Original Author: Jaleel Jia Liu
"What the actual fuck, we can't even use a pillow? Are we not allowed to sleep?"
On December 13, 2022, FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried was officially arrested by the Bahamian police. Counting from that day, it has been 720 days since SBF went to prison, exactly two years.
"I miss my teddy bear pillow, it's called Manfred," SBF wrote in his diary. This teddy bear pillow named Manfred is the longest entry in the first three chapters of SBF's diary, aside from descriptions of his cellmates, after experiencing the confiscation of $11 billion in assets and a 25-year prison sentence at the age of 32.
Exterior view of the prison where SBF is held, Brooklyn MDC, New York
Outside the prison, another busy person is SBF's father. In addition to preparing for SBF's appeal on a legal level, his father has also hired a Forbes contributor, Walter Pavlo, as SBF's advisor, focusing on writing about prison topics.
According to an informed broker, SBF's autobiography could bring in millions of dollars in advance payments for publishers. "SBF's motivation for seeking a publisher for his diary is unclear. It is obviously not for the money."
Because according to the confiscation policy, all of SBF's assets and potential income, including any revenue from publishing a memoir, will be used to repay his debts and compensate the victims of his fraud. This means that even if the publication of the memoir brings in a large income, that money will go directly to compensating those who suffered financial losses due to the bankruptcy of FTX.
In SBF's eyes, all cellmates are gorillas
"His writing makes it seem like he is Jane Goodall," said someone who has read the first three chapters of SBF's diary. I find this analogy very vivid. This biologist is the world's most famous expert on chimpanzee research, and her studies on chimpanzee social and family interactions have lasted for 60 years.
I found a sentence written by Jane Goodall: "In the first ten years of my research, I believed that chimpanzees were friendlier than humans, until I observed that dominant females would deliberately kill the infants of other females in the group to maintain their dominance, and even engage in cannibalism. They, like us, have a dark side to their nature."
Next is what SBF wrote, as he seems to observe and study the other inmates in prison like "chimpanzees":
"Most people get assimilated into prison; they will fight over a banana and use everything they have to trade for another chance to get high."
"A drug called Deuce is widely used here; I can't tell what it's made of, I only know it is smuggled into the prison by soaking it into regular paper, and those who smoke it turn into zombies every night."
"There are two types of people in prison: one type is long-term inmates who have consciously given up hope for life." The other type is the group SBF belongs to: "When the system deprives you of the freedom to resist, how do you fight against the system? When your true self is seen as such a huge threat to society that it needs to be caged until you finally give it up, how do you remain loyal to your true self?"
It is said that after experiencing significant events, people go through several psychological stages: numbness—disbelief, refusal to accept the facts; blame—blaming others and oneself, failing to handle the development of events; depression—accepting what has happened, thus feeling sad and depressed; recovery—getting through the depression and starting a new life.
Having been born into a highly educated family, SBF's current life is a huge shock for him, and he seems to take longer than most people to digest his emotions after experiencing significant events. Even after two years of prison life, SBF seems to still be in the first and second stages. His diary entries always "observe coldly" everything around him, expressing that "he does not belong here."
On the 720th day of his imprisonment, SBF misses his teddy bear pillow
Sleep in prison is not good; MDC, this sleepless place, has prisoners screaming and cursing at night, and the lights are always in a dim state 24 hours a day, making it hard to tell the time, which makes SBF very uncomfortable.
Since he was two years old, SBF has had a teddy bear stuffed toy named Manfred. This unassuming teddy bear has witnessed his journey from Stanford to Boston during his college years, to his career as a trader in New York, and from Berkeley and Hong Kong to the Bahamas where he founded Alameda and FTX—these are the most important moments of SBF's life.
In this moment of his life, the loneliest, Manfred is his only comfort. "I really miss Manfred," he wrote in his diary.
Image source: @LilMoonLambo
In MDC, a comfortable pillow is almost a luxury. SBF tried to use his court suit or towels and prison clothes stacked together as a substitute for a pillow, but these makeshift solutions provided far from enough comfort, "My neck is starting to hurt," he said helplessly.
Until he traded two muffins for a pillow improvised from mattress stuffing and a T-shirt by a fellow inmate who was a drug addict, this slight improvement made his nights a bit easier.
