Speaker 1: When it comes to strategic reserves, I think it's an
Speaker 1: inevitability that all of these entities are going to eventually
Speaker 1: adopt the strategic reserve. The question is gooplenks first? Which
Speaker 1: major nation decides to go first, because that triggers a
Speaker 1: domino effect.
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Speaker 2: rewards program and if you'd like to learn more, please
Speaker 2: visit the link in the description. Welcome into the Thinking
Speaker 2: Crypto Podcast. I'm your host, Tony Edward, and my guest
Speaker 2: today is doctor Arman mcgerion, who's the founder and CEO
Speaker 2: of Timestamp. Arman, great to have you on.
Speaker 1: Nice to be here, Tony, thank you for having me Armon.
Speaker 2: Excited to learn about time stamp and the great things
Speaker 2: you're doing around bitcoin in highlighting different bitcoin companies and
Speaker 2: the ecosystem. But before we get there, tell us a
Speaker 2: bit about yourself. What's your background and where are you from?
Speaker 1: Sure, So, I'm Armenian born in Los Angeles, California. I
Speaker 1: am the first generation in my family born in the US.
Speaker 1: So my parents both immigrants to the country, and I
Speaker 1: am the prototype for the American dream quite frankly, so
Speaker 1: I'm the first in my family to go to medical school,
Speaker 1: become a doctor, became a neuroscientist, and went down that
Speaker 1: traditional route and achieved a lot of great things, but
Speaker 1: eventually bitcoin is a bug I caught and that's the
Speaker 1: path I ended up following. So I left that career
Speaker 1: to work on bitcoin, and that's how I ended up
Speaker 1: here talking to you.
Speaker 2: Wow, that's a big jump going from the medical field
Speaker 2: into bitcoin. I know, you know I can relate as
Speaker 2: an immigrant myself, and you know, I don't know if
Speaker 2: you agree, but our parents kind of wanted to either
Speaker 2: be lawyers or doctors things like that.
Speaker 1: It's so funny you mentioned that, because the path was
Speaker 1: always for me to become a doctor and my brother
Speaker 1: to become a lawyer. And now I'm running my own
Speaker 1: company that's bitcoin focused on my brother as a computer programmer.
Speaker 1: So it's funny how that works out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. So what was your first encounter with
Speaker 2: bitcoin and what was your AHA moment?
Speaker 1: Sure? So, I think I was primed to at least
Speaker 1: be interested in bitcoin because I was very much the
Speaker 1: Ron Paul libertarian type in the early two thousands, and
Speaker 1: because of that, I think I got exposed pretty early
Speaker 1: to the bitcoiner cipherpunk types. At the time, I didn't
Speaker 1: know enough about money to really understand how important it
Speaker 1: was and what bitcoin really offered. So like most people.
Speaker 1: When I first heard about bitcoin, it was honestly, in
Speaker 1: twenty thirteen. I was doing a surgical fellowship in Armenia,
Speaker 1: of all places, at a surgical hospital, and there were
Speaker 1: several people there from the United States, including a friend
Speaker 1: from back home, and he's very libertarian leaning. He was
Speaker 1: a Ron Paul type, and we ended up in a
Speaker 1: bank in the center of the city and we were
Speaker 1: exchanging dollars for the local currency, and I very very
Speaker 1: clearly remember him saying, you know, if we had bitcoin,
Speaker 1: we wouldn't have to be doing this right now. And
Speaker 1: I was like, what hold on, let's go back. What
Speaker 1: do you mean by that? And you know, he tried
Speaker 1: to tell me as best he could. Remember this is
Speaker 1: twenty thirteen, where we had very little information. We didn't
Speaker 1: have all these books and resources, so he did the
Speaker 1: best he could. He tried to explain to me. But
Speaker 1: like most people, the first time I heard about bitcoin,
Speaker 1: I thought, great, that's very cool meat de he nerdy money.
Speaker 1: But it's never going to amount to anything. So I
Speaker 1: just completely forgot about it, went about my life, you know,
Speaker 1: my career path becoming a doctor. Then kept hearing about
Speaker 1: it again and again and again an event truly, I said, Okay,
Speaker 1: I think I have to dig into this a little
Speaker 1: bit further. And so by the time twenty fifteen twenty
Speaker 1: sixteen came around, I think that's when I started becoming
Speaker 1: obsessed to the point where I think my family can
Speaker 1: attest to it. They thought I'd gone a little mad,
Speaker 1: quite frankly. So that's around the time when I started
Speaker 1: really becoming obsessed with it and it for me. You know,
Speaker 1: when you look at my career path, you know, you wonder,
Speaker 1: how does someone that's a doctor and an academic become
Speaker 1: a bitcoiner that's focused on this entirely. It's because those
Speaker 1: two ships crossed in the night, right like the my
Speaker 1: love for bitcoin and my dismay of the medical system
Speaker 1: eventually just overlapped so hard that I just felt like
Speaker 1: I needed to put the brakes on the medical career
Speaker 1: and start focusing on something I truly loved, which was bitcoin.
