Just recently, the founder of FTX, Sam Bankman-Fried, stated that he could get involved in the future U.S. elections. Of course, he mentions the fact that being a crypto billionaire makes it possible for him to take such action. Bankman-Fried made this announcement during a podcast on Monday, stating that he is preparing for donating up to $1 billion for the elections.
After his statement, Bankman-Fried made sure that everybody knows he is serious by saying that he is likely to allocate at least $100 million to the elections. He believes that he is going to have an influence on the upcoming elections through this donation. Moreover, he states that putting “hard ceilings” on such a donation is not good since $1 billion is a huge amount.
Bankman-Fried is not new to the political scene. According to BBC, he was one of the 20 biggest donors to the Democrat’s presidential campaign. For your information, the Democrats won the 2020 elections, leading to Joe Biden being the 46th President of the U.S. This, however, does not mean that Bankman-Fried is going to support the Democrats again. He did not fail to mention the fact that he might donate $1 billion to Trump’s re-election campaign. By the end of the podcast, he said that he will calculate the exact size of the donation based on the candidates and their platforms.
The Cryptocurrency Market and Politics
If Bankman-Fried actually donates that amount of money for a presidential campaign, he will make history. This is because the crypto market and Bitcoin are still not seen as serious markets to invest in, and a crypto billionaire influencing the U.S. elections is a big deal. According to Alex Baumgart, a donation of that size would be in a league of its own.
At the time of writing, Bankman-Fried has a net worth of $20 billion. Until today, he has donated more than $200 million to various charities. During the interview with “What’s Your Problem?” he warned he is still undecided on the political scene. Thus, he holds no political positions as of right now and is prone to changing his political opinion until 2024; when the next elections are set to happen.
If this $1 billion donation happens, it will become the single biggest donation in the history of electoral campaigns. Back in 2020, the two biggest donators accounted for only $218 million of the electoral campaign. These two also hold the crown for the biggest donation of this kind. However, this is about to change, with the founder of FTX stepping in to set new standards.
There are rumors that Bankman-Fried is going to support the party that is more pro-crypto. However, there is no way to confirm such rumors until he himself announces something like that.