In prison life, sports betting has become a pastime for many inmates. One day, a cellmate named Harry shared his betting strategy with SBF: "Bet $100 first, if you lose, bet $250, if you lose again, bet $600, and so on, until you win back all your bets."
SBF wrote with a tone of disdain: "I really couldn't bear to tell him that this trading strategy is a classic example of the 'gambler's fallacy.'"
Although SBF appears to have the physique of an 80-year-old man in prison, no one understands "gambling" better than him. Life in prison mainly consists of beans and rice, and rice has "become a form of currency within MDC." SBF even jokingly stated, "Compared to his previous life as a high-frequency trader, the arbitrage opportunities in prison are much better." He finally gets to be a proud trader again, continuing to look down on everything around him, whether it's the people here or the life here.
Arrogant people are more likely to succeed but also more likely to mess things up. This can also explain why he stood in the witness stand to personally testify against the three star witnesses on the opposite side in court. Even when his lawyer and a prosecutor told him that the chances of self-testimony were quite low, and that historically very few defendants have succeeded in self-testimony, he had only seen one defendant succeed in his 22-year career.
But SBF was stubborn, and he almost fell out with his own lawyer, creating a chaotic scene.
On Christmas 2023, SBF in MDC prison photo
On the other hand, in stark contrast to SBF is CZ, who completed a $4.3 billion fine and spent four months in a U.S. prison. In previous court appearances, he was photographed by reporters wearing a neat suit, looking relaxed.
CZ entering and exiting the court
In addition to the apology letter written by CZ himself, the judge also received the longest plea letter in history, a 43-page letter from CZ's family, friends, and colleagues, which presented a more complete image of CZ to the judge.
Both experiencing prison life, CZ and SBF display completely different styles: "This experience has made me re-evaluate the most important things in life. I miss my children, family, friends, colleagues, and community. I miss other things too, but not nearly as strongly as I miss people. You miss food, a comfortable bed, but these things don't affect me much."
When asked if he made friends in prison, CZ's answer was affirmative, "Yes, you have to make friends; it can be very hard if you are isolated." He expressed sympathy for those inmates serving long sentences for minor mistakes and maintained contact with some friends.
CZ also started working out, which may have been a preparation he started before going to prison to prevent being seen as having the "physique of an 80-year-old man." A little over a month after his release, CZ appeared at the Binance Blockchain Conference in Dubai, looking better than anyone had imagined, winning a standing ovation from the audience. That day, the foreign media's headline news was "The King Is Back."
If SBF were still around
When SBF was arrested, the price of BTC was $16,000, and now the price of BTC is $100,000. In these two years, SBF has missed too much in the crypto industry.
Some who judge heroes by success or failure say that CZ has much richer life experience than SBF and has shown more resilience in adversity. But those who do not judge heroes by success or failure say that if SBF had not gotten into trouble, the current market environment might be different.
"If SBF hadn't gotten into trouble, the market would definitely be better now." This is a common sentiment among many old investors who experienced the golden period of FTX and SBF.
"For example, in the past few days, the market has plummeted. If FTX were still operational, retail investors would have more opportunities to make money. The most typical example is FTX's basket of altcoin indices, which allows for long and short positions on the entire altcoin index rather than on a single altcoin."
However, after FTX's collapse, the product track for this "altcoin index" remains vacant, and currently, no platform in the market can provide similar services.
It's not just the absence of a trading tool; the collapse of FTX has also dealt a significant blow to the liquidity of the crypto market, causing liquidity in the industry to shrink rapidly. "The entire industry has at least regressed by three years," is the intuitive feeling shared by many at the time, including Sun Yuchen.
"SBF and FTX understood the market better than any trading platform currently available."
SBF's background as a trader left a deep impression on the market, and people believed he was more sensitive to market trends. Many believed that if SBF were still around, his insights and innovative capabilities would elevate emerging sectors, led by Solana, to new heights, thereby lifting the entire industry to greater heights.
On the 720th day of his imprisonment, SBF misses his teddy bear pillow, Manfred. Meanwhile, outside, there are still those who reminisce about SBF's golden era.
References:
"Sam Bankman-Fried Is Shopping His Prison Diary – Here’s A Peek Inside," Steven Ehrlich, Forbes;
"SBF maintains his innocence as he trades rice in jail," Jesse Coghlan;
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