Ex-Alameda rent on ‘strain’ to not blow up Backpack trade: Armani Ferrante, X Corridor of Flame

Former Alameda Analysis worker turned crypto trade founder Armani Ferrante is aware of firsthand that Eminem’s lyrics — “you solely get one shot, don’t miss your probability to blow” — couldn’t be extra true in crypto.

“Whenever you see Elon Musk standing subsequent to his rocket, then it collapses and crashes, he feels dangerous about it. He loses some huge cash. It’s horrible, however he will get to strive once more when the rocket crashes,” Ferrante tells Corridor of Flame.

“If an trade collapses, you don’t get to strive once more; it’s sport over,” the 32-year-old US-born, Tokyo-based entrepreneur declares.

Nobody is aware of that higher than Ferrante, an early rent on the now-defunct Alameda Analysis. He spent three months at Alameda earlier than it formally launched in 2018, then returned briefly in September 2020 to work on Solana tasks like Serum. Ultimately, Ferrante grew to become one of many many victims, dropping tens of millions.

The strain to maintain his crypto trade Backpack squeaky clear is what retains Ferrante on his toes. Backpack, which has greater than $60 billion in buying and selling quantity, capabilities as each a centralized trade and a self-custodial pockets, letting customers commerce simply whereas conserving management of their funds — the other of what FTX provided.

When requested if operating an trade and seeing what occurred to his former boss, Sam Bankman-Fried, retains him up at evening, he admitted, “No person’s ever requested me that earlier than… however I might do an entire podcast on it.”

“That strain is sweet. With out that strain, you don’t have the outcomes you need,” Ferrante says, who now has round 95 folks working for him worldwide.

“As a result of that strain exists, I get up daily interested by how I remedy these issues in a means that is smart,” he provides.

Ferrante’s transferring quick, however he nonetheless needs to ensure every little thing’s executed correctly.

“Individuals used to reward FTX for how briskly they moved…it seems they moved so quick as a result of they took each shortcut within the guide.”

FTX co-led Backpack’s $20 million strategic funding spherical in September 2022, however when SBF’s trade imploded simply two months later, Ferrante misplaced 80% of his working capital, which was caught on FTX. Ferrante determined to take the danger and preserve constructing the trade with hardly any funds. The wager paid off — inside 4 days of launching in February 2024, it had already crossed $1 billion in buying and selling quantity.

How did Armani Ferrante construct his X following?

Ferrante first hopped on Twitter in April 2011 and now has 127,100 followers, however he admits his first massive bump got here alongside Solana’s rise.

“I feel it actually began rising when Solana began rising,” he says. Ferrante has been a robust supporter of Solana since its launch in March 2020 and can be the creator of Anchor, a developer and safety protocol utilized by practically half of all Solana tasks.

“I used to be fairly vocal within the early days of Solana. I used to be engaged on the developer instruments, and it was rising actually exponentially,” Ferrante says.

He says that that was the primary part of his follower development, as much as round 30,000 to 50,000 followers. 

The second part was the launch of Mad Lads in April 2023, a Solana NFT venture he launched with Tristan Yver, which is Solana’s second largest NFT assortment, in response to DappRadar.

Ferrante says he most likely hit the 100,000-follower mark throughout the late 2023 Solana memecoin bull run, as curiosity within the ecosystem and Solana-related founders surged. Not too lengthy after, Backpack went public, giving him one other enhance.

“Beginning Backpack, all these folks began tweeting me to do partnerships,” he says. “When you become involved in crypto, so many individuals are concerned in crypto, you begin getting a following,” he provides.

What kind of content material does Armani Ferrante do?

Ferrante admits that his social media content material is “so all over.”

“It is rather inconsistent,” he laughs.

He says his posts are a mixture of Backpack updates, new options and storytelling about what the trade is constructing.

From reminding Backpack customers that their maxed-out leverage will get auto-trimmed as positions develop to taking photographs at crypto wallets by calling them “restricted financial institution accounts” to joking concerning the market downturn by telling followers to disregard his “very unfavourable” P&L — Ferrante’s content material is something however predictable.

He additionally shares his ideas on the crypto trade and isn’t afraid to name out lies about him. Firstly of 2025, Ferrante took day out of his day to close down an X consumer who claimed he was conscious of the “rug” and “scams” at FTX and Alameda Analysis earlier than they got here to gentle.

“Every part in that put up is, at worst, a fabrication and, at greatest, a misunderstanding. A very faux actuality,” Ferrante mentioned in a Jan. 10 X put up.

It got here simply days after Backpack introduced the acquisition of FTX EU, the previous European arm of the defunct FTX trade.

Predictions for Armani Ferrante?

Ferrante was fast to say he’s “a horrible particular person” to reply the query of the place Solana’s worth goes in 2025.

He says there’s no good method to reply a worth prediction query. Even when he’s performed it secure earlier than with one thing like, “Costs go up, costs go down, level is, I don’t know,” he nonetheless received backlash on-line.

“If I knew, I’d be so wealthy you don’t have any F$%king thought.”

Ferrante isn’t a lot into predicting costs as he’s predicting “the speed of progress” of your complete crypto trade, which he says is progressing shortly.

One massive distinction this time, he says, is that when the subsequent bull run ends, fewer folks should ditch crypto and return to common 9-to-5 jobs like they did after the 2021 bull run.

“Individuals went again to their jobs at Apple or Fb; they have been like, this crypto factor is lifeless,” he mentioned.

“No person is now questioning whether or not that is going to die or not,” he says.

Subscribe

Probably the most partaking reads in blockchain. Delivered as soon as a
week.

Ciaran Lyons

Ciaran Lyons is an Australian crypto journalist. He is additionally a standup comic and has been a radio and TV presenter on Triple J, SBS and The Challenge.