FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried is one of the youngest billionaires in the world. At the age of thirty the crypto billionaire now wants to give his fortune away, something he has always intended to do as part of his philosophy of effective altruism.
As one of the richest people in the world, with a networth of $US24 billion, surpassing Twitter and Deutsche bank in terms of market value, Sam Bankman-Fried is a proponent of the effective-altruism movement that uses scientific reasoning to do the most good for the greatest amount of people.
The founder of two crypto firms, Alameda Research and FTX, Bankman-Fried worked at Berkley’s Centre for Effective Altruism as director of development, and has taken his beliefs in effective altruism to his career as a member of Giving What We Can (GWWC).
In an interview with Bloomberg, Bankman-Fried revealed his intention to give away the majority of his fortune, keeping enough of his wealth to live a comfortable life – 1% of his earnings or, at the very least, $100,000 a year.
Bankman-Fried is the wealthiest member of the effective-altruism movement, which maximises the good that individuals can do with their career. His choice of career, as an altruist, might come as a surprise to many given the industry that has given him his wealth has associations with scams, ransomware, and has questionable energy consumption. Nonetheless, the founder of FTX has stated that the exchange runs ethically, purchasing carbon credits to offset its emissions, and is fundamentally more ethical than the traditional finance system.
The ethical conundrum of using a capitalist approach to pursue altruistic ends is not something that Bankman-Fried seems to be at ease with, noting:
“It’s not a decision that I constantly reevaluate, because I think it just doesn’t do me any good to be constantly reevaluating anything. It doesn’t, minute to minute, feel to me like a decision anymore.”
The media has painted Bankman-Fried as a modern day Robinhood, giving away what he earns as the CEO of one of the largest crypto exchanges in the world. However his altruism is based on mathematical decision making, doing what he believes is the right thing to do – requiring no greater thought than leaping into a pond to save a drowning person, because it is the right thing to do, as he puts it.
Disclaimer: This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.