Speaker 1: So I took the leap. I decided to end up
Speaker 1: focusing on bitcoin, and I couldn't be happier about it.
Speaker 2: That's amazing. And you know, obviously, people outside the United States,
Speaker 2: I think many times, and I might be wrong here,
Speaker 2: but from what I've noticed they kind of grasp more
Speaker 2: or lean more towards bitcoin because they understand the money
Speaker 2: problem they deal with. A very many of them are
Speaker 2: dealing with hyperinflation. Their currency has been debased, and their
Speaker 2: economies are not as great as maybe the United States,
Speaker 2: which has the world reserve currency. And do you find,
Speaker 2: you know, with your experience, and I think you said
Speaker 2: Armenia right, that people there gravitate more to bitcoin.
Speaker 1: Well, I'll tell you. I'll tell you an interesting story
Speaker 1: on that. I have this prevailing theory that we in
Speaker 1: the West are very privileged because we we we essentially
Speaker 1: are living with the world reserve currency, right, the US dollars,
Speaker 1: So we don't get to experience the day to day,
Speaker 1: the week, the week, the month to month troubles of
Speaker 1: living with a an inflating currency that's on the level
Speaker 1: of something that you would experience in South America or
Speaker 1: Africa or even other nations around the world. And most
Speaker 1: people don't realize that a lot of these nations, I
Speaker 1: think over sixty nations are dollarized, as in they have
Speaker 1: their current currency and they also have the dollar because
Speaker 1: their currency is so weak they don't need another currency
Speaker 1: that they can save in and the dollar has become
Speaker 1: a savings mechanisms for a lot of these people. Now,
Speaker 1: what I find interesting is that here in the West,
Speaker 1: when we think about bitcoin, we think of it as
Speaker 1: an asset class. We think of it as part of
Speaker 1: our portfolio. Look at how it fits into your portfolio.
Speaker 1: If you add just two percent or five percent, it's
Speaker 1: going to outperform this portfolio that's just SMP five hundred
Speaker 1: and bonds by x amount. And that's great. I'm happy
Speaker 1: people are doing that. I'm happy people are putting it
Speaker 1: into their ETFs and whatnot or saving into bitcoin, and
Speaker 1: people should continue to do that. But when you go
Speaker 1: to these other places that have a dysfunctional currency and
Speaker 1: you start talking to them about bitcoin, it's not a
Speaker 1: hard sell. You basically sell them on the fact that, hey,
Speaker 1: it's this money that can't be printed, there's a set supply,
Speaker 1: it's a predictable issue and schedule. The government can't stop
Speaker 1: you from sending it or using it. And all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, you see the wheels turn and they click,
Speaker 1: and then it starts becoming part of their lives. And
Speaker 1: so what we're seeing is the adoption is different in
Speaker 1: different places based on their experiences, and so people in
Speaker 1: South America, for example, are using it as part of
Speaker 1: a portfolio of money essentially, where they have their daily currency,
Speaker 1: which is what they earn in usually let's say, for example, apeso,
Speaker 1: and then they have a dollar which they use as
Speaker 1: a short to medium term savings, and then something like
Speaker 1: bitcoin which they're using as long term savings. So you
Speaker 1: don't see that kind of stuff in the way West
Speaker 1: and the West you see it as a privilege and
Speaker 1: an asset class that you can invest in. And I
Speaker 1: think we're very lucky to be there, but I would
Speaker 1: caution people in the West to take it a little
Speaker 1: bit more seriously because once the game of musical chair stops,
Speaker 1: you're going to be want wanting to hold the hardest
Speaker 1: money that there is out there, and that's bigcoin.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you brought up some great points and some
Speaker 2: of it I've tried to explain to people that bitcoin
Speaker 2: is this incredible monetary system where in the West it
Speaker 2: can be a store of value for some people, but
Speaker 2: in other parts of the world it can be a
Speaker 2: store of value and a currency and other things. Because
Speaker 2: just depends on your financial situation, your living situation. But
Speaker 2: that's what's great about it. It's this global asset, sits
Speaker 2: on a blockchain, twenty four to seven, immutable, borderless, all
Speaker 2: all these great attributes. And even in the West, like
Speaker 2: you said, where we're a privileged and we have the
Speaker 2: world reserve currency, we can use it, but people around
Speaker 2: the world can give benefit from it. So it doesn't
Speaker 2: even matter what walk of life you're in. It's there
Speaker 2: to meet you or meet your need around currency, store
Speaker 2: value in these different things.
