{"id":244812,"date":"2022-11-23T11:17:27","date_gmt":"2022-11-23T17:17:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/?p=244812"},"modified":"2022-11-23T17:15:39","modified_gmt":"2022-11-23T23:15:39","slug":"casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/","title":{"rendered":"Casino Card Tricks Helped Burst the Crypto Bubble \u2013 Report"},"content":{"rendered":"

Card-counting and other casino tricks figured heavily into the strategy of a former hedge fund chief, according to a new report. Those risky bets may have contributed to the collapse of Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX cryptocurrency exchange earlier this month.<\/p>\n

Bloomberg News<\/em> was the first to spot old Twitter threads from Sam Trabucco that clearly described how the 30-year-old former crypto exec applied his knowledge of gambling strategies to crypto trading and other business decisions. Trabucco resigned in August as co-CEO of Alameda Research, sister company to FTX.<\/p>\n

\"Sam
Blackjack and poker tricks learned in casinos by former cryptocurrency exec Sam Trabucco greatly influenced his company’s business strategy, according to a recent report. (Image: coindesk.com)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The story provides insight into the mindset of those who artificially inflated cryptocurrency into a bubble that encouraged millions to lose billions when it popped dramatically earlier this month.<\/p>\n

‘Bet Big on the Way Down’<\/h2>\n

When XRP, the native cryptocurrency of the money-transfer network Ripple, plunged amid speculation of a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation, \u201cWe basically just bet as big as liquidity would let us on momentum on the way down, which ended up great,\u201d Trabucco tweeted<\/a> in January 2021. \u201cWe made a list of all the bad news announcements we thought were likely, and we just kinda waited for them to come out. Bittrex delisting? Hit. Grayscale removing? Hit. Etc. We got less short once these \u2018seemed over\u2019 (this was more about intuition on timing than anything).\u201d<\/p>\n

In the same series of tweets, Trabucco alluded to counting cards at blackjack, posting: \u201cI may or may not be banned from 3 casinos for this.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the veracity of Trabucco’s claim has yet to be investigated, his embrace of risk may have contributed to the losses that sent Alameda, FTX, and more than 130 related entities into bankruptcy court this month. The crypto exchange \u2013\u00a0 which allegedly traded with customer funds when it didn’t have enough money on hand for customer withdrawals \u2013 plummeted from a $32 billion valuation to nothing as liquidity dried up over a 10-day span. It reportedly owes creditors more than $3 billion.<\/p>\n

Reuters<\/em> reported at least $1 billion in FTX client funds is still missing. According to its report, Bankman-Fried had \u201csecretly\u201d moved $10 billion in FTX assets to help prop up Alameda\u2019s risky bets.<\/p>\n

Bubble Factor<\/h2>\n

Speaking on an episode of the YouTube show UpOnly<\/em> in 2021, Trabucco recalled playing poker in his early 20s while earning a degree in math and computer science from MIT. He later traded at Susquehanna International Group.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow I really don\u2019t tilt very much,\u201d he said, referencing a poker term for when players let their emotions guide them. However, Trabucco admitted to still sometimes buying impulsively.<\/p>\n

A Trabucco tweet from July 2022 showed a poker table with chips on it, captioned with, \u201cI should stick to trading.\u201d Nevertheless, Trabucco posted his follow-up tweet from Las Vegas.<\/p>\n

Trabucco, who has never been accused of any wrongdoing, stepped down as Alameda\u2019s co-CEO in August, leaving Caroline Ellison as Alameda\u2019s sole chief.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I’ve learned anything at Alameda, it’s how to make good decisions \u2013 and this is the right one for me,” he tweeted at the time.<\/p>\n

When CoinDesk<\/em> reported on Nov. 2 that Alameda \u2013 with $8 billion in liabilities and $14.6 billion in assets \u2013 was insolvent, Trabucco took to Twitter to debunk the story.<\/p>\n

\u201cBonkers how people just instantly 100% believe every s***** \u2018news\u2019 story they see,\u201d he tweeted.<\/p>\n

