Regarding the secondary debt holders, my position is that FTX didn’t have the right to disperse the funds, and so the grantees who might have custody of the money currently don’t have any right to try to intervene in the outcome. Now, I use the term “rights” here, but really that’s just a shorthand for the rule utilitarianism I mentioned in the original post. I don’t believe in natural rights or something. I just think that society needs to coordinate around clear principles for things like property, and actions which go against those principles are almost always net bad.
So, the people with the title to the debt via the secondary market have the right and proper claim to the property. The people who are holding the property shouldn’t try to do anything but get out of the way.
When it comes to Anthropic, I’ve just seen from your profile that you work there. I understand that you might know much more about the situation, and also that you might not be able to comment on it.
Based on the information that’s available (which might paint a misleading picture), I’d say that SBF also didn’t have the right to make the investment into Anthropic. So it seems to me that the right thing for Anthropic to do would be to offer to buy back their shares. I think they should not prefer to have $500m in stolen money as investment capital. They should prefer to get their equity back and find another investor.
Again, I accept that there could be a lot of specifics about the situation that aren’t public, or where the information that’s available is wrong or misleading. But I do strongly believe that Anthropic needs to come forward and explain its position. So far the company hasn’t said anything at all in response to this.
Re the secondary debt holders, to me there are two different questions here. One of them is obeying whatever outcome of legal proceedings happens, where I think we both agree that people should fully obey the law. But the second is whether you should go above and beyond and be unsolicitedly cooperative with the legal proceedings, try to proactively allow money to be clawed back, etc. I agree that living in a society with strong, functional property rights is important, but don’t think that people going above and beyond in a complex situation like this is a core part of what makes property rights work (and, indeed, any system relying on that would have less reliable property rights!)
The people who are holding the property shouldn’t try to do anything but get out of the way.
I vibe with this, but to me this implies the first but not the second.
Re Anthropic, I used to work there, but left well before the FTX crisis, and have no particular position on those questions. I just think they’re a sufficiently different category to be worth clearly distinguishing from Future Fund donations to non-profits.
Anthropic is in a different category for a number of reasons. I believe FTX got something of value (equity in Anthropic) in exchange for the $500MM. If $500MM was in fact a reasonable market value for that equity at the time of the transaction, I don’t think Anthropic has any moral obligations here. It gave something of equal value to FTX for what it got. No one would argue that Pepsi has a moral obligation to repay FTX or its creditors if FTX had invested in Pepsi stock at fair market value and then that stock lost value. Of course, if the Anthropic share is worth more than $500MM, the estate can sell it and make some money.
On the other hand, if $500MM wasn’t a reasonable value for the equity share at the time of transfer, then I would view the portion of the $500MM that exceeded FMV as a de facto gift that needs to be returned.
Regarding the secondary debt holders, my position is that FTX didn’t have the right to disperse the funds, and so the grantees who might have custody of the money currently don’t have any right to try to intervene in the outcome. Now, I use the term “rights” here, but really that’s just a shorthand for the rule utilitarianism I mentioned in the original post. I don’t believe in natural rights or something. I just think that society needs to coordinate around clear principles for things like property, and actions which go against those principles are almost always net bad.
So, the people with the title to the debt via the secondary market have the right and proper claim to the property. The people who are holding the property shouldn’t try to do anything but get out of the way.
When it comes to Anthropic, I’ve just seen from your profile that you work there. I understand that you might know much more about the situation, and also that you might not be able to comment on it.
Based on the information that’s available (which might paint a misleading picture), I’d say that SBF also didn’t have the right to make the investment into Anthropic. So it seems to me that the right thing for Anthropic to do would be to offer to buy back their shares. I think they should not prefer to have $500m in stolen money as investment capital. They should prefer to get their equity back and find another investor.
Again, I accept that there could be a lot of specifics about the situation that aren’t public, or where the information that’s available is wrong or misleading. But I do strongly believe that Anthropic needs to come forward and explain its position. So far the company hasn’t said anything at all in response to this.
Re the secondary debt holders, to me there are two different questions here. One of them is obeying whatever outcome of legal proceedings happens, where I think we both agree that people should fully obey the law. But the second is whether you should go above and beyond and be unsolicitedly cooperative with the legal proceedings, try to proactively allow money to be clawed back, etc. I agree that living in a society with strong, functional property rights is important, but don’t think that people going above and beyond in a complex situation like this is a core part of what makes property rights work (and, indeed, any system relying on that would have less reliable property rights!)
I vibe with this, but to me this implies the first but not the second.
Re Anthropic, I used to work there, but left well before the FTX crisis, and have no particular position on those questions. I just think they’re a sufficiently different category to be worth clearly distinguishing from Future Fund donations to non-profits.
Anthropic is in a different category for a number of reasons. I believe FTX got something of value (equity in Anthropic) in exchange for the $500MM. If $500MM was in fact a reasonable market value for that equity at the time of the transaction, I don’t think Anthropic has any moral obligations here. It gave something of equal value to FTX for what it got. No one would argue that Pepsi has a moral obligation to repay FTX or its creditors if FTX had invested in Pepsi stock at fair market value and then that stock lost value. Of course, if the Anthropic share is worth more than $500MM, the estate can sell it and make some money.
On the other hand, if $500MM wasn’t a reasonable value for the equity share at the time of transfer, then I would view the portion of the $500MM that exceeded FMV as a de facto gift that needs to be returned.