Speaker 1: I do feel like it's a bit of that parable
Speaker 1: of everyone is standing around an elephant and they have
Speaker 1: their hand on the elephant, and they're saying, you know,
Speaker 1: if their hand is on the trunk, they think it's
Speaker 1: on one thing. If they think if their hand is
Speaker 1: on a leg, they think it's another thing. And no
Speaker 1: one is seeing the full picture of the elephant, right
Speaker 1: because none of us are experiencing that in its totality.
Speaker 1: We're either seeing it as a savings mechanism or a
Speaker 1: medium of exchange. And then some people that are all
Speaker 1: the way at the end of the spectrum are actually
Speaker 1: using it as a unit of account because they're already
Speaker 1: living on a bitcoin standard. And those are the people
Speaker 1: that are the hardcore times, right, there's very very few
Speaker 1: of those. But I think we're all living on the
Speaker 1: spectrum because we're living in real time during this monetary transition.
Speaker 1: And it's only been fifteen years since bitcoins is inception,
Speaker 1: so that may feel like a long time, but really
Speaker 1: it's nothing if you look at it on the grand
Speaker 1: scale things.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, what is it a teenager, right if
Speaker 2: you use human years, But you compare it to gold
Speaker 2: and other currencies. Nothing, a tiny blip.
Speaker 1: A history, tiny blip in terms of time. It's also
Speaker 1: still tiny in terms of its market cap people. I
Speaker 1: think people have a unit bias when it comes to
Speaker 1: a lot of things. But bitcoin is a great example.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: People see that the price of one bitcoin is one
Speaker 1: hundred thousand dollars and that's exciting, but it is really
Speaker 1: a psychological barrier. Everyone thinks of one hundred thousand as
Speaker 1: a big milestone, and it is, but when you look
Speaker 1: at it relative to other asset classes like gold, it's
Speaker 1: still less than ten percent of gold's market cap, So
Speaker 1: it is tiny in comparison to everything else that is
Speaker 1: surrounding it in terms of traditional asset classes, whether it's gold,
Speaker 1: real estate, other currencies, and and we have to be
Speaker 1: cognizant of that when we talk to people that feel
Speaker 1: like maybe they miss the boat. I do get that
Speaker 1: a lot a lot of people who feel like, oh,
Speaker 1: maybe it's too late to be into bitcoin, and so
Speaker 1: I won't even bother with it. And people are not
Speaker 1: seeing that it's a monetary technology. And ultimately, when it
Speaker 1: comes to monetary technologies, you want to be holding the
Speaker 1: best money there is out there because the consequences of
Speaker 1: not doing so are serious. If you're holding a money
Speaker 1: that is inferior to bitcoin or inferature, whatever you think
Speaker 1: is the most superior type of money, you're losing your
Speaker 1: purchasing power over an extended period of time. And then
Speaker 1: you look up five, ten, fifteen, twenty years from now,
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, all that work you put
Speaker 1: in to earning value, earning money, keeping yourself sustainable, keeping
Speaker 1: your family, keeping your generations, well, all of a sudden
Speaker 1: that evaporates. And we have evidence to show that the
Speaker 1: dollar is a great example of this. Even the US dollar,
Speaker 1: which is the strongest currency there is out there, is
Speaker 1: the best house in a bad neighborhood, even that loses
Speaker 1: ninety nine percent of its value over a century. And
Speaker 1: so if your grand great grandparents or your grandparents decided
Speaker 1: to save in the US dollar in the US banking
Speaker 1: institution that somehow managed to survive over one hundred years,
Speaker 1: even then they would lose ninety nine percent of its value.
Speaker 1: And that's the tough part of it is, even if
Speaker 1: you get all those things right, you somehow manage to
Speaker 1: make it to the US, You somehow manage to save
Speaker 1: in the dollar, You somehow manage to save in a
Speaker 1: US banking institution, say like Chase, that survived for one
Speaker 1: hundred years, you still lost ninety nine percent of your
Speaker 1: value because the currency itself that you're saving in is
Speaker 1: being printed and it's being expanded in terms of the
Speaker 1: currency supply, and all of a sudden you're left holding
Speaker 1: bags and you're wondering what the heck happened.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a great point. And I think as someone
Speaker 2: who lives in the US, and I believe you're in
Speaker 2: the US as well.
Speaker 1: Right, I'm currently in Boston.
Speaker 2: Message, that's right, Okay, So I think we both have
Speaker 2: seen the headlines. People are like, why can I not
Speaker 2: afford a house? Why is are things so hard right now?