Apparently, Trabucco was bluffing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Card-counting and other casino tricks figured heavily into the strategy of a former hedge fund chief, according to a new report. Those risky bets may have contributed to the collapse of Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX cryptocurrency exchange earlier this month. Bloomberg News was the first to spot old Twitter threads from Sam Trabucco that clearly described […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":78,"featured_media":244826,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[24066],"tags":[83875,82949,83872,83873,83871,81888,81892,83874,81907],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nCasino Card Tricks Helped Burst the Crypto Bubble \u2013 Report - Casino.org<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Card-counting and other casino tricks figured heavily into the strategy of a former hedge fund chief, according to a new report. Those risky bets may have\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Casino Card Tricks Helped Burst the Crypto Bubble \u2013 Report - Casino.org\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Card-counting and other casino tricks figured heavily into the strategy of a former hedge fund chief, according to a new report. Those risky bets may have\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Casino.org\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Casino.OrgNews\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2022-11-23T17:17:27+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-11-23T23:15:39+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/trabucco-coindesk-dot-com.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1438\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1005\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Corey Levitan\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@Casino_Org\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Casino_Org\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Corey Levitan\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/\",\"name\":\"Casino Card Tricks Helped Burst the Crypto Bubble \u2013 Report - Casino.org\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/trabucco-coindesk-dot-com.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2022-11-23T17:17:27+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-11-23T23:15:39+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/281fd7b5480c9afb75e84ffb75039f09\"},\"description\":\"Card-counting and other casino tricks figured heavily into the strategy of a former hedge fund chief, according to a new report. Those risky bets may have\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/trabucco-coindesk-dot-com.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/trabucco-coindesk-dot-com.jpg\",\"width\":1438,\"height\":1005},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"News\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Cryptocurrency\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/cryptocurrency\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":3,\"name\":\"Casino Card Tricks Helped Burst the Crypto Bubble \u2013 Report\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/\",\"name\":\"Casino.org\",\"description\":\"Latest Casino and Gaming News\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/281fd7b5480c9afb75e84ffb75039f09\",\"name\":\"Corey Levitan\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/cropped-3-3-96x96.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/cropped-3-3-96x96.png\",\"caption\":\"Corey Levitan\"},\"description\":\"Corey Levitan joined Casino.org in 2022 after a long career covering Las Vegas. He currently covers gaming news on the US West Coast, including Las Vegas. Corey spent six years covering the Vegas Strip for the Las Vegas Review-Journal, where he also wrote the most popular humor column in the city\u2019s history. (For \u201cFear and Loafing,\u201d he tried out 176 Vegas jobs, including poker player, blackjack dealer and Follie Bergere dancer.) Corey has won more than 100 local, state and national awards for his journalism, which has also appeared in Rolling Stone, New York Magazine and the New York Post. Corey is a New York native whose hobbies include playing guitar, trying to be a better husband, and arguing with strangers on Facebook. Contact Corey at corey@casino.org.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/author\/corey-levitan\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Casino Card Tricks Helped Burst the Crypto Bubble \u2013 Report - Casino.org","description":"Card-counting and other casino tricks figured heavily into the strategy of a former hedge fund chief, according to a new report. Those risky bets may have","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Casino Card Tricks Helped Burst the Crypto Bubble \u2013 Report - Casino.org","og_description":"Card-counting and other casino tricks figured heavily into the strategy of a former hedge fund chief, according to a new report. Those risky bets may have","og_url":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/","og_site_name":"Casino.org","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Casino.OrgNews","article_published_time":"2022-11-23T17:17:27+00:00","article_modified_time":"2022-11-23T23:15:39+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1438,"height":1005,"url":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/trabucco-coindesk-dot-com.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Corey Levitan","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@Casino_Org","twitter_site":"@Casino_Org","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Corey Levitan","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/","url":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/","name":"Casino Card Tricks Helped Burst the Crypto Bubble \u2013 Report - Casino.org","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/trabucco-coindesk-dot-com.jpg","datePublished":"2022-11-23T17:17:27+00:00","dateModified":"2022-11-23T23:15:39+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/281fd7b5480c9afb75e84ffb75039f09"},"description":"Card-counting and other casino tricks figured heavily into the strategy of a former hedge fund chief, according to a new report. Those risky bets may have","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/trabucco-coindesk-dot-com.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/trabucco-coindesk-dot-com.jpg","width":1438,"height":1005},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/casino-card-tricks-helped-burst-the-crypto-bubble-report\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"News","item":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Cryptocurrency","item":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/cryptocurrency\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Casino Card Tricks Helped Burst the Crypto Bubble \u2013 Report"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/","name":"Casino.org","description":"Latest Casino and Gaming News","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/281fd7b5480c9afb75e84ffb75039f09","name":"Corey Levitan","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/cropped-3-3-96x96.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/cropped-3-3-96x96.png","caption":"Corey Levitan"},"description":"Corey Levitan joined Casino.org in 2022 after a long career covering Las Vegas. He currently covers gaming news on the US West Coast, including Las Vegas. Corey spent six years covering the Vegas Strip for the Las Vegas Review-Journal, where he also wrote the most popular humor column in the city\u2019s history. (For \u201cFear and Loafing,\u201d he tried out 176 Vegas jobs, including poker player, blackjack dealer and Follie Bergere dancer.) Corey has won more than 100 local, state and national awards for his journalism, which has also appeared in Rolling Stone, New York Magazine and the New York Post. Corey is a New York native whose hobbies include playing guitar, trying to be a better husband, and arguing with strangers on Facebook. Contact Corey at corey@casino.org.","url":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/author\/corey-levitan\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244812"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/78"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=244812"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244812\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/244826"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=244812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=244812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=244812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}