The Ledger

Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.

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why aren't all 19 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable

Prediction Not checkable as stated
Lemkin: A Top VC Firm Will Give Sam Bankman-Fried $100M
“I don't think Rory or I would, I'll defer to Rory, but I think someone will fund him. He's smart as Rory, Rory said, like he showed the upside as well as the downside. I don't know if there's a lot of morality in the business. I think someone will give them ju…”
Jason Lemkin May 15, 2025 ▶ 20:47 OpenAI, SBF & Perplexity: What VCs Know That You Don’t · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Claure: I Invested $150M Into FTX at SoftBank Due to FOMO
“So I invested hundred and fifty million dollars on FTX, which I mean, apologies to SoftBank, because I should have never made that investment, but it's probably one decision that has changed my life forever. I'm never going to invest in something that I don't …”
Marcelo Claure Jul 31, 2023 ▶ 1:04:12 Marcelo Claure & Shu Nyatta: LATAM's New $500M Growth Fund; Investing Billions at SoftBank | E1042 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Opinion
Tomaino: FTX was a perception fraud enabled by politicians and investors
“The people that got sucked into this perception game that FTX was playing that, you know, the politicians, the regulators, the investors, they all now are trying to just sweep it under the rug and say, oh, I didn't know about this financial fraud. It wasn't ju…”
Nick Tomaino Oct 30, 2023 ▶ 0:00 Nick Tomaino: The Future of NFTs, What Will Happen with FTX & Who Should be Held to Account | E1076 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Opinion
Brian Armstrong calls Sam Bankman-Fried brilliant and praises FTX execution speed
“I think Sam is a brilliant guy. I've gotten a chance to talk to him on a number of occasions. I think he's done a really good job of kind of generating interest in the company with his public persona, which is something that, you know, as more of an introvert,…”
Brian Armstrong Nov 7, 2022 ▶ 45:17 Brian Armstrong: Coinbase’s Failed NFT Launch, Thoughts on SBF & FTX, Crypto Winter | 20VC #946 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
What-if
Stebbings: Anthropic and Cursor Venture Investments Would Have Saved FTX
“When you look at FTX, their positions in Anthropic and Cursor actually would have saved them if they had the time to prove that out and they hadn't done the commingling. That would have saved their financial performance with those two investments alone.”
Harry Stebbings May 15, 2025 ▶ 18:23 OpenAI, SBF & Perplexity: What VCs Know That You Don’t · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Opinion
Stebbings: Dealing With FTX Bankruptcy Estate Has Been a Nightmare
“I'm in deals with FTX now, and they've been an absolute fucking nightmare, to be blunt. Demanding cash back, really being very difficult.”
Harry Stebbings Apr 21, 2025 ▶ 25:20 Dave CEO, Jason Wilk: The Best Performing Fund Would Only Back YC Founders on Their Second Time · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Opinion
Dixon: FTX Collapse Set the Crypto Industry Back Two Years
“I think, you know, I'd like their setbacks, like in, in crypto, the stuff that happened two years ago with FTX and a bunch of scandals, I think, set back the space a couple, you know, maybe a couple of years.”
Chris Dixon Mar 27, 2024 ▶ 23:03 Chris Dixon: Who Will Win the Next Generation of Venture? | E1132 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Assertion Supported
Samani: Only four insiders knew about the database manipulations at FTX
“There, we know now there were four people who knew. Sam, Caroline, Nishad, and Gary. No one else knew. When you keep the circle small, like, you can keep information hidden, and explicitly, in this case, the information was, go make arbitrary changes in the da…”
Kyle Samani Jan 8, 2024 ▶ 34:03 Crypto Roundtable with Nick Tomaino & Kyle Samani: US Elections, NFTs, and Trump | E1100 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Wenger: The collapse of FTX will be a temporary blip for crypto
“I think it'll be a blip in the long term, and it'll be a blip, you know, much like, you know, web van imploding, or a flooz.com, or whatever, you know, pick your favorite .com, you know, thing that imploded.”
Albert Wenger Jan 23, 2023 ▶ 39:16 Albert Wenger: Elon & Twitter; Impact of SBF; Income Inequality; Will they ban TikTok? | 20VC #969 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Assertion Supported
Armstrong: FTX and Binance took riskier international regulatory paths than Coinbase
