month...”). $140 mil divided by $8 bil is just under 2%. If all that $140 million is given back, then 98% of money owed will be remaining. The vast majority of depositors will still be financial affected, and now suddenly hundreds (if not more) of recipients of FTX Foundation grants will be financially affected.
I don’t think 3e is convincing, both because it doesn’t account for other potential revenue streams for the bankruptcy estate and because partial recompense is still valuable. Also, as to much of the funds in question, the grantees are still in a position to avoid or at least manage financial loss. A grantee’s continued interest in working on a cause that is important to them just isn’t in the same category as a depositor’s interest in recovering monies stolen from them. Nor is a larger organization’s desire not to cancel initiatives that it was planning on due to the FTX money. Collasping the effect of the fraud into a binary of “financially affected” / “not financially affected” and counting noses doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me.
Would you be asking 3e—and would your own answer be the same—if FTX had made the grants to opera organizations and opera singers in the United States? I think there have been at least a few posts (not by you, to my recollection) that strongly suggest the author is applying a different standard to EA grantees than they would to opera grantees. I think it problematic if the answer to whether money should be returned changes much based on the nature of the charity. Such a stance will generally imply that we have some sort of right to tell crime victims that they will have to be involuntary donors because the cause is so important in our eyes as to justify them making that sacrifice.
I think you are correct that, as a practical matter, there is a difference between FTX grant money that has already been spent and grant money that is unspent. Unspent money should be returned. It would be asking too much for grant recipients to also return money already spent. That would be ideal but it is unrealistic.
3c. Janitors? Please. That is a false equivalency equating grant recipients with janitors. Grant recipients didn’t scrub any toilets or empty any trash cans at FTX. Instead, grant recipients were given a gift of money from FTX. This is another example of misdirection and searching around for a rationalization to keep the tainted grant money, it is an unseemly form of what-aboutism. “But, what about the janitors?” Let the janitors figure out what they want to do. What are the grant recipients going to do?
As for the celebrity endorsers, of course they should return all the money they were paid. They affirmatively helped lure more depositors into the scheme. But again, that’s a separate issue from the EA grant recipients.
3e. Is someone seriously arguing that because the amount of FTX grants was ‘only’ $140 million the money should not be returned because it’s only a fraction of the stolen $8 billion? That is an unworthy and unseemly argument. “Hey, I’m only going to keep a portion of the stolen money, so it’s okay.” If that argument is indeed advanced then the moral compass has been tossed overboard and the ship is being intentionally run onto the reef.
Grant recipients didn’t scrub any toilets or empty any trash cans at FTX. Instead, grant recipients were given a gift of money from FTX. This is another example of misdirection and searching around for a rationalization to keep the tainted grant money, it is an unseemly form of what-aboutism.
I would push back against this. Grant recipients were given money to carry out a job. They were not given money unconditionally, which is what a gift is. So I think you still need to spell out the underlying principle here.
Well, if doing the right thing isn’t enough in itself to convince grant recipients (see ARC’s commendable statement that they are returning their $1.25 million grant) then how about wanting to stay out of prison.
Right now FTX grant recipients are relying on the fig leaf that FTX and/or its former executives have not yet been been charged or convicted of criminally defrauding (embezzling from) FTX’s depositors.
But even at this point grant recipients are on notice that their grant money likely was stolen funds. If criminal convictions are obtained, this will be cemented—the money is stolen property.
Therefore, grant recipients who possess stolen funds (grants from FTX made with stolen money) are on the cusp of potentially committing a crime themselves if they refuse to return it—the crime of retaining known stolen property. It matters not that they did not know at the time they received it that it was stolen. They know now and yet are retaining the money rather than returning the money to its rightful owners.
In many jurisdictions retaining know stolen property is a crime (not talking about receiving stolen property—there you do have to know at the time you received it that it was stolen; talking about retaining known stolen property once you know it is stolen—that is an independent crime). Look for example at Model Penal Code 223.6(1) “A person is guilty of theft if he purposely … retains or disposes of … property of another knowing that it has been stolen, or believing that it probably has been stolen, unless the property is … retained, or disposed with purpose to restore it to the owner.”
