- Michael Lewis, the author of "Going Infinite," said being around SBF was a lifestyle "downgrade."
- Lewis met Sam Bankman-Fried more than 100 times and interviewed his FTX colleagues for the book.
The author Michael Lewis met Sam Bankman-Fried more than a hundred times in two years while writing the former crypto mogul's biography — but it didn't seem like a cushy ride-along.
"My private life is more comfortable and materialistic than his. So I always felt it was a downgrade moving into his world," Lewis told Emily Donaldson in a Wednesday report in The Globe and Mail, a Canadian newspaper.
"The food was worse. The company was worse," the author said.
Bankman-Fried, 31, is best known on the lifestyle front for his messy head of curls and cargo-shorts-and-t-shirt getup.
The FTX cofounder and former CEO, who was worth $16 billion in early November, was apparently Spartan on a personal level. He drove a Toyota Corolla and ate vegan food — his favorite food was said to be french fries with salt, Insider reported in December 2021.
Even so, the disgraced persona did splurge on a few things. Bankman-Fried was said to have bunked with several FTX colleagues in a $35 million penthouse in the Bahamas, where the exchange was based after it moved from Hong Kong. FTX and its executives also apparently spent freely on Bahamas luxury real estate, luxury hotel stays, and even on private-jet services for their Amazon packages, Insider reported in May.
Lewis, who is 62, also interviewed former FTX employees for the book. He admitted he had trouble fitting in.
"What was hard was getting into the heads of these 25-year-old computer people. I would have had as much trouble with this crowd when I was 25," Lewis told Donaldson. "It took a while before I got comfortable with them, and they got comfortable with me."
Lewis' book, "Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon," was released Tuesday — the same day Bankman-Fried's criminal fraud trial started.
The author has already faced backlash for comments made while promoting his book, including criticism of his defense of FTX. Lewis told CBS's "60 Minutes" the crypto exchange would still be making "tons of money" if there hadn't been a run on customer deposits.
Bankman-Fried faces seven charges, including fraud and conspiracy relating to FTX's collapse. He has pleaded not guilty.
The crypto exchange FTX — which was worth $32 billion in early 2022 — filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on November 11 of the same year after a weeklong liquidity crisis.
A representative for Bankman-Fried declined to comment to Insider.