Number go up : inside crypto's wild rise and staggering fall / Zeke Faux.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Faux, Zeke, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Cryptocurrencies.

Investments.

Digital currency.

cryptocurrencies.

Physical Description:

viii, 280 pages : color illustrations, map ; 25 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Other Title:

Inside crypto's wild rise and staggering fall

Place of Publication:

New York : Currency, [2023]

Summary:

"In 2021 cryptocurrency went mainstream. Giant investment funds were buying it, celebrities like Tom Brady endorsed it, and TV ads hailed it as the future of money. Hardly anyone knew how it worked-but why bother with the particulars when everyone was making a fortune from Dogecoin, Shiba Inu, or some other bizarrely named "digital asset"? As he observed this frenzy, investigative reporter Zeke Faux had a nagging question: Was it all just a confidence game of epic proportions? What started as curiosity-with a dash of FOMO-would morph into a two-year, globe-spanning quest to understand the wizards behind the world's new financial machinery. Faux's investigation would lead him to a schlubby, frizzy-haired twenty-nine-year-old named Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF for short) and a host of other crypto scammers, utopians, and overnight billionaires. Faux follows the trail to a luxury resort in the Bahamas, where SBF boldly declares that he will use his crypto fortune to save the world. Faux talks his way onto the yacht of a former child actor turned crypto impresario and gains access to "ApeFest," an elite party headlined by Snoop Dogg, by purchasing a $20,000 image of a cartoon monkey. In El Salvador, Faux learns what happens when a country wagers its treasury on Bitcoin, and in the Philippines, he stumbles upon a Pokémon knockoff mobile game touted by boosters as a cure for poverty. And in an astonishing development, a spam text leads Faux to Cambodia, where he uncovers a crypto-powered human-trafficking ring. When the bubble suddenly bursts in 2022, Faux brings readers inside SBF's penthouse as the fallen crypto king faces his imminent arrest. Fueled by the absurd details and authoritative reporting that earned Zeke Faux the accolade "our great poet of crime" (Money Stuff columnist Matt Levine), Number Go Up is the essential chronicle, by turns harrowing and uproarious, of a $3 trillion financial delusion"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Prologue

"I am freaking Nostradamus!"

Number go up technology

Doula for creation

The plastic surgeon

Getting hilariously rich

Cat and mouse tricks

"A thin crust of ice"

The name's Chalopin. Jean Chalopin.

Crypto pirates

Imagine a Robin Hood thing

"Let's get weird"

"Click, click, click, make money, make money"

Play to earn

Ponzinomics

All my apes gone

It's the community, bro

Blorps and fleezels

Pig butchering

"We have freedom"

No acceptamos bitcoin

Honey is better

Assets are not fine

Inside the orchid

Epilogue.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 247-267) and index.

Other Format:

Online version: Faux, Zeke. Number go up

ISBN:

9780593443811

0593443810

9780593728222

059372822X

OCLC:

1396083228