The founder of crypto platform FTX, Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) says that he could spend upto $1 billion or more in the 2024 elections. This gigantic amount would make him the biggest-ever political donor in a single election.
The crypto billionaire said in a recent podcast interview that he expects to donate “north of $100 million” in the upcoming presidential elections and has a “soft ceiling” of $1 billion.
“I would guess north of $100 million. As for how much more than that, I don’t know. It really does depend on what happens. It’s really dependent on exactly who’s running where for what,” he said in the podcast.
Sam Bankman-Fried leans towards the democratic candidates, and his spending would likely be on the higher end should former President Donald Trump decide to run again.
“[$1 billion] is a decent thing to look at as a — I would hate to say hard ceiling, because who knows what’s going to happen between now and then — but at least sort of as a soft ceiling.”
Looking at Bankman’s political donation history, all of this could probably come true. Bankman was one of the biggest donors of the Biden campaign, contributing a total of $5.2 million.
“The question is, does his spending bear fruit in the midterms? And ultimately I think that will wade pretty heavily in his decision to keep this going or not,” said Alex Baumgart, a researcher with the campaign finance tracker Open Secrets.
Bankman donated millions of dollars to a PAC backing the democratic candidate, Carrick Flynn for an open seat in Oregon’s 6th Congressional District. However, Flynn lost the primaries to Andrea Salinas.
When asked about this particular vote, Bankman said he viewed the situation as a low-risk, high reward gamble stating, “If you’re donating to political races that you think your candidate is 99 percent to win, you’re almost certainly doing something wrong.”
“You should be donating such that you think you have a pretty substantial chance of losing, and I stand by that.”
Apart from that, the FTX founder has already spent a total of $31.5 million in this election season thus far, including donating $16 Million to super PACs just in the month of April.
