FTX之后，谁能成为加密货币世界的新明星？

IN JULY, THE GIANT cryptocurrency derivatives exchange FTX looked like a pillar of stability. The company and its slacker-chic founder, Sam Bankman-Fried, projected calm and confidence during so-called Crypto Winter, even swooping in to rescue weaker rivals.

That facade crumbled in just a few days in November. First, the value of FTX’s in-house token cratered; then FTX was in talks to be acquired by a rival; then it declared bankruptcy as the rival walked away. It was a stunning turn of events for a company that had been valued at over $30 billion, one regarded as a best-in-breed firm that could bring crypto into the mainstream of American finance.

The worst was still to come. FTX appears to have engaged in a massive fraud, lying to investors and looting customer funds, all while operating without board oversight or even basic financial controls. The 30-year-old Bankman-Fried had charmed investors, politicians, and the media (including, yes, Fortune: We put him on our August/ September 2022 cover), but he came to be seen as a curly-headed cross between Elizabeth Holmes and Bernie Madoff.

Numerous regulatory and criminal investigations were underway as this story went to press. (Bankman-Fried has said on social media that he “fucked up,” but insisted he was naive, not nefarious.) Still, as investors and regulators scramble to determine how a massive fraud occurred right under their noses, it’s not too early to take stock of what we’ve learned.

HARD LESSONS

It’s easy to spot a scam in hindsight, and with FTX, the signs were all there: the lack of a board, the refusal to share basic accounting documents with the press or financial backers, a CEO who reveled in playing League of Legends during investor meetings. The harder question is how people who should have known better—including experienced hands like those at prestigious VC firm Sequoia Capital and the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan—missed those red flags.

The best answer is that in the rush to snag a piece of the next big thing, basic safeguards and skepticism were thrown aside. Investment firms, reluctant to miss a hot deal, cut corners on vetting. Sequoia invested $210 mil- lion in an FTX Series B round and commissioned a puffy 14,000-word profile titled “Sam Bankman-Fried Has a Savior Complex—and Maybe You Should Too.” Now the firm is probably wishing it had spent some of that marketing money on a forensic accountant. (Sequoia apologized to investors and said it would beef up its auditing; OTPP said in a statement, “no due diligence process can uncover all risks.”)

It’s obvious now that the firms throwing money at Bankman-Fried should have done the humdrum work of due diligence and demanded a hand in overseeing the company. But FTX raised most of its financing in 2021, when it seemed like crypto prices could only go up. Under such circumstances, it’s all too easy for founders to get funded with few or no strings attached.

Media and politicians, meanwhile, gullibly accepted Bankman-Fried at face value—perhaps because he was a major contributor to Democratic causes. His earnest-sounding but fuzzy plans to give his money away through “effective altruism” also made him a refreshing contrast to the crypto-bro stereotype. As for FTX customers, who have lost millions in savings, it is hard to fault them, given that the company had run Super Bowl ads and gathered endorsements from the likes of Tom Brady, Steph Curry, and Larry David.

Then there is the question of transparency— something that FTX and many of its peers conspicuously lack. Blockchain, ironically, is a technology that can allow an unprecedented level of visibility into ledgers and accounts. Yet FTX nonetheless was able to conceal its many misdeeds through a web of 130 offshore entities. In response to the debacle, there is a clamor in the crypto world for companies to furnish “proof of reserves”—a standard that at a minimum should require firms to show that customer funds are safe, in a way that does not require a Ph.D. in cryptography to understand.

WHAT COMES NEXT

The White House, members of Congress, and agency heads have vowed to bring the crypto industry to heel, and some progressives have suggested they would be happy to destroy crypto once and for all. But it should be possible to fashion a response that will prevent another FTX while allowing the best parts of blockchain to flourish. Industry advocates argue that the SEC’s current “regulation by enforcement” tactics, which many decry as vague and unpredictable, should be replaced with clear rules that define when a crypto-currency is a security.

Another move that could help crypto thrive in a safer way: allowing crypto-based financial products like ETFs and interest-bearing loans to exist, albeit under clear rules governing how they operate.

The financial toll of the FTX scandal will reach far beyond its own customers; crypto-lender BlockFi and a series of other crypto firms, especially centralized ones that offer loans, are expected to file for bankruptcy. But one unlikely winner, relatively speaking, may be Coinbase. That publicly traded exchange pursued a slow, stodgy course even as FTX ate into its market share. Its revenue and shares have plummeted during Crypto Winter, but it’s playing nice with U.S. regulators, and it avoided the offshore schemes and proprietary trading sleight-of-hand that Bankman-Fried deployed.

There’s a larger take-away from the FTX meltdown. Shady practices aside, far too many crypto ventures revolve around exotic financialization and the introduction of tokens whose prime purpose is to enrich insiders. There are plenty of crypto entrepreneurs who care about building products that normal people would actually want to use. It’s time to give those innovators more of the spotlight.