SAM BANKMAN FRIED PICKED EVERY WINNER OF THE 2020s AND HIS LAWYERS SOLD THEM ALL AT THE BOTTOM.
If the FTX estate hadn't panic-sold its assets during bankruptcy, SBF would be sitting on a $114 billion empire today. Instead, he is watching the greatest trades of the decade from a prison cell.
The data is almost impossible to believe:
- Anthropic: $82.3 billion (165x) SBF bought an 8% stake for $500M. The estate sold it for $1.3B in 2024. Today, that stake would be worth over $80B.
- SpaceX:$15 billion (75x) A massive stake liquidated early to pay creditors.
- Solana: $5.1 billion (27x) SBF was an early backer at $8. The estate offloaded a massive chunk at $64.
- Robinhood: $4.9 billion (8x)
- Genesis Digital: $3.5 billion (3x)
The Latest "Missed" Fortune: CURSOR
In 2022, Alameda Research wrote a tiny $200,000 check for a 5% stake in the AI startup Cursor. In April 2023, the bankruptcy estate sold that entire stake back for exactly what they paid: $200,000.
Yesterday, SpaceX announced a deal to buy Cursor for $60 billion.
That "worthless" 5% stake would be worth $3 billion today. That is a 15,000x return that vanished because the lawyers wanted a quick exit.
SBF was a genius at picking generational winners and a criminal at managing their money.
The lawyers recovered $18 billion for users. If they had just held, they would be sitting on $114 billion and the most valuable venture portfolio in history.