10 Most Surprising and Little-Known Facts About SBF
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10 Most Surprising and Little-Known Facts About SBF
At 29, Sam Bankman-Fried became a billionaire through cryptocurrency, making him the only person besides Mark Zuckerberg to have achieved such rapid wealth.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsBy Business Insider
Translated by TechFlow Friends
After months of conversations with Sam Bankman-Fried’s closest friends, family members, and colleagues, we’ve uncovered 10 surprising and little-known facts about the man who became a billionaire at age 29 through cryptocurrency.
For over four years, Sam Bankman-Fried accumulated a net worth of $26.5 billion and built a cryptocurrency empire.
Below are the 10 most surprising and lesser-known insights we gathered.
At 29, Sam Bankman-Fried became a billionaire through cryptocurrency—making him the only person besides Mark Zuckerberg to have achieved such rapid wealth accumulation.
His path to riches began by exploiting arbitrage opportunities between Western and Asian cryptocurrency exchanges, eventually generating daily trading profits of millions of dollars at 10% for his crypto trading firm Alameda Research in 2018.
While executing arbitrage trades, he also saw an opportunity to improve existing “shitshow exchanges,” leading him to launch FTX, a cryptocurrency exchange.
According to CoinGecko data, the exchange evolved from modest beginnings three years ago into a top performer—ranked sixth in spot trading and second in derivatives trading within just two years.
As assessed by Forbes as of December 13, Bankman-Fried rapidly built a cryptocurrency empire over a brief four-year span, amassing a $26.5 billion net worth. Amid intense regulatory scrutiny, he navigated compliance successfully while his competitors failed to do so.
Insider spoke with Bankman-Fried and several of his closest friends, colleagues, and investors to gain deeper insight into the young crypto billionaire. They shared their experiences working with Bankman-Fried, the daily habits that contributed to his success, and how he attracted major investors while staying ahead of regulatory oversight.
1. Bankman-Fried’s favorite food is salted french fries.
Out of concern for animal welfare, Bankman-Fried is a vegetarian. Andrew Croghan, a friend and former colleague who served as Alameda’s former COO, described how Bankman-Fried adapted this diet while working in Hong Kong.
“His sense of taste is unusually sensitive. His favorite foods are extremely basic,” Croghan said, adding: “He says adding seasonings or spices is like dumping a pile of salt on it. He won’t eat anything touched by even a speck of pepper.”
Because East Asian cuisine often emphasizes spicy flavors rather than pure vegetarianism, Bankman-Fried’s sensitivity sometimes poses challenges. As a result, his go-to meal is usually french fries.
“To him, the best meal in the world is plain french fries with a bit of light salt,” Croghan said.
He said that after leaving the Bahamas, Bankman-Fried found his vegetarian diet easier to manage than expected.
2. The viral TikTok video of Bankman-Fried dancing is authentic—not staged.
In addition to simple eating habits, Bankman-Fried keeps a minimalist wardrobe, typically wearing loose hoodies emblazoned with the FTX logo.
“He spends zero money on clothing,” said Sam Trabucco, co-CEO of Alameda Research and Bankman-Fried’s MIT classmate.
In a TikTok video that went viral, Bankman-Fried responded to questions confirming all his clothes fit into one backpack and explaining his minimal wardrobe setup.
Many assumed the video was fake, but FTX confirmed it was genuine.
3. He enjoys playing multiple board games simultaneously and finds sitting still entertaining.
Bankman-Fried and his younger brother Gabe enjoy intellectual challenges from games like Magic: The Gathering, bridge, and chess. But for Sam, playing just one type of strategy game at a time isn’t always enough.
“Growing up with games, his attitude was: if board games are fun, you should use timers and play two at once,” Gabe Bankman-Fried told Insider.
Once, Sam organized a puzzle game for a group of high school students, spending hundreds of hours designing rules and scenarios. In Gabe’s memory, the smooth execution of the game was a “huge success” for his brother. Afterward, Sam joyfully ran around Stanford’s campus.
“When he truly dedicates himself to something—even something nerdy and silly like puzzles—he succeeds,” Gabe said.
He uses it to pass idle time.
"There's no time pressure; others take forever to move, so I walk around," Sam said, adding that when opponents move slowly, he starts "playing games on my phone or computer, doing other things."
4. He’s a fan of Rihanna and pop music.
“You’d often see him watching football on one screen, YouTube videos of artists like Rihanna on another, replying to messages on a third, trading on a fourth, and taking calls on a fifth—all nearly simultaneously,” Caroline Ellison, co-CEO of Alameda Research, described Bankman-Fried’s multitasking ability.
Bankman-Fried said people close to him would easily notice he frequently listens to Rihanna.
