The gold might be in the new financial plumbing itself rather than what flows through it
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Apr 06, 2022 • 26 minutes ago • 11 minute read • Join the conversation
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Sam Bankman-Fried cut an unlikely figure as he took the stage on the final morning of this year’s big derivatives-industry conference in Boca Raton, Florida. Sporting a grey T-shirt, khaki shorts and sneakers, his mane of curly hair untamed, the 30-year-old chief executive of FTX looked more like a student who had just rolled out of bed to grab breakfast at his college cafeteria than the boss of an international cryptocurrency exchange valued at US$32 billion.
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Adding to incongruity at the Futures Industry Association event was that Bankman-Fried was engaging in a one-on-one chat with Alex Rodriguez, the retired American baseball star, broadcaster and business executive known as A-Rod. Standing a good six inches taller than his interlocutor and still fit at 46, the one-time fiancé of Jennifer Lopez was every inch a red-carpet celebrity in his dark suit, white shirt and power tie.
But it was A-Rod who was out of his league.
Bankman-Fried had already stolen the show at the March gathering with a groundbreaking proposal to U.S. regulators to automate risk management in financial markets — using practices developed for digital assets. FTX says it plans to start with a small market —…