Speaker 2: And many of them don't know the underlying problem, and
Speaker 2: that is the debasement of currency. You can't print the
Speaker 2: most money ever in the history of the United States,
Speaker 2: and just just in the short timeline of like twenty
Speaker 2: twenty and then not expect inflation and not expect your
Speaker 2: the you're purchasing power to be devalued. And they don't
Speaker 2: understand that, right. And now I should say politics is
Speaker 2: downstream of economics. So people but Democrats Republicans, right, and
Speaker 2: they're at each other, but they don't understand the underlying problem,
Speaker 2: which you know, bitcoin definitely fixes.
Speaker 1: There's another thing I'd like to add here is you
Speaker 1: mentioned it. So around COVID, we saw more money printing
Speaker 1: in those six to twelve months than we saw in
Speaker 1: the first two hundred and fifty years as a country.
Speaker 1: And there's a price to pay for that. It doesn't
Speaker 1: come for free. Oftentimes, what happens is there's a lag
Speaker 1: between the action and the effect when it comes to
Speaker 1: money printing and economics, and we saw that in that
Speaker 1: very short timeframe. We didn't see prices rise. People were
Speaker 1: very happy, they were getting stimulus checks, they were spending
Speaker 1: left and right on all these sorts of things. And
Speaker 1: then what we saw was a year or two later,
Speaker 1: the prices of everything was slowly starting to rise. But
Speaker 1: more importantly, and I think maybe some people don't realize this,
Speaker 1: asset prices rose, so that money printing really affects the
Speaker 1: lower and middle class more than anyone else. And the
Speaker 1: reason being is when the money is broken. When money
Speaker 1: is being printed, the people that are in the know,
Speaker 1: the people that have wealth, are investing that wealth into assets,
Speaker 1: so things like real estate and stocks, and so what
Speaker 1: happens is the people that are living paycheck to paycheck,
Speaker 1: lower to middle class, or the people that have a
Speaker 1: tiny bit of savings, they're not able to attain those assets.
Speaker 1: So take a look at real estate. Now, most people
Speaker 1: our age, quite frankly, are not owning a home and
Speaker 1: have no reasonable path to actually own a home anytime soon.
Speaker 1: The reason being is when the money is broken, a
Speaker 1: lot of people decide they need to park their money somewhere,
Speaker 1: and the safest place to park it is in assets.
Speaker 1: So real estate prices decide to skyrocket. You have everyone
Speaker 1: and their mother trying to invest in real estate, whether
Speaker 1: it's foreign entities or investment banks. We've seen people entities
Speaker 1: like black Rock investing in real estate. They're all trying
Speaker 1: to park their money somewhere because it's a melting ice
Speaker 1: cube that you're sitting on if you're holding cash, and
Speaker 1: so you've got to find somewhere to put it. And
Speaker 1: the avenue for most people nowadays in this current era
Speaker 1: is real estate and stocks, and so you see those
Speaker 1: prices of those assets skyrocket in a way that doesn't
Speaker 1: necessarily make sense because when you look around you you
Speaker 1: see people struggling, right, You see people struggling with their
Speaker 1: grocery bills, you see people struggling with their car payments.
Speaker 1: And then you see asset prices go up, and you say,
Speaker 1: how does this make sense? The economy's not doing well
Speaker 1: because look at everything around me, But then you see
Speaker 1: these asset prices going up. So you're seeing this cognitive
Speaker 1: dissonance of the day to day economy in your life,
Speaker 1: the day to day economy in your neighbor's life, your
Speaker 1: community's life is getting worse and worse and worse. But
Speaker 1: asset price is rising, and that's all related to the
Speaker 1: broken money that we're living with.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, and you know, I hope the folks who are
Speaker 2: going to watch this and listen to this really grasp
Speaker 2: what you just said there. It's so important because many
Speaker 2: are struggling and they just don't know why the knowledge
Speaker 2: is not there. And you know, I'm hoping we can
Speaker 2: get that information out there and unders and folks can
Speaker 2: see there's bitcoin an avenue, a flight to safety, so
Speaker 2: to speak. And it's not going to solve every problem,
Speaker 2: but at least can help them to retain their purchasing
Speaker 2: power and outpays the debasement and the inflation and for
Speaker 2: them and even their future generations. Right because like for me,
Speaker 2: my plan, Like I have a six year old, there's
Speaker 2: some bitcoin I'm not selling. I'm it's gonna go to her.
Speaker 2: And because I see, you know, bigcoin really open my
Speaker 2: understanding of the economy, how the money system works, the
Speaker 2: federal is there, what central banks are doing. And it's
Speaker 2: like a blessing and a curse to know that.
Speaker 1: Tony, Do you know about the curse of Cassandra. No,
Speaker 1: So it's this ancient fable that it's it's a it's
Speaker 1: a Greek god Cassandra that was blessed with knowing things
Speaker 1: before they happen and trying to warn others. But the
Speaker 1: curse is that no one listens. Yeah, and no one
Speaker 1: is able to take that information and do anything with it.