“In fact, there’s a strong correlation between an artist’s popularity and how much I personally enjoy them,” Bankman-Fried said. “I tend to believe good music is music that people like—that’s a solid benchmark.”
While his musical tastes include artists like Rihanna and Kanye West, he primarily listens to pop music.
“For outsiders, songs popular around five years ago might be the best predictor of my taste,” Bankman-Fried said.
5. Many assume he’s a programmer—but he’s not.
“I think most people assume I’m a great programmer,” Bankman-Fried said. “But I’m not. I don’t code. I’m nothing in computer science. I haven’t written any code for FTX. FTX has many other truly impressive people—but that’s simply not me.”
6. In 2010, he attended a five-week high school math camp with almost no sleep.
Bankman-Fried is known for sleeping just four hours per night on a beanbag chair at his desk.
Trabucco met Bankman-Fried during a five-week math training camp at Mount Holyoke College in 2010 and recalled that Bankman-Fried had chronic insomnia and seemed to need far less sleep than others.
“I still remember clearly—it really happened during that math camp,” he recalled. “My impression was that he hardly slept at all throughout the program.”
7. He was part of Epsilon Theta, a student fraternity at MIT.
Bankman-Fried completed his undergraduate studies at MIT, majoring in physics.
During college, he joined a student fraternity called Epsilon Theta, consisting of about 20 members who replaced typical drinking and partying with puzzle-solving and board games.
8. He and the FTX team routinely take investor calls at 3 or 4 a.m.
Multiple investors and colleagues from Alameda and FTX described how Bankman-Fried remains available to take calls—even at 3 or 4 a.m.
Amy Wu, a venture capitalist at Lightspeed Ventures who invested in FTX’s Series B-1 round, said: “Due to time zones, we thought they were in the Bay Area, only to realize it was 4 a.m. there.”
Bankman-Fried’s work rhythm is straightforward.
Ryan Salame, CEO of FTX Digital Markets, once canceled a client meeting so Bankman-Fried could continue sleeping after roughly 30 straight hours of work.
When Bankman-Fried woke up, he walked over and said, ‘Why didn’t you wake me? That’s wrong. Without question, you must wake me next time,’ Salame recalled.
Edith Yeung, a venture capitalist at Race Capital and one of FTX’s seed investors, had a similar experience speaking with the Hong Kong team.
“No matter the time, we keep talking to his team—we call them at noon our time, which means they’re answering calls at 3 or 4 a.m. theirs—and unbelievably, they’re still awake, responsive, and ready to jump on Zoom. How are you still functioning?” asked Yeung, later adding: “So in a way, they clearly lack work-life balance and operate on a true 24/7 schedule.”
9. Alameda employees donate 50% or more of their salaries to effective charities.
Effective altruism is a philosophy emphasizing the use of personal resources to maximize benefit for others.
This principle is embedded in Alameda’s culture. According to a software engineer who previously worked at both FTX and Alameda, employees were initially required to donate at least 50% of their salaries to charity—a policy later acknowledged as detrimental to talent recruitment.
When Croghan joined Alameda, he was unfamiliar with the term. He initially thought the rule requiring staff to donate half their salary was “crazy,” but quickly realized he was the only one who felt that way. He added that many employees left major companies like Facebook and Google specifically to join and contribute more effectively.
10. Bankman-Fried may have political ambitions.
“Ten years from now, I expect SBF to be one of the richest people in the world and solving some of humanity’s most critical problems—though not immediately. I do believe there will come a point when he shifts focus from FTX to global issues,” wrote Noah Dummett, a former trader at FTX and Alameda, in an email to Insider. “A political career wouldn’t be surprising given his genuine motivations.”
Bankman-Fried hasn’t entirely ruled out a future in politics.
“I’m interested in politics because I think it’s at least something I’ll pay attention to, and I’ve already started playing a role elsewhere,” Bankman-Fried said. “And I intend to stay involved in shaping the DC landscape because I believe it matters—and it genuinely does hold value.”
According to multiple insiders, he has already entered the political arena, becoming one of President Biden’s largest donors during the 2020 campaign. He appears capable of navigating Washington’s growing scrutiny of cryptocurrency by building relationships with regulators.
Bankman-Fried’s standout ability to collaborate with regulators was part of why Lightspeed’s Wu chose to invest in FTX.
“They actively engage with regulators in every jurisdiction they operate in—and proactively anticipate dialogue even in those where engagement hasn’t yet begun,” Wu said.
But according to his brother, Bankman-Fried’s approach to policymaking so far resembles that of a philanthropist more than a profit-driven businessman.
“He’s really crafting rules as a philanthropist, not merely as a corporate figure seeking greater profits,” Gabe said. “That’s crucial for driving movements and mobilizing people who want to make real change.”
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