The FTX Crypto Fiasco Is a Gift to All Bitcoin Haters.
Jesse Powell, the co-founder of Kraken, is right to point this out.
On Twitter, Kraken co-founder Jesse Powell let out a cold rage at the cataclysmic FTX/Alameda sequence. Without ever mentioning them, nor the name of the fallen idol, Sam Bankman-Fried, one of the historical figures of the ecosystem evokes “a massive setback” for the cryptocurrency industry from which it will struggle to recover, but it will recover, he assures us, especially by facing the tenfold blows of regulators.
Jesse Powell is not the first to enter the world of cryptocurrencies. He is the co-founder of the exchange platform Kraken, which was created in 2011 and went online in 2013, in reaction to the disastrous management of the flagship exchange of the time (of course, there were no others), Mt. Gox. The latter, declared bankrupt in 2014, is back in the headlines almost 10 years later because it will “honor,” at least partially, its debts to users.
But to get back to what concerns us, it is important to know that the veteran Powell had from the start a rather square conception of what a Bitcoin exchange should be (Altcoins will come later).
His key words: reliability and security, rarely taken in default throughout its history, the platform being one of the only ones to have never known any hacking, only a few extravagances of rebellious streaks and other rather venial adventures.
Faced with a sequence like the FTX fiasco that he no doubt thought relegated to the dustbin of cryptocurrency history, Kraken’s ex-CEO, who continues to work within it as chairman of the company’s board of directors, sees red.
And having greater freedom of expression to which he aspired, Jesse Powell does not hesitate to call Sam Bankman-Fried, without naming him, of “clown” and “swindler” by drawing a portrait in vitriol.
“This isn’t about aiming high and missing. This is about recklessness, greed, self-interest, hubris, sociopathic behavior that causes a person to risk all the hard-won progress this industry has earned over a decade, for their own personal gain. While already being rich AF.”
