The FTX Future Fund team has resigned
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Good quality. Reputable source with community review or editorial standards, but less rigorous than peer-reviewed venues.
Rating inherited from publication venue: EA Forum
This post is a primary source document marking the collapse of one of the largest AI safety and EA funding sources; the FTX Future Fund had committed ~$160M in grants, and its collapse significantly disrupted the AI safety funding landscape in late 2022.
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Summary
On November 10, 2022, the FTX Future Fund team (Nick Beckstead, Leopold Aschenbrenner, Avital Balwit, Ketan Ramakrishnan, and Will MacAskill) announced their resignation following FTX's collapse, citing fundamental questions about the legitimacy of FTX's business operations. They expressed deep regret that many committed grants to EA and AI safety projects would likely go unfulfilled and condemned any deception by FTX leadership.
Key Points
- •The entire FTX Future Fund team resigned on November 10, 2022, immediately following FTX's collapse and bankruptcy filing.
- •Team members cited inability to process grants and fundamental doubts about the legitimacy of FTX's business operations as reasons for resignation.
- •Many committed Future Fund grants—totaling hundreds of millions of dollars pledged to EA and AI safety projects—were expected to go unhonored.
- •The team condemned any deception or dishonesty by FTX leadership while acknowledging they lacked a full picture of what went wrong.
- •Signatories included prominent EA and AI safety figures: Nick Beckstead, Leopold Aschenbrenner, Avital Balwit, Ketan Ramakrishnan, and Will MacAskill.
Cited by 4 pages
| Page | Type | Quality |
|---|---|---|
| EA Epistemic Failures in the FTX Era | -- | 84.0 |
| EA Institutions' Response to the FTX Collapse | -- | 53.0 |
| Longtermism's Philosophical Credibility After FTX | -- | 50.0 |
| FTX Future Fund | Organization | 60.0 |
Cached Content Preview
# The FTX Future Fund team has resigned By Nick_Beckstead, leopold, ab, ketanrama Published: 2022-11-11 We were shocked and immensely saddened to learn of the recent events at FTX. Our hearts go out to the thousands of FTX customers whose finances may have been jeopardized or destroyed. We are now unable to perform our work or process grants, and we have fundamental questions about the legitimacy and integrity of the business operations that were funding the FTX Foundation and the Future Fund. As a result, we resigned earlier today. We don’t yet have a full picture of what went wrong, and we are following the news online as it unfolds. But to the extent that the leadership of FTX may have engaged in deception or dishonesty, we condemn that behavior in the strongest possible terms. We believe that being a good actor in the world means striving to act with honesty and integrity. We are devastated to say that it looks likely that there are many committed grants that the Future Fund will be unable to honor. We are so sorry that it has come to this. We are no longer employed by the Future Fund, but, in our personal capacities, we are exploring ways to help with this awful situation. We joined the Future Fund to support incredible people and projects, and this outcome is heartbreaking to us. We appreciate the grantees' work to help build a better future, and we have been honored to support it. We're sorry that we won't be able to continue to do so going forward, and we deeply regret the difficult, painful, and stressful position that many of you are now in. To reach us, grantees may email [grantee-reachout@googlegroups.com](mailto:grantee-reachout@googlegroups.com). We know grantees must have many questions, and in our personal capacities we will try to answer them as best as we can given the circumstances. Nick Beckstead Leopold Aschenbrenner Avital Balwit Ketan Ramakrishnan Will MacAskill
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