Complex Systems with Patrick McKenzie (patio11)6 Maalis 2025

A tale of two Americas in one $50K cash withdrawal

Patrick McKenzie (patio11) explains the standard procedure for large withdrawals in bank branches, with particular focus on the viral story published in The Cut about a woman who withdrew $50,000 cash from a bank and handed it to scammers. Certain minor details in the article set off a year-long investigation where he identified the exact physical location of the bank branch in question, researched the context for the transaction using public records, and obtained new details through FOIA requests. His investigation reveals an underlying narrative that accounts for what actually happened, and provides a worked example for fact-checking in journalism.
–

Full transcript available here:
www.complexsystemspodcast.com/two-americas-one-50k-withdrawal/

–
Sponsors: Safebase

Ready to save time and close deals faster? Inbound security reviews shouldn’t slow down your team or your sales cycle. Leading companies use SafeBase to eliminate up to 98% of inbound security questionnaires, automate workflows, and accelerate pipeline. Go to safebase.io/podcast
–
Recommended in this episode:

Two Americas, one bank, and $50,000 cash https://www.bitsaboutmoney.com/archive/two-americas-one-bank-branch/
The Cut, The Day I Put $50,000 in a Shoe Box and Handed It to a Stranger https://www.thecut.com/article/amazon-scam-call-ftc-arrest-warrants.html
Kelsey Piper on Complex Systems https://open.spotify.com/episode/33rHTZVowaq76tCTaKJfRB
Jim McKenzie on Complex Systems https://open.spotify.com/episode/6ocJirzGTStuf0K9ITM21X

–

Timestamps:

(00:55) Suppose you ask a bank to withdraw $50,000 in cash

(07:55) Style magazines sometimes publish hard-hitting journalism

(12:36) Reaching out to Vox Media

(17:09) Sources of doubt
(17:55) Sponsor: Safebase

(22:30) The physical reality of bank branches

(25:53) In which we became acquainted with brisk walks across Brooklyn

(34:42) New York’s Finest foil FOIL for a time

Tämä jakso on lisätty Podme-palveluun avoimen RSS-syötteen kautta eikä se ole Podmen omaa tuotantoa. Siksi jakso saattaa sisältää mainontaa.

Jaksot(94)

Forty ways to pay for coffee in Japan

Patrick McKenzie (patio11) reads his 2021 essay "Payments in Japan," tracing how Japanese consumers navigate a landscape with dozens of competing payment methods at once: credit cards, electronic mone...

25 Kesä 35min

The factory behind your home loan

Patrick McKenzie reads from his 2022 Bits About Money essay on mortgages, making the case that a mortgage is best understood as a manufactured product, not a simple loan between a bank and a customer....

18 Kesä 26min

How brokerage transfers actually work

Patrick McKenzie reads from his 2024 Bits About Money essay on ACATS, the Automated Customer Account Transfer Service that governs how Americans move investment accounts between brokerages, then updat...

4 Kesä 43min

Wrong numbers and why they survive, with Aaron Brown

Patrick McKenzie (patio11) is joined by Aaron Brown, author of Wrong Number, to examine why institutions that produce bad statistics face so few consequences for doing so. They trace the pattern from ...

14 Touko 55min

Defendant, Censor, Politico, Spy

The improbable but true story of how non-profits operating a private intelligence agency to combat terrorism decided to interfere with campaign infrastructure in a U.S. election.This piece includes or...

8 Touko 1h 5min

How the SPLC became financial infrastructure

Patrick McKenzie reads from his latest Bits About Money essay, walking through why bank fraud charges are a prosecutor's favorite tool, how the Bank Secrecy Act's surveillance regime is designed to fo...

1 Touko 51min

The honey badger of payments

Patrick McKenzie (patio11) reads his classic Bits about Money essay on how checks shaped the entire American payments infrastructure, from the origins of ACH to why a standard US bank account is, tech...

23 Huhti 29min

Cash received is not revenue earned

Patrick McKenzie (patio11) reads his classic Bits about Money essay explaining why revenue recognition in software is more complicated than most engineers, founders, and financial reporters think. The...

16 Huhti 33min