Santa’s Naughty List Crypto Villain Edition

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For most of 2021, the crypto space reeked of desperation, with dubious (and even “legit”) figures either shamelessly shilling the possibility that something as volatile as crypto could in fact become the de facto currency. of the world, or change their social media profile pictures to an Adjective Animal NFT which more than often, as the name suggests, looked suspiciously like some top notch NFT.

Boosted by a bull run, investors blindly meddled in dog-themed tokens, VCs sputtered and prayed, and the metaverse was suddenly a tangible place to live and work.

Then came Web2.5, born out of the sudden realization that Web3 was not going to be a walk in the park. It’s basically the industry saying, “Look, we’ve exploded disproportionately, and we’re probably not going to get there, so let’s just tell everyone that halfway is enough for now.”

And then in 2022, some of crypto’s biggest smart alecs decided to go all out on Wolf of Wall St in the market, sending it into a death spiral and breaking countless hearts and banks in the process. .

As the year draws to a close, let’s review the list of crypto supervillains who pooped on the much-missed 2021 bullfight and are definitely not getting any presents from Santa this Christmas.

Do Kwon – TerraForm Laboratories

This pompous, Kim Jong Un-looking MF is one of the main reasons our crypto portfolios are down 70% this year. Kwon’s Algorithmic-I-Don’t-Even-Know-How-Stablecoin TerraUSD (UST) Suddenly Turned Unstable Overnight, Causing Perpetually Anxious Crypto Markets to Panic Attack, Then Complete Cardiac Arrest .

What made matters worse was the fact that the Luna Foundation Guard (LFG) and Do Kwon had purchased large amounts of bitcoins (believed to be somewhere around 80,000 BTC) to store in reserves, if the ‘UST was to come off, which meant that their sale only exacerbated the stock market crash.

Kwon once said: I don’t debate poor people on Twitter, and sorry I don’t have a change on me for her at the moment. He was responding to British economist Francesca Coppela’s tweet that self-correcting mechanisms such as those adopted by the UST would likely fail if large numbers of investors suddenly headed for the exit door.

Read more: You’re not answering the question: Laura Shin Grills Do Kwon

On the surface, Kwon’s arrogance contributed to Terra’s downfall because he refused to acknowledge the flaws in Terra’s ecosystem. But one can’t help but wonder if he genuinely believed in Terra’s success, or maybe it was just an elaborate facade to cover up the fact that he deliberately planted the rifts in the armor. of Terras.

Read more: Su Zhu and Do Kwon take a stand against SBF for market manipulation

The crypto winter was sparked by the fall of Terra, so the only gift Kwon deserves is a visit from the police.

Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) and his girlfriend Caroline Ellison – FTX

Crypto ends the year with a new final boss: former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried.

FTX’s problems first came to light when a private financial document reviewed by CoinDesk revealed that its sister company Alameda would have a balance sheet full of FTX tokens “FTT”, which meant that the hedge fund was essentially based on a self-conjuring token, not an independent asset like fiat currency. Alameda was reportedly run by Caroline Allison, a self-proclaimed “Potterhead” who is also believed to be SBF’s ex-girlfriend.

Despite news of the Coindesk allegations, SBF has been seen busy playing League of Legends. In a screenshot circulating on Twitter, it appeared that SBF logged into the game amid FTX’s initial chaos and played multiple games for a collective duration of over an hour over 24 hours.

FTX then collapsed under the weight of $32 billion in risky bets, with the company eventually filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the United States.

Any apology from me would ring hollow, nobody gives a fuck right now, I don’t know, it’s complicated, it is what it is, Bankman-Fried said in an interview with the pitcher crypto alert Tiffany Fong.

As reported earlier today, SBF is set to be remanded to the infamous Fox Hill Jail in the Bahamas. We wonder what kind of “gifts” SBF would soon be getting there…probably just the Epstein treatment. It’s like that.

Su Zhu & Kyle Davies – Three Arrows Capital (3AC)

Founded by Su Zhu and Kyle Davies in 2012, 3AC was one of the largest crypto hedge funds, with stakes in some of the industry’s top players including Terra (LUNA), BlockFi, and Deribit.

However, the founders’ ego grew with the size of the fund and 3AC began taking risky bets. When Terra finally collapsed in May, a domino effect set in and 3AC failed to meet its margin calls. It then became insolvent and was unable to repay its $665 million loan from Voyager Digital, causing the crypto brokerage to file for bankruptcy. About 27 companies were reportedly exposed to 3AC, and its collapse only aggravated the contagion triggered by the fall of Terra (LUNA).

Zhu and Davies’ fates remain a mystery after their respective businesses and coins collapse. Neither has yet been held fully accountable for their crimes and has taken an uncooperative and evasive stance with law enforcement. However, the pair suddenly resurfaced on Twitter and even adopted self-righteous personas to weigh in on FTX’s collapse.

Read more: Su Zhu and Do Kwon take a stand against SBF for market manipulation

No freebies for being a hypocrite.

Alex Mashinsky – Celsius Network

The Terra implosion saw crypto markets take an initial plunge between May and June this year, triggering a series of bank-style pullbacks from crypto lender Celsius Network – likely the winter’s first casualty. crypto ignoring Terra (LUNA).

In July, the company finally announced that it had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Court documents spanning more than 14,500 pages have revealed that Celsius Network executives withdrew substantial funds before stopping withdrawals for users of the platforms.

The document, uploaded by Gizmodo, shows transactions for all Celsius users, including purchases, withdrawals and interest earned. Former CEO Alex Mashinsky and ex-CSO Daniel Leon had been accused of withdrawing $17 million between May and June 2022, before the withdrawal was suspended and the company went bankrupt.

The document also revealed that Mashinsky’s wife withdrew more than US$2 million on May 31.

FTX was even interested in making a deal with Celsius but walked away due to the state of its finances, two sources told The Block. The platform had a $2 billion hole in its balance sheet and FTX found the company too much to handle, one of the sources told the publication.

In September, Mashinsky resigned from his post, saying his role as CEO had become a “growing distraction”.

No freebies for being sleazy and abandoning ship.

Changpeng Zhao (CZ)’s “Not so bad but still a little sus” list – Binance

Don’t be fooled by CZ’s understanding smile and cute little bald head.

CZ is currently the most powerful middleman in crypto, an ironic statement considering that crypto is supposed to be about decentralization and self-custody.

You have to give it to the guy. Before the market downturn, CZ was worth US$96 billion (by the way, so much for a crypto being a fairer form of funding), and with what was arguably its biggest competitor now sitting in a Bahamian jail cell. , CZ and Binance are set to dominate further.

Right now, if Binance were to crash, BTC would likely drop to 0 within minutes. The bad news is that investors are actually growing nervous about the stock market’s unsatisfactory reserve evidence, after the Wall Street Journal identified a number of red flags in the report.

CZ isn’t “villain” yet, but it’s entirely possible he’s the secret “Bond Villain” of crypto now.

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