Thanks for your efforts here. How likely do you think it is that the farm will succeed in creating a commercially viable product, apart from public pressure? Sounds like there are significant biological and ecological barriers.
Also, unrelatedly, seems to me like octopus and squid would be relatively easier to create vegan alternatives to. People mostly likely them for the texture, there isn't really a flavor. But I know nothing about the science of alt protein.
Thanks for this interesting tool. I'd suggest that you suggest to submitters not to send compound statements in the section "What makes a good statement." E.g., "It's really bad that EAs don't feel comfortable questioning longtermism. This points to deeper groupthink inside EA." If it's a premise-conclusion statement, you could also make clear that voters should pass unless they accept the premise.
Do you mean that FTX grantees should attempt to make the victims whole by paying the amount they received from FTX back to the estate, or that "EA" at large - so organizations and people with no relation to FTX, but who consider themselves "EA" - should do so?
What happens to those $500 mil shares depends almost entirely on Anthropic's governing documents, which are not public AFAICT. It could be they are entirely non-voting class shares. The FTX estate/bankruptcy trustee will try to liquidate them, i.e. will try to sell the shares. Whether there are limitations on who they can sell the shares to also depends on Anthropic's governing documents. I know Anthropic has some bespoke governance structure, but I don't know the specific terms.
From the little I know about Anthropic, getting anything like dollar-for-dollar on those shares is going to be very hard.
Also, my guess is that these shares were held by SBF and he just intermingled his funds with FTX's based on the leaked balance sheet. Which isn't to say that they won't be taken by the FTX estate - very likely they will - but it's a complication because they'll have to prove they can reach SBF's personal assets first (at this point, won't be hard).
I think I agree with you in some cases, but can you explain why you think that way for all of the funds? Does it matter whether or not the money was actually spent by the recipient on the project that they received the grant to do? For example, if I received a grant to spend three months full time doing scientific research and publishing my findings to the public, and I quit my job to do this, should I be obligated to return the funds? This is the circumstance of many of the people affected, including some of the people who commented here.
I do agree with you that if I received funding to do a particular project, and I haven't done that project and have no intention of doing it now, I should absolutely return the money.
I'm not Molly and I'm sure she'd know better than I, but I'm pretty confident that part of this post only applies to grantees who received their grant from one of the FTX entities that is now bankrupt - this is what she means by "the debtor group."
Essentially, if you received money from an FTX entity in the debtor group anytime on or after approximately August 11, 2022, the bankruptcy process will probably ask you, at some point, to pay all or part of that money back.
I'm not a bankruptcy lawyer, and I know how frustrating of an answer this is, but if the grant came from a non-debtor entity like FTX Foundation Inc., I think it's very unclear what's going to happen because a lot depends on information we don't know yet. The exact sources and timing of any transfers to FTX Foundation may matter. The fact that the corporate form was, clearly, not respected within FTX complicates things further. But the fact that FTX Foundation Inc. was not bankrupt would not by itself confer immunity from the possibility of clawback. That's 11 U.S.C. 550(a)(2).
I just wanted to say I think your comments responding to a lot of the questions about the legal fallout are very helpful. They balance emphasizing the uncertainty of the situation with being informative very well.
As Jason noted, this definitely happens and is allowed, see 11 U.S.C. 550(a)(2). Some cases where this has happened are In re Laines, 352 B.R. 397 (Bankr. E.D. Va. 2005); In re Lindley, 121 B.R. 81 (Bankr. N.D. Okla. 1990); In re Crabtree, 49 B.R. 806 (Bankr. E.D. Tenn. 1985).
Was the entity that wrote you the grant in the debtor group? That list is here, though note that reportedly it has some errors already. If it is, then it will depend on when that entity transferred the grant to you. If it is not, it gets very complicated and basically I'm not sure.
I will say - and this is absolutely not legal advice, etc., etc. - just because they can ask you to return the money doesn't mean they will. If it was a trivial amount, it would be quite surprising. Different bankruptcy lawyers have different approaches to something like this, though.
Thanks for your efforts here. How likely do you think it is that the farm will succeed in creating a commercially viable product, apart from public pressure? Sounds like there are significant biological and ecological barriers.
