And another one...

A large cryptocurrency exchange has gone bankrupt, and after that, several crypto exchanges have 'paused withdrawals'. Did you spot the big mistake in that sentence? The mistake is the word 'exchange'. To a considerable extent, people (ordinary people) who have lost money in crypto over the last year or so have done so because of the confusion over what an exchange does. In equity or debt trading, the exchange is an intermediary that brings buyers and sellers together. In crypto, exchange means a combination of a bank, a depository, a mutual fund, and a company that issues stock. Oh, and also the regulator! In fact, it means everything except exchange. Consider the facts that have emerged from the bankruptcy-eve balance sheet of FTX that has been revealed. On the liability side, it has roughly 9 billion USD of funds, most of it being depo