Imagine you are a grant recipient, and in two years are in court trying to explain why you kept the grant money and then spent it, after you were on notice that it was likely stolen funds.
Right now there is a window where people can freely choose to do the right thing, or not. That window will likely close, and then the discussion will reduce to return the money or potentially commit a crime and go to jail.
(Again, I have have never owned or speculated in any cryptocurrency, and I have no connections whatsoever with FTX or any crypto business—I do not have a dog in this fight.)
Hi OP,
Welcome to the EA Forum! I appreciate you sharing your thoughts and using this forum to engage with the EA community.
I’ll use my own number system separate from yours so it doesn’t get too confusing if you want to respond.
1. To summarize my personal thoughts, it’s plausible that people should return unspent money (I’m mostly unsure but lean towards disagree). But if what you’re saying is that people should return FTX Future Fund money that they’ve spent (and therefore go into personal debt), I disagree.
2. Regarding your #5, could you give examples of people giving “zero empathy for the individuals who put money/crypto on the FTX exchange and then were criminally defrauded by FTX”? And could you give examples of “Those people do not seem to count to the EA community”? I feel like most posts I’ve read about this have mentioned people feeling terrible about the effects on innocent people who lost money to FTX. I agree that the harm suffered by them is far greater than any harm to the EA community.
For some examples off the top of my head, there’s the Future Fund team’s post (“Our hearts go out to the thousands of FTX customers whose finances may have been jeopardized or destroyed.”), Michel’s post (“people’s lives got ruined...”), Will’s post (”… that may cost many thousands of people their savings...”), evhub’s post (“People’s life savings and careers...”), Rob Wiblin’s post (“Most importantly FTX’s depositors… may lose savings they and their families were relying on...”), and Rethink Priorities’ Leadership Statement (“many customers are unable to retrieve funds held by FTX”).
3. It would help if you could spell out your exact logic here. The next few questions are sub-questions/specifics I fail to understand. Feel free to answer them specifically or just spell out your logic cohesively if you think that would answer all my questions.
3a. I (and every EA I’m aware of) agree that depositors in FTX who’ve lost their money are victims here. If FTX Future Fund recipients paid back all their money (including spent money), most would be in financial problems and be victims as well. What good would that do? And why should the recipients pay back the money and not the organizations that they paid their money to?
3a. How does this apply to money that had been spent before the FTX news came out? Many individuals or organizations would need to pay back thousands (or tens of thousands) of dollars that they don’t have. FTX grantees who would face financial ruin as a result would also be victims here.
3c. Would you then agree that all organizations and celebrities that were paid by FTX should pay back whatever money they got? Including sponsorships like the Miami Heat, TSM (the e-sports team), and Stephen Curry? And the electrical company and janitors in the Bahamas paid by FTX? And other employees of FTX (uninvolved and unaware of the scandal) who received a salary?
3d. If your answer to 3c is that some parties shouldn’t have to pay back money, then why? I really encourage you to think about why this should apply to the people and organizations who used or are using the money they received to fund charitable causes. Why is the financial burden on them?
3e. Is your logic affected by how the amount of money FTX grantees received compares to the amount of money owed to depositors? By my best findings, it seems like over $8 billion is owed back (New York Times, “The run on FTX...”), and the FTX Foundation gave away $140 million (New York Times, “as recently as last month...”). $140 mil divided by $8 bil is just under 2%. If all that $140 million is given back, then 98% of money owed will be remaining. The vast majority of depositors will still be financial affected, and now suddenly hundreds (if not more) of recipients of FTX Foundation grants will be financially affected.
Thank you!
