> For what it's worth, they are also a YC backed company
Severely disappointing. I respect PG too much to believe he would knowingly condone this. The partner who did this didn't understand what they were investing in or should be decoupled with haste.
At the very least, the Alaska RMB, U of M Endowment, Bloomberg's family office and SMC should be asking why their capital is backing what should have been clear as day ex ante a fraud. Anyone living in Alaska, going to or an alumni of U of M or Stanford, or working for Bloomberg should be asking the same question.
What does Paul Graham have to do with any of this? He hasn't been operationally involved with YC for years, lots of them, so far as I know. Also: YC invests in companies that are 2-3 people and a vague idea; that's the whole concept. Why wouldn't YC end up backing a shady cryptocurrency company? I read all of your comments and guess we're on the same page about "crypto" and wish YC was staying the hell away from it --- but if they're going to invest in "crypto" startups, they're going to get their share of companies like this.
If you believe this company is an outright fraud (I don’t have an opinion) “shrug its crypto” is a horrendous defense for the funds backing it.
At a bare minimum they should be doing due diligence for their own investors to prevent losses if not the higher standard of being a good citizen and shutting down the fraud.
We would not think it’s ok for a fund backing pharma startups to give cash to Avon Barksdale…
Let’s not even get started with Sama pushing Worldcoin, a pretty exploitative attempt at getting everyone’s irises with a pre-mined currency supposed to revolutionize world finance.
The VC drive to jump into the crypto world was startling to me. People hold varying opinions on various crypto products, but so many of the ones getting investment are making claims that should gather extreme scrutiny from a crowd that should be familiar with finance and returns. "We expect 10%+ returns for a long time"? Folks investing in companies instead of banks should know firsthand that guaranteed market-beating returns are almost definitionally suspect!
Even if you think it's not fraudulent on the part of the founders, the industry is frothy and unproven and fraud-adjacent enough that investing in many companies in the space should appear to be a huge potential reputational risk beyond just losing some invested money. The people putting up the cash should be looking long and hard at this whole story.
And then once you get into the details, the moment you hear about one of the use cases for defi lending leading to these high interest rates being "put up crypto collateral to borrow to buy even more crypto since it's appreciating rapidly"... run!
VCs promoting this sort of blatant and obvious Ponzi - and there are many VCs getting into ponzinomic crypto enterprises - is a good reason to start making some of the investors more liable.
> is a good reason to start making some of the investors more liable
I'm beginning to agree.
Piercing the corporate veil is reserved for "serious misconduct" [1]. If you're told someone will sell an unlicensed deposit-like product [2], promise depositors (their words) "will not lose [their] funds" [3] and pay a ten or 20% interest rate, and you give them money to do it, you aided and abetted fraud. (At the very least you were grossly negligent with your LPs' money.) You should have to make the people you scammed and hoped to profit off whole.
> For what it's worth, they are also a YC backed company
Severely disappointing. I respect PG too much to believe he would knowingly condone this. The partner who did this didn't understand what they were investing in or should be decoupled with haste.
At the very least, the Alaska RMB, U of M Endowment, Bloomberg's family office and SMC should be asking why their capital is backing what should have been clear as day ex ante a fraud. Anyone living in Alaska, going to or an alumni of U of M or Stanford, or working for Bloomberg should be asking the same question.
What does Paul Graham have to do with any of this? He hasn't been operationally involved with YC for years, lots of them, so far as I know. Also: YC invests in companies that are 2-3 people and a vague idea; that's the whole concept. Why wouldn't YC end up backing a shady cryptocurrency company? I read all of your comments and guess we're on the same page about "crypto" and wish YC was staying the hell away from it --- but if they're going to invest in "crypto" startups, they're going to get their share of companies like this.
If you believe this company is an outright fraud (I don’t have an opinion) “shrug its crypto” is a horrendous defense for the funds backing it.
At a bare minimum they should be doing due diligence for their own investors to prevent losses if not the higher standard of being a good citizen and shutting down the fraud.
We would not think it’s ok for a fund backing pharma startups to give cash to Avon Barksdale…
4 replies →
Let’s not even get started with Sama pushing Worldcoin, a pretty exploitative attempt at getting everyone’s irises with a pre-mined currency supposed to revolutionize world finance.
The VC drive to jump into the crypto world was startling to me. People hold varying opinions on various crypto products, but so many of the ones getting investment are making claims that should gather extreme scrutiny from a crowd that should be familiar with finance and returns. "We expect 10%+ returns for a long time"? Folks investing in companies instead of banks should know firsthand that guaranteed market-beating returns are almost definitionally suspect!
Even if you think it's not fraudulent on the part of the founders, the industry is frothy and unproven and fraud-adjacent enough that investing in many companies in the space should appear to be a huge potential reputational risk beyond just losing some invested money. The people putting up the cash should be looking long and hard at this whole story.
And then once you get into the details, the moment you hear about one of the use cases for defi lending leading to these high interest rates being "put up crypto collateral to borrow to buy even more crypto since it's appreciating rapidly"... run!
6 replies →
pg defended YC funding a company making installer adware [0], you shouldn't really be surprised
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5092711
VCs promoting this sort of blatant and obvious Ponzi - and there are many VCs getting into ponzinomic crypto enterprises - is a good reason to start making some of the investors more liable.
> is a good reason to start making some of the investors more liable
I'm beginning to agree.
Piercing the corporate veil is reserved for "serious misconduct" [1]. If you're told someone will sell an unlicensed deposit-like product [2], promise depositors (their words) "will not lose [their] funds" [3] and pay a ten or 20% interest rate, and you give them money to do it, you aided and abetted fraud. (At the very least you were grossly negligent with your LPs' money.) You should have to make the people you scammed and hoped to profit off whole.
[1]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31462617
Until and such time as there are consequences I wouldn't hold my breath. America is nice if you're rich. It's not so great otherwise.