I love @MikeBurgersburg dearly, but he wasn't the the first to draw attention to problems at #CelsiusNetwork. I was, by more than 6 months. And he wasn't the first to declare Alameda insolvent, either. Again, I was. Why am I being ignored, @taylorlorenz? @washingtonpost
In April 2021, I wrote detailed threads about Celsius in which I took their terms of service apart, examined their published accounts, and analysed their marketing material. I warned people then that it was taking huge risks with people's funds and was possibly insolvent.
I took massive amounts of abuse from Celsians for these threads. Among other things, they accused me of being paid by Coindesk to discredit Celsius. I write for Coindesk, but I'm not employed by them. I would never do hit work for them or anyone else.
I resent being airbrushed out of existence. I was ahead of everyone else on this. I deserve acknowledgement.
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NYAG: Celsius lent $1bn to Alameda against collateral constisting largely of FTX's token FTT. ag.ny.gov/sites/default/…
NYAG: On 16th May 2022, Mashinsky falsely told investors that Celsius was solvent. In fact its liabilities exceeded its assets by $820 million.
NYAG: In May 2022, when Celsius was already insolvent and suffering a bank run that eventually proved terminal, Mashinsky was actively recruiting new depositors by offering financial incentives for referrals from existing customers.
I've seen this type of comment a number of times now. Crypto people seem to think they have control and ownership rights over funds they loan. But this isn't how financial loans work. They are more like temporary gifts. Ownership and control of funds transfers to the recipient.
Some collateralised loans (repos, for example) are explicitly structured as a spot sale and forward purchase of securities. Celsius's loans were structured like this. So when Celsius loaned funds, ownership rights and control of the collateral transferred to Celsius.
I'd be willing to bet that the same people who didn't realise ownership and control of the coins the deposited in interest-bearing accounts transferred to Celsius also didn't realise that coins they used as collateral against borrowing also became Celsius's to own and control.
My first, and perhaps most important observation, is that this report is written by a single author who is evidently supportive of gender-critical arguments and hence hardly an unbiased researcher. This statement could have come straight from Sex Matters.
The dishonesty and gaslighting is really why I stopped writing about Brexit. I debunked some of the lies, but like the Hydra, whenever a lie was debunked, two more grew in its place. It was utterly dispiriting.
To be fair, Brexit is far from the only Hydra-like belief system. Social media makes it very easy to create and spread lies, and very difficult to debunk them. And because the lies reinforce the belief, debunking them attracts abuse from believers.
So I've now read Sherelle Jacobs' writings from last October onwards, and I've concluded she hasn't the faintest idea what "Judeo-Christian values" even are.
In this piece from October, which pretty much covers what she said at the Battle of Ideas, she talks about "Methodist values". But she didn't bother to find out what those actually are, though the Methodist Church publishes them. telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/10/0… methodist.org.uk/our-work/our-w…
But at the Battle of Ideas she talked about "Judeo-Christian values". This is a dogwhistle term deployed by the far right to subsume Judaism into Christianity (thereby eliminating Jews) and exclude Islam. It is thus antisemitic and Islamophobic. theconversation.com/why-judeo-chri…
When I wrote this, I didn't pay too much attention to the "new morality" being promoted by the Battle of Ideas panellists. I was more interested in the economics of populism. But I now think their ideas on morality must be confronted directly. coppolacomment.com/2022/10/when-p…
Firstly, it beggars belief that someone can think "sacrifice" has no place in Judaeo-Christian morality. Sacrifice is a recurring feature in Jewish scripture. And at the very heart of the Christian religion is the sacrifice of an innocent.
Secondly, the idea that "dependency" has no place in Judaeo-Christian morality is also bonkers. The duty to care for the poor and vulnerable runs throughout Jewish and Christian scripture. How is this even possible, if there is no dependency?