FTX’s lending product was (theoretically) peer-to-peer, the rates were driven by actual borrow demand from other people.
FTX was just a tremendously better derivatives exchange than everybody else when it was launched. To this day only Okex of the major exchanges has a competitive margin system imo. Continuous pnl realization and cleaner perpetual models are icing on the cake.
Theft of user funds aside, SBF likely knows more about derivatives and trading them than most exchange operators and it shows in the design of the exchange.
"... the rates were driven by actual borrow demand from other people..."
Or, alternatively, the rates were artificially inflated by a ponzi operator interested in getting more and more people joining the pyramid. Just like Coinbase, FTX was, with 99% certainty, not profitable. Of course, the creators of the pyramid WILL profit and take resources for themselves to buy things like, let's say, a 10% stake on Robinhood, or invest in many real state properties around the world, a la Do Kwon. People are just gullible, anyone who believed on those "crypto earn" vehycles, paying 5 to 10 times the market interest rates, is probably the same people that would buy magic beans from a random dude in Times Square.
"FTX’s lending product was (theoretically) peer-to-peer"
that's the point of theoretically?
Their spot lending system didn't come out until well after they had cemented their spot as a top exchange, and if you look at the rates anytime in the last year they were well under market rate - like ~1-2% rates for most major products.
It might have been part of the scam, but this looks much more like pretty bog standard "let's go trade our users funds away".
Their little friend BlockFi was offering 8% at the end of 2021 if I'm not mistaken. That was the moment I got out of the crypto space for good, the ponzi mask was all but gone at that point. The fact that FTX bought BlockFi just cemented their ponzi friendly, to say the least, business model.
Ah yeah, I was thinking about the ftx on-exchange spot margin system.
You're definitely right that the retail lending aspects were generally somewhat scammy. I suspect those rates made more sense pre-2021 when it was very expensive and hard for crypto firms to borrow capital, but offering 8% fixed on dollars in any recent time was a loss leader at best.
It's sadly looking more like sbf was buying up these firms to do exactly as you said and grab capital to fill the whole, and hide their own liabilities to said firms.
FTX was just a tremendously better derivatives exchange than everybody else when it was launched. To this day only Okex of the major exchanges has a competitive margin system imo. Continuous pnl realization and cleaner perpetual models are icing on the cake.
Theft of user funds aside, SBF likely knows more about derivatives and trading them than most exchange operators and it shows in the design of the exchange.