Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon

Natalie Tien, a Taiwanese woman, was hired as FTX’s head of public relations in 2020.

Initially, Sam, the founder of FTX, was resistant to doing media interviews. However, this changed after the magazine Forbes published his net worth as part of their billionaires list. When Forbes attempted to investigate his wealth, Sam worried that they would publish an accurate figure, which would “set the wrong tone" (7) by seeming unreasonably high. Forbes investigators decided to only tally Sam's stake in his company FTX, rather than also including Alameda Research, Sam’s crypto quant trading firm, as well as the other companies he owned. When Forbes published the highly conservative estimate of $22.5 billion, likely much lower than Sam’s actual net worth, Sam was pleased with the positive response he received. The number ranked him as wealthy, but it also seemed reasonable rather than fantastic. After this experience, Sam decided to open the floodgates and say yes to every media appearance that came his way.

Natalie then became his de facto personal scheduler. Enigmatic and elusive, Sam was extremely difficult to locate at any given time. He viewed every commitment on his schedule as optional—opportunities to be evaluated in the context of his current mood and interests.

Lewis describes a scene that typified Sam’s approach to commitment. After flying out from the Bahamas and having brunch with Shaquille O'Neal and dinner with the Kardashians, Sam sat in his hotel room and opened his laptop for a Zoom call with Anna Wintour, famed editor of Vogue magazine. As he usually did for interviews, media appearances, and meetings, Sam immediately minimized the Zoom window and started multitasking. He played his favorite game, Storybook Brawl, as Anna Wintour talked. Fully engrossed in the game, he peppered the conversation with the occasional, “Yuuuuup!” to indicate attentiveness. By the end of the call, Sam had agreed to be Wintour’s special guest at the Met Gala and had implied that he would fund the whole event.

Sam calculated that the Met Gala would be beneficial to him because he wanted to attract more female speculators to crypto, and he thought women would be inclined to watch the Met Gala. However, he still viewed commitments as fluid. Even though his team diligently prepared for him to attend the event, he backed out at the last minute. Natalie was surprised at the blowback Sam received for canceling. He had already built up a record of canceling appearances last-minute: He had blown off CEOs, Time magazine, and the World Economic Forum. Nevertheless, Natalie never got mad at Sam; she viewed his actions as simply a part of his nature.

Sam’s parents, Joe Bankman and Barbara Fried, law professors at Stanford, raised Sam and his younger brother, Gabe, in a household that valued intellect and utilitarianism. They often hosted fellow academics at weekly dinner parties, participating in stimulating debates. As parents, Joe and Barbara did not adhere to conventions. They did not marry, instead opting for a civil union in support of their gay friends who could not legally marry. As a family, the Bankman-Frieds stopped celebrating holidays and birthdays because they felt the celebrations were unnecessary. 

As a child, Sam felt different and separate from other children; he found it easier to converse with adults. Overall, he felt isolated from other humans and didn't care about the same things other people cared about. He was shocked when he found out that children believed in Santa, and that both children and adults believed in God. Sam took these discoveries to mean that the world could be completely wrong about something, while he could be right.

Sam struggled with things that were easy for most people, but found it easy to do things typically considered hard. For example, while he found it difficult to make facial expressions and understand social cues, he excelled in mathematics and other quantitative pursuits. Sam did not see the point of emotional expression, religion, travel, or the liberal arts. He was defiant towards his English teachers and started blogging about his utilitarian philosophical beliefs. He felt so unengaged at school that he became depressed. In attempt to alleviate Sam’s boredom, his mother placed him in private school, but he still felt separate from his classmates.

The only times when Sam felt a sense of belonging and excitement were when he attended a math camp for gifted kids, and when he played strategy tabletop games like Magic: The Gathering. While at math camp, Sam became even more interested in games and puzzles and began designing his own for others to play.

Although Sam had previously believed that he was smarter than other people, when he arrived at math camp, he was not the most gifted one there and not the best at games and puzzles. However, he suspected that these games were too ordinary to reveal his true potential: He might turn out to be more talented than others when it came to playing unusual games.