Speaker 1: So it is a blessing and a curse. And I'm
Speaker 1: telling you, I'm sure you've experienced this as well. You're
Speaker 1: often shouting into the void for years and years and
Speaker 1: years and people you love, it's people you want to help,
Speaker 1: and they just that there's a dissonance there, there's something
Speaker 1: that's missing in terms of the connection. And so I
Speaker 1: found that the best way to do it is to
Speaker 1: do what you do is to keep putting yourself out there,
Speaker 1: keep talking about it, and eventually they'll come around. Maybe
Speaker 1: it won't be the first time, but usually it takes one, two,
Speaker 1: three touch points and eventually people will say, Okay, tell
Speaker 1: me about it now, I'm ready. They have to be
Speaker 1: ready to actually be able to take in that information.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely, well said before we talk about timestep, I
Speaker 2: did want to get your thoughts just because the conversation
Speaker 2: is leading this dire Bitcoin Strategic reserve. The United States
Speaker 2: put their stake in the ground. We're hearing Russia talk
Speaker 2: about it now. There's a bunch of states within the US.
Speaker 2: I think just Texas yesterday announced they want to have
Speaker 2: a Bitcoin strategic reserve. So do you see the start
Speaker 2: of hyper bitcoinization right now? With all these things.
Speaker 1: So, the fascinating thing about bitcoin is it's one of
Speaker 1: the few technologies and innovations I can think of where
Speaker 1: retail was able to access it first before institutions and governments.
Speaker 1: And so what you saw with retail is being replicated
Speaker 1: on the corporate side, and it's also being replicated on
Speaker 1: the nation state side. So on the retail side, there
Speaker 1: were people like myself and you who saw the value
Speaker 1: in bitcoin and decided, Okay, I'm going to start using
Speaker 1: bitcoin as my savings and consider that a store of value.
Speaker 1: I believe it's a better money than x, whether it's
Speaker 1: a dollar or gold or what have you. And so
Speaker 1: by being early compared to most other people, you benefit
Speaker 1: from holding that currency and your wealth and your influence
Speaker 1: grows with that. And so like you're saying you want
Speaker 1: to hold some bitcoin for your daughter, the why do
Speaker 1: you want to hold it for your daughter? Because you
Speaker 1: know in the future that it's going to do well
Speaker 1: compared to all these other currencies. It's going to hold
Speaker 1: its value well, and you want your daughter to be
Speaker 1: in a position where she can use that wealth to
Speaker 1: exert her influence on the world and actually make a
Speaker 1: significant impact. And so we all think like that, I
Speaker 1: do the same thing. I mean, I have some bitcoins
Speaker 1: sort away. I have some bitcoins sort away for those
Speaker 1: family members that don't listen to me, because I know
Speaker 1: that'll eventually come back, and I have like a little
Speaker 1: portion sort away for them. Now, that's all well and good.
Speaker 1: On the retail side, I've been around for over ten
Speaker 1: years now. On the bitcoin side of things, this last cycle,
Speaker 1: i'd say the four years or so has been very different.
Speaker 1: We've definitely crossed rubicon here where it's no longer the
Speaker 1: cipherpunk libertarian retail investors only. We've had a lot of
Speaker 1: institutional adoption. So let's take Michael Sailor as an example.
Speaker 1: On the corporate side of things. He really, really, you know,
Speaker 1: pioneered the corporate side of things, started adopting bitcoin as
Speaker 1: a reserve asset in his corporation and then started doubling
Speaker 1: and tripling down on it by essentially borrowing money to
Speaker 1: buy more bitcoin. And so I promise you this, A
Speaker 1: lot of people in the corporate world are looking at
Speaker 1: him and thinking, huh, that's interesting. We're sitting on a
Speaker 1: pile of cash. Where Apple or where Microsoft or where whoever?
Speaker 1: And you know those things are like yeah, right, Like
Speaker 1: it's not easy to shift that yacht and actually be
Speaker 1: able to maneuver to do that. Michael Saylor was in
Speaker 1: a unique position because he was the standing CEO, the
Speaker 1: standing leader of that company for thirty plus years. He
Speaker 1: had voting power, so he could actually exert his influence
Speaker 1: on that company. Some of these other companies are not
Speaker 1: set up that way. So what we're seeing is the
Speaker 1: nimble and flexible types are able to access this, both
Speaker 1: in the corporate world and on the nation state side.
Speaker 1: So a great case study here is El Salvador. El
Speaker 1: Salvador had nothing to lose when they decided to adopt bitcoin.
