He appears to me to be a financial geek, interested in the mechanics of finance for its own sake, and who finds comedy (often dark comedy) in the mechanics of our financial systems.
Philosophically, we can’t be 100% sure of his motivations to publish his insights, but everything of his that I have read points to the reason primarily being that he finds it fascinating, a nearly purposeless academic joy.
The point about being an entertainer is a good one. Nonetheless, after reading that I came out with more respect for Levine. With FTX in shambles, it would've been easy to go with the flow and lean into how he predicted the whole thing with his Ponzi question, but Levine instead honestly comes out and says that he actually liked SBF more after that interview.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33594284
I think people would do well to remember that Levine's job is NOT to do your due diligence for you; he's an entertainer.