Also, unrelatedly, seems to me like octopus and squid would be relatively easier to create vegan alternatives to. People mostly likely them for the texture, there isn't really a flavor. But I know nothing about the science of alt protein.
Thanks for this interesting tool. I'd suggest that you suggest to submitters not to send compound statements in the section "What makes a good statement." E.g., "It's really bad that EAs don't feel comfortable questioning longtermism. This points to deeper groupthink inside EA." If it's a premise-conclusion statement, you could also make clear that voters should pass unless they accept the premise.
Do you mean that FTX grantees should attempt to make the victims whole by paying the amount they received from FTX back to the estate, or that "EA" at large - so organizations and people with no relation to FTX, but who consider themselves "EA" - should do so?
What happens to those $500 mil shares depends almost entirely on Anthropic's governing documents, which are not public AFAICT. It could be they are entirely non-voting class shares. The FTX estate/bankruptcy trustee will try to liquidate them, i.e. will try to sell the shares. Whether there are limitations on who they can sell the shares to also depends on Anthropic's governing documents. I know Anthropic has some bespoke governance structure, but I don't know the specific terms.
From the little I know about Anthropic, getting anything like dollar-for-dollar on those shares is going to be very hard.
Also, my guess is that these shares were held by SBF and he just intermingled his funds with FTX's based on the leaked balance sheet. Which isn't to say that they won't be taken by the FTX estate - very likely they will - but it's a complication because they'll have to prove they can reach SBF's personal assets first (at this point, won't be hard).
I think I agree with you in some cases, but can you explain why you think that way for all of the funds? Does it matter whether or not the money was actually spent by the recipient on the project that they received the grant to do? For example, if I received a grant to spend three months full time doing scientific research and publishing my findings to the public, and I quit my job to do this, should I be obligated to return the funds? This is the circumstance of many of the people affected, including some of the people who commented here.
I do agree with you that if I received funding to do a particular project, and I haven't done that project and have no intention of doing it now, I should absolutely return the money.
I'm not Molly and I'm sure she'd know better than I, but I'm pretty confident that part of this post only applies to grantees who received their grant from one of the FTX entities that is now bankrupt - this is what she means by "the debtor group."
Essentially, if you received money from an FTX entity in the debtor group anytime on or after approximately August 11, 2022, the bankruptcy process will probably ask you, at some point, to pay all or part of that money back.
I'm not a bankruptcy lawyer, and I know how frustrating of an answer this is, but if the grant came from a non-debtor entity like FTX Foundation Inc., I think it's very unclear what's going to happen because a lot depends on information we don't know yet. The exact sources and timing of any transfers to FTX Foundation may matter. The fact that the corporate form was, clearly, not respected within FTX complicates things further. But the fact that FTX Foundation Inc. was not bankrupt would not by itself confer immunity from the possibility of clawback. That's 11 U.S.C. 550(a)(2).
The date would be Nov. 11, and I'm pretty confident it's 90 days, see 11 U.S.C. 547(b)(4), but Molly can correct me. I think Aug. 11 may be a typo.
I just wanted to say I think your comments responding to a lot of the questions about the legal fallout are very helpful. They balance emphasizing the uncertainty of the situation with being informative very well.
As Jason noted, this definitely happens and is allowed, see 11 U.S.C. 550(a)(2). Some cases where this has happened are In re Laines, 352 B.R. 397 (Bankr. E.D. Va. 2005); In re Lindley, 121 B.R. 81 (Bankr. N.D. Okla. 1990); In re Crabtree, 49 B.R. 806 (Bankr. E.D. Tenn. 1985).
Was the entity that wrote you the grant in the debtor group? That list is here, though note that reportedly it has some errors already. If it is, then it will depend on when that entity transferred the grant to you. If it is not, it gets very complicated and basically I'm not sure.
I will say - and this is absolutely not legal advice, etc., etc. - just because they can ask you to return the money doesn't mean they will. If it was a trivial amount, it would be quite surprising. Different bankruptcy lawyers have different approaches to something like this, though.