Speaker 1: Their currency was in the gutter, their country was in
Speaker 1: societal dismay. Let's say there's a lot of criminal issues,
Speaker 1: there were a lot of issues in terms of poverty,
Speaker 1: and President Bukela came in there and said, Okay, we
Speaker 1: need to figure out a way out of this. And
Speaker 1: so our options are basically allied and basically adopt a
Speaker 1: dollar as a secondary currency officially and go down that route,
Speaker 1: go work with the IMF, basically borrow a ton of
Speaker 1: money and be a slave to the central banks, or
Speaker 1: we can try out this bitcoin think, and he decided
Speaker 1: to go down the bitcoin route. So, just like Michael
Speaker 1: Sailor in the corporate world, Bukele did it in the
Speaker 1: in the on the nation state side of things, and
Speaker 1: we've seen how much El Salvador has prospered their their
Speaker 1: wealth has grown significantly in just a few years and
Speaker 1: in fact has attracted so much capital into the country people.
Speaker 1: I know several people in my life who five years
Speaker 1: ago couldn't find El Salvador on a map, and now
Speaker 1: they're they're living there, and that's because El Salvador is
Speaker 1: very friendly to them. El Salvador allows them the freedom
Speaker 1: to work on bitcoin, to live with bitcoin on a
Speaker 1: day to day basis, and to build a community there,
Speaker 1: and they get the benefits of being early adopters of bitcoin.
Speaker 1: So when it comes to strategic reserves, I think it's
Speaker 1: an inevitability that all of these entities are going to
Speaker 1: eventually adopt a strategic reserve. The question is gooplnks first?
Speaker 1: Which major nation decides to go first, because that triggers
Speaker 1: a domino effect in terms of how people decide to act,
Speaker 1: And there is a lot of geopolitics involved in this
Speaker 1: because you have to remember, the US is a world
Speaker 1: reserve currency. Russia and China are looking at the US
Speaker 1: trying to figure out what to do, because the second
Speaker 1: they decide to enact a Bitcoin strategic reserve then is essentially,
Speaker 1: you know, firing the gun to say, Okay, the race
Speaker 1: is on. Let's see who's going to stack as much
Speaker 1: bitcoin as we can, and let's go for it. And
Speaker 1: so it is an inevitability that this is going to happen.
Speaker 1: The question is how it happens, how public it is,
Speaker 1: because remember a lot of this could be done fairly
Speaker 1: quietly until it can't and it's exposed, and really, what
Speaker 1: are the consequences of it? So this is excuse me
Speaker 1: for going down this rabbit hole as well, But I
Speaker 1: do think we're entering an era where in a sense,
Speaker 1: I want to caution people in terms of trying to
Speaker 1: advocate for a quick transition to a Bitcoin standard or
Speaker 1: a quick transition off fiat currencies. I believe that a
Speaker 1: quick transition off any currency is generally a recipe for disaster.
Speaker 1: You want to make sure that enough people understand what
Speaker 1: is happening enough people have a way to actually access bitcoin,
Speaker 1: which we're starting to get there, to understand it, to
Speaker 1: use it, to be able to save in it, so
Speaker 1: they don't get wiped out overnight like a Great Depression
Speaker 1: type of situation. So we're entering a very interesting era
Speaker 1: where we're seeing the transition of these currencies. We're seeing
Speaker 1: it at different stages in different places, but the people
Speaker 1: who hold the hardest money there is are ultimately going
Speaker 1: to benefit. The question is how long is it going
Speaker 1: to take, Who's going to bling first? And what are
Speaker 1: the consequences in terms of the timeline.
Speaker 2: Yeah? Absolutely, And what are your thoughts on what's happening
Speaker 2: with the et aps. You got all of Wall Street,
Speaker 2: trat FI, led, Blite, black Rock, and we were talking
Speaker 2: about them earlier about scooping up the homes in the
Speaker 2: United States in the twenty twenties era. What do you
Speaker 2: think about them? And the inflows have been incredible, fastest
Speaker 2: growing ETF and history of ETFs is blowing all the
Speaker 2: records out of the water.
Speaker 1: I think ETFs were the real starting line for institutional
Speaker 1: adoption because when you look at a lot of these funds,
Speaker 1: when you look at a lot of these investment firms,
Speaker 1: they have certain mandates in terms of what they can
Speaker 1: and can't do. And so what I found previously is
Speaker 1: I would speak to people that are leading these funds,
Speaker 1: people that are worth billions and billions of dollars, wanting
Speaker 1: huge funds, and you would talk to them and they
Speaker 1: would all own bitcoin individually, but they would say, you know,
Speaker 1: I wish we could hold it in our investment fund,
Speaker 1: but we can't because we just if we just don't
Speaker 1: have the green light yet, you know, we just can't
Speaker 1: do it. Meanwhile, they own you know, double digit, if
Speaker 1: not triple digit amount of bitcoin in their own personal wallets.
Speaker 1: And so once the ETFs got approved, all these people
Speaker 1: that were just standing on the sidelines were like, Okay,
Speaker 1: we've got the green light, let's go. Let's do it.
