Book Review: Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon by Michael Lewis
The trial of Sam Bankman-Fried has been a hot topic in the news recently. He is the founder of the cryptocurrency exchange FTX and in 2022 made Forbes’s list as one of the richest Americans. All that changed in late 2022 when FTX abruptly became bankrupt and Bankman-Fried was arrested on multiple charges including money laundering, violations of campaign finance laws, and securities, commodities, and wire fraud. At a trail in late 2023 he was convicted on all counts and now awaits sentencing.
Going Infinite follows Bankman-Fried’s early life, the founding of FTX, its rise as a cryptocurrency power, and the collapse and fall of the company and its employees. It ends with Sam’s arrest and the initiation of bankruptcy proceedings against FTX. As I finished reading it, I wished that Lewis had held off publishing it for another year and a half or so; he could have included details about Sam’s trial. Anyway, it is what it is: a fascinating look at an idiosyncratic character working in the bizarre, quirky, otherworldly realm of cryptocurrency.
I picked up the book because I was interested in learning something about the phenomenon of cryptocurrency and its iterations such as Bitcoin. However, Lewis makes it clear early on that cryptocurrency is a complex topic and he does not intend to delve into a detailed explanation of it. By that time, though, I was already hooked on the story of Sam and the rise and fall of FTX.
From the beginning, Lewis presents Sam as an incredibly rude, self-centered, and antisocial person who played video games while on important calls and ignored scheduled meetings and appearances at whim. Everywhere he went, even to business events and introductions to celebrities, he wore the same outfit of rumpled tee-shirt, cargo pants, and baggy socks. His professed attitudes towards art and literature displayed a very shallow, immature mindset. Although he was in his late twenties when he founded FTX, he considered people with adult perspectives to be “grown-ups,” and did not trust them. As Lewis writes: “The truth was that grown-ups bored him. All they did was slow him down.”
Early in his financial career, Sam became interested in Peter Singer and effective altruism, which involves following a career path that will enable the maximum benefit to others. This often means pursuing the accumulation of significant wealth that can then be given away to good causes. However, Lewis clarifies that in Sam’s circle at least, the calculation of which effective altruistic causes to support became a sort of “gonzo science fiction.” As Lewis explains, “One day some historian of effective altruism will marvel at how easily it transformed itself. It turned its back on living people without bloodshed or even, really, much shouting.” He continues: “What mattered was the math. Effective altruism never got its emotional charge from the places that charged ordinary philanthropy. It was always fueled by a cool lust for the most logical way to lead a good life.” Effective altruists, in other words, ignored, say, the plight of starving children to focus on ephemeral existential threats such as pandemics, nuclear warfare, and artificial intelligence.
Sam handled his philanthropy, political donations, and decisions concerning the running of FTX the same way he handled every aspect of his life: as a sort of elaborate video game. No one questioned his high IQ, but his employees described him as remote, uncommunicative, and unemotional. In fact, early on, when he realized that sometimes it was important that he should make a good impression, he had to consciously train his facial muscles to emote – otherwise he maintained a perplexingly blank expression at all times.
What is amazing is not that people like Sam exist, but rather that a sociopath like Sam should somehow accumulate such a vast fortune and that so many intelligent people could be persuaded to work for him at a dysfunctional company such as FTX. The entire unlikely story is like a wild rollercoaster ride, as its characters first climb the steep slope to wealth and popularity and then plunge down into the abyss of bankruptcy and censure. It’s a fascinating true tale. This book is well-written and I recommend it.