“I think generally, I think both FTX and Binance have been really good at execution and You know, they've taken a different risk posture, I would say, internationally as well, which, you know, we'll, we'll see, have to see what happens with that. But Coinbase i…”
Brian Armstrong Nov 7, 2022 ▶ 46:55 Brian Armstrong: Coinbase’s Failed NFT Launch, Thoughts on SBF & FTX, Crypto Winter | 20VC #946 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
G Squared acquired a large stake in Anthropic via FTX bankruptcy auction
“You know, we were fortunate enough during, you mentioned FTX earlier, to be awarded during the bankruptcy a bunch of stock. We bid on it. We went through the whole process, bid on the stock, bought a big chunk, and now the company, look, the company is, in my …”
Larry Aschebrook Jun 16, 2025 ▶ 1:26:39 Larry Aschebrook, Founder & MP @GSquared: How We Lost Money on Uber and Made Millions on Lyft · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Opinion
O'Driscoll: FTX's Core Exchange Was a Good Business Destroyed by Fraud
“The core business he also had was a pretty impressive and good business. I mean, the core exchange worked fine too. It was all the weird shit on top. It was all the commingling.”
Rory O'Driscoll May 15, 2025 ▶ 20:13 OpenAI, SBF & Perplexity: What VCs Know That You Don’t · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Wilk: Dave Settled $100M FTX Convertible Note Early for $71M
“That note was not due until 2026. And I think it was last year, January, we paid them back seventy one million dollars as opposed to the, you know, at the time of repayment would have been probably 109 or one hundred and ten million.”
Jason Wilk Apr 21, 2025 ▶ 25:43 Dave CEO, Jason Wilk: The Best Performing Fund Would Only Back YC Founders on Their Second Time · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Wilk: Dave Reached Peak Market Cap Upon Announcing $100M FTX Deal
“We had this big partnership with FTX. That's when our market cap reached its all time high. Was when we announced that partnership and they wrote us a hundred million dollar convertible check into the company.”
Jason Wilk Apr 21, 2025 ▶ 24:49 Dave CEO, Jason Wilk: The Best Performing Fund Would Only Back YC Founders on Their Second Time · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Samani: Multicoin passed on FTX seed round before buying FTT in 2019
“The original reason we passed on the FTT seed round in March, April, 2019 was because we were like, Hey man, no separation of church and state. You can't run Alameda and FTX. People are not going to trade here. And we were like, okay, pass. And then we passed.…”
Kyle Samani Jan 8, 2024 ▶ 33:28 Crypto Roundtable with Nick Tomaino & Kyle Samani: US Elections, NFTs, and Trump | E1100 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Assertion Supported
Tomaino: Alameda invested in tokens that FTX listed and hyped
“Alameda was their investment arm that was basically investing in these token projects. Then FTX, the exchange, was listing these tokens, hyping up the tokens to their users.”
Nick Tomaino Oct 30, 2023 ▶ 23:40 Nick Tomaino: The Future of NFTs, What Will Happen with FTX & Who Should be Held to Account | E1076 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Opinion
Hockey: Coinbase was punished for following regulations while competitors like FTX cheated
“I hope they do really well, because I think what they have tried to do very well is they've tried to embrace regulation and they've tried to do things the right way. They've tried to do things that are right by the regulators and they're right by consumers. An…”
William Hockey Dec 3, 2022 ▶ 45:05 William Hockey: How I Founded Plaid; The Ultimate Cold Email Tip; Hiring Lessons | 20VC #955 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Assertion Supported
Tomaino: 1confirmation partner posted the first viral tweet exposing SBF's lobbying
“Richard on, on, my team, my partner, tweeted out on October 13th that Sam was working behind closed doors on a bipartisan bill that would have been very good for FTX, but bad for DeFi, right? And that tweet went viral. Obviously, a lot of other stuff happened …”
Nick Tomaino Jan 8, 2024 ▶ 36:29 Crypto Roundtable with Nick Tomaino & Kyle Samani: US Elections, NFTs, and Trump | E1100 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Opinion
Tomaino: FTX's Super Bowl ad was inauthentic and purely attention-seeking
“It's like that FTX Super Bowl ad Felt very inauthentic to me. It was Larry David and Tom Brady or something, and it was just, it was clearly very concerned with what other people think, and just trying to get the maximum attention in the simplest way.”
Nick Tomaino Jan 8, 2024 ▶ 32:52 Crypto Roundtable with Nick Tomaino & Kyle Samani: US Elections, NFTs, and Trump | E1100 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
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