Speaker 1: And obviously, on a retail side of side of things,
Speaker 1: when it comes to people like you know, my mother
Speaker 1: or my aunt and uncle who might not feel comfortable
Speaker 1: with holding bitcoin in self custody and don't don't understand
Speaker 1: hardware wallets, this is a nice alternative for them to
Speaker 1: be able to hold bitcoin in a retirement fund or
Speaker 1: an IRA. Of course, there are trade offs when it
Speaker 1: comes to that, and I'd always recommend considering self custody,
Speaker 1: but it is an alternative that was not available just
Speaker 1: you know, a year ago, and so it's been a
Speaker 1: major change, and I think it's yet another signal of
Speaker 1: the direction we're heading in where it's a one way door.
Speaker 1: There's no going back. Now. Pandora's box has been opened,
Speaker 1: and we're just heading in that one direction.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And you know, to your point, I wasn't a
Speaker 2: big fan of the et aps initially because I saw
Speaker 2: Wall Street kind of stealing a bit of the ethos
Speaker 2: of bitcoin right where you can self custody and so forth.
Speaker 2: But then I think about my mom and Dada be
Speaker 2: able to self custody, and remember their seed phrase, they
Speaker 2: lose stuff, so it's not physically possible for them. So
Speaker 2: the ets makes sense for you know, the folks who
Speaker 2: are not tech savvy and so forth. But to your point,
Speaker 2: Pandora's box has been open, and I see the amount
Speaker 2: of buying that that's happening on Wall Street, and you
Speaker 2: got the strategic Reserve, you get the states in play,
Speaker 2: you get countries doing all these in Bhutan, El Salvador,
Speaker 2: and it's like wow, I mean, I'm really excited to
Speaker 2: see what happens next year as things become more friendlier
Speaker 2: in the US, you know, with the pro crypto president
Speaker 2: coming in, pro crypto Congress and so forth, and even
Speaker 2: the next five years. What is twenty twenty eight having
Speaker 2: looks like it look like with all these things in place.
Speaker 1: So this is yet another signal as to what direction
Speaker 1: we're going. And you know, President elect Trump and Robert F.
Speaker 1: Kennedy both showed up to the Bitcoin conference in Nashville,
Speaker 1: And I was in conference those ten years ago where
Speaker 1: you couldn't fill a small room with you thirty people.
Speaker 1: And now we got President elect and RFK and cabinet
Speaker 1: members like coming to the Bitcoin conference and catering to
Speaker 1: a growing number of constituents that are bitcoin and crypto
Speaker 1: people that want fair treatment. And I don't know if
Speaker 1: you had a chance to ever listen to that speech
Speaker 1: or if your viewers did, but if you remember when
Speaker 1: he gave that speech, the biggest cheer was about SEC
Speaker 1: Chair Gary Gensler, And there's a reason for that. I
Speaker 1: think a lot of people in this space have been
Speaker 1: very frustrated with the arbitrary rules and regulations from regulatory bodies,
Speaker 1: and they see that President Trump's election is signaling a
Speaker 1: change in that, and we've seen from his appointments, his
Speaker 1: rhetoric that that seems to be the case.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about Timestamp. Tell us about the company, why
Speaker 2: you decided to start it, and what's the mission.
Speaker 1: Right. So, when I when I left medicine and academia
Speaker 1: a few years ago, I knew I wanted to work
Speaker 1: in bitcoin, but I didn't know exactly what I was
Speaker 1: going to do. So what I ended up doing actually
Speaker 1: was dropping everything moving to Austin, Texas, which is a
Speaker 1: bitcoin hub, and I did so with no plan, no job.
Speaker 1: I didn't know very many people there, and my mission
Speaker 1: there was just to learn as much as I could
Speaker 1: talk to as many people as I could that were
Speaker 1: working on bitcoin, and I was blessed to get to
Speaker 1: work with so many people that were that were so helpful.
Speaker 1: You know. I learned very early on that if you're
Speaker 1: humble and you ask questions, lots of people are willing
Speaker 1: to help you, and that's what I did. So I
Speaker 1: treated it as essentially an internship where you know, I
Speaker 1: went from the top of the Totem bowl in medicine
Speaker 1: to all the way to the bottomn of bitcoin entrepreneurship,
Speaker 1: and so I learned as much as I could. I
Speaker 1: talked to people that were building wallets, people that were
Speaker 1: doing bitcoin mining, people that were building accelerators, and so
Speaker 1: I got to see a lot of the different avenues
Speaker 1: that are offered in the bitcoin space. And I compare
Speaker 1: to the Internet of the nineties. How in the nineties
Speaker 1: you'd have Internet companies, and now that phrase doesn't mean
Speaker 1: much because every company is an Internet company. They're operating
Speaker 1: on that network. I see bitcoin in the same way.
