Commentary: FTX collapse signals time for better financial innovation – just look at the digital Singdollar
SINGAPORE: The crypto world had barely recovered from the TerraUSD stablecoin crash in May, which dragged other major cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin down, wiping billions from the market.
It faced yet another calamitous event on Friday (Nov 11): The collapse of FTX.FTX was one of the largest and most respected crypto exchanges that counted top-tier institutional investors such as Lightspeed Venture Partners, Sequoia Capital and Singapore’s own Temasek among its backers.
Sam Bankman-Fried, its curly-haired 30-year-old MIT graduate CEO was the darling of venture capitalists, with a net worth valued at US$26 billion (S$35.7 billion) at his peak.
All of this collapsed in a span of a month, when financial misappropriations were brought to light between FTX and Alameda Research, a hedge fund that he also ran.
