Hype Machine: Inside the Cult of Crypto

A compelling and incendiary exploration of the cult of crypto told through the rise and fall of its most mercurial figure - Sam Bankman-Fried.

'Anybody who wants to understand the cryptocurrency mania should read Hype Machine.' LIONEL BARBER, FORMER EDITOR OF THE FINANCIAL TIMES

'A richly reported and devastating indictment of a financial bubble of unprecedented size and stupidity.' ZEKE FAUX, AUTHOR OF NUMBER GO UP

On 2 November 2023, in one of the largest fraud trials in history, Sam Bankman-Fried was found guilty of stealing billions of dollars from the customers of his crypto-exchange, FTX.

How did this 31-year-old Californian in shorts and a T-shirt manage to become one of the most famous CEOs in the world? How did greed, fear and free money inflate the crypto bubble until it finally popped with devastating consequences for millions of people who lost money in the crash? Who were the enablers, investors and innovators who transformed the original promise of crypto into a digital Wild West?

Hype Machine is the definitive story of the boom and bust of crypto, written by award-winning Financial Times journalist Joshua Oliver. Expansive, nuanced and eminently entertaining, it demystifies the crypto circus by following the journeys of its most influential participants and the trajectory of SBF, its enigmatic ringmaster.

Oliver, who reported on the crypto crash with extensive access to SBF himself, introduces readers to the people and ideas that shaped crypto's wild rise and fall, including Arthur Hayes, Changpeng Zhao and the coterie of acolytes who surrounded FTX. Through exclusive interviews, compelling research and with ringside seats at the trial of the decade, he paints a vivid, detailed and tragi-comic picture of this defining financial moment of our times.

About the Author

Joshua Oliver is a correspondent for the Financial Times, where he has reported on investing, markets and real estate. He covered the cryptocurrency bubble and the collapse of the FTX crypto exchange led by Sam Bankman-Fried, for which he was named Young Journalist of the Year in the 2022 Wincott Awards. He holds a master's degree from Columbia Journalism School and studied history at Trinity College, University of Toronto. He grew up in Toronto and lives in London.