I don’t think 3e is convincing, both because it doesn’t account for other potential revenue streams for the bankruptcy estate and because partial recompense is still valuable. Also, as to much of the funds in question, the grantees are still in a position to avoid or at least manage financial loss. A grantee’s continued interest in working on a cause that is important to them just isn’t in the same category as a depositor’s interest in recovering monies stolen from them. Nor is a larger organization’s desire not to cancel initiatives that it was planning on due to the FTX money. Collasping the effect of the fraud into a binary of “financially affected” / “not financially affected” and counting noses doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me.
Would you be asking 3e—and would your own answer be the same—if FTX had made the grants to opera organizations and opera singers in the United States? I think there have been at least a few posts (not by you, to my recollection) that strongly suggest the author is applying a different standard to EA grantees than they would to opera grantees. I think it problematic if the answer to whether money should be returned changes much based on the nature of the charity. Such a stance will generally imply that we have some sort of right to tell crime victims that they will have to be involuntary donors because the cause is so important in our eyes as to justify them making that sacrifice.
I think you are correct that, as a practical matter, there is a difference between FTX grant money that has already been spent and grant money that is unspent. Unspent money should be returned. It would be asking too much for grant recipients to also return money already spent. That would be ideal but it is unrealistic.
3c. Janitors? Please. That is a false equivalency equating grant recipients with janitors. Grant recipients didn’t scrub any toilets or empty any trash cans at FTX. Instead, grant recipients were given a gift of money from FTX. This is another example of misdirection and searching around for a rationalization to keep the tainted grant money, it is an unseemly form of what-aboutism. “But, what about the janitors?” Let the janitors figure out what they want to do. What are the grant recipients going to do?
As for the celebrity endorsers, of course they should return all the money they were paid. They affirmatively helped lure more depositors into the scheme. But again, that’s a separate issue from the EA grant recipients.
3e. Is someone seriously arguing that because the amount of FTX grants was ‘only’ $140 million the money should not be returned because it’s only a fraction of the stolen $8 billion? That is an unworthy and unseemly argument. “Hey, I’m only going to keep a portion of the stolen money, so it’s okay.” If that argument is indeed advanced then the moral compass has been tossed overboard and the ship is being intentionally run onto the reef.
I would push back against this. Grant recipients were given money to carry out a job. They were not given money unconditionally, which is what a gift is. So I think you still need to spell out the underlying principle here.
Well, if doing the right thing isn’t enough in itself to convince grant recipients (see ARC’s commendable statement that they are returning their $1.25 million grant) then how about wanting to stay out of prison.
Right now FTX grant recipients are relying on the fig leaf that FTX and/or its former executives have not yet been been charged or convicted of criminally defrauding (embezzling from) FTX’s depositors.
But even at this point grant recipients are on notice that their grant money likely was stolen funds. If criminal convictions are obtained, this will be cemented—the money is stolen property.
Therefore, grant recipients who possess stolen funds (grants from FTX made with stolen money) are on the cusp of potentially committing a crime themselves if they refuse to return it—the crime of retaining known stolen property. It matters not that they did not know at the time they received it that it was stolen. They know now and yet are retaining the money rather than returning the money to its rightful owners.
In many jurisdictions retaining know stolen property is a crime (not talking about receiving stolen property—there you do have to know at the time you received it that it was stolen; talking about retaining known stolen property once you know it is stolen—that is an independent crime). Look for example at Model Penal Code 223.6(1) “A person is guilty of theft if he purposely … retains or disposes of … property of another knowing that it has been stolen, or believing that it probably has been stolen, unless the property is … retained, or disposed with purpose to restore it to the owner.”
Imagine you are a grant recipient, and in two years are in court trying to explain why you kept the grant money and then spent it, after you were on notice that it was likely stolen funds.
Right now there is a window where people can freely choose to do the right thing, or not. That window will likely close, and then the discussion will reduce to return the money or potentially commit a crime and go to jail.
(Again, I have have never owned or speculated in any cryptocurrency, and I have no connections whatsoever with FTX or any crypto business—I do not have a dog in this fight.)