Speaker 1: There are bitcoin companies. Now. Eventually all companies will be
Speaker 1: bitcoin companies because they'll be utilizing the bitcoin network in
Speaker 1: one way or another. So to get to that point,
Speaker 1: there's a transition period of people building the infrastructure for
Speaker 1: bitcoin companies, for the bitcoin network. And what I found
Speaker 1: was that a lot of people that were building in
Speaker 1: this space were not able to access the capital they
Speaker 1: needed to actually fund their missions, to fund their companies
Speaker 1: because there are such a limited pool of venture capitalists
Speaker 1: and angel investor investors that are focused on bitcoin and crypto,
Speaker 1: and yet there are so many people that are bitcoin
Speaker 1: and crypto users that would love to invest in these companies,
Speaker 1: but they just don't have access. So I started on
Speaker 1: this rabbit hole of trying to figure out how can
Speaker 1: I democratize access to investments in this space, and that
Speaker 1: let me let me down a very difficult path of
Speaker 1: trying to work with SEC and FINRA to get approval
Speaker 1: for an investment platform specifically geared towards bitcoin and open
Speaker 1: source companies. And it's a path that many told me
Speaker 1: it's not worth traversing. Many people said, good luck, let
Speaker 1: us know how it goes. I received no funding for it,
Speaker 1: so I self funded this whole project myself, and after
Speaker 1: nearly two years, we got approval from SEC and FINRA
Speaker 1: to become an investment platform for bitcoin and open source companies,
Speaker 1: and recently we made our announcement and launch, and since
Speaker 1: then we've had eight projects already signed up on platform.
Speaker 1: On our platform, two of them are live and already
Speaker 1: raising funds successfully. And it's a platform which I'm very
Speaker 1: proud of because it's open to everyone, So it's open
Speaker 1: to accredited and non accredit investors worldwide, so not just
Speaker 1: US investors, not just accredit investors, it's open to everyone.
Speaker 1: They're relatively low minimums compared to other investment avenues. So
Speaker 1: if you wanted to invest with a VC fund, oftentimes
Speaker 1: you'd have to write a check that's five or six figures,
Speaker 1: and even then you don't get the choice of what
Speaker 1: you're investing in. You're giving them your money and they're
Speaker 1: investing on your behalf. Now there's some benefit to that.
Speaker 1: They're capital allocators. They know what's good and what's not
Speaker 1: good in theory, and they should be good at that.
Speaker 1: That's their job. But ultimately, we wanted to give you,
Speaker 1: the investor, the people a chance to pick and choose
Speaker 1: what they want to invest in, and relatively low minimums
Speaker 1: and be able to access these investment opportunities. So I
Speaker 1: really believe that one of the keys to bitcoin success
Speaker 1: is the incentives. It drives incentives, and so when I
Speaker 1: built this company, I wanted to drive incentives as well.
Speaker 1: So I wanted to make it founder friendly. So we
Speaker 1: have no upfront costs for founders. We just do a
Speaker 1: success based commission. So if founders don't succeed, we don't
Speaker 1: succeed and our business doesn't work. We're very much focused
Speaker 1: on driving our founders to success. For investors, it's free
Speaker 1: to join, it's open to everyone. And it's low minimums.
Speaker 1: We want to get as many people involved in the
Speaker 1: space as possible. So that is a lot of thought
Speaker 1: and effort has been put into that, and now we
Speaker 1: get to present it to the world. And so this
Speaker 1: is why I'm so excited to talk to you about
Speaker 1: it today.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's awesome, and congrats going through that sec finneral
Speaker 2: process sounds painstake in two years, but congrats on getting
Speaker 2: that and launching this great service. And I love it.
Speaker 2: I love that it's for accredited and non accredit because
Speaker 2: we know historically the gatekeepers, you guys can't access it
Speaker 2: right and like you said, unless you're attached to some
Speaker 2: fund or you're part of some club or whatever it is.
Speaker 2: But it's great that the common man can participate. So
Speaker 2: my question is, how is it that the average Joe
Speaker 2: and Jane can participate? Is there a change in their
Speaker 2: investment rules or around that.
Speaker 1: So there was a law that was passed in twenty twelve.
Speaker 1: It was part of the Jobs Act during the Obama era,
Speaker 1: and it was specifically meant to try to get regular
Speaker 1: people involved in these investment opportunities. But because lawfare takes
Speaker 1: a long time to implement, that didn't even get implemented
Speaker 1: until twenty sixteen, and it's under a framework called Regulation Crowdfunding.
Speaker 1: So this specific regulation allows crowdfunding portals such as ourselves
Speaker 1: to open up these opportunities to both accredited and non
Speaker 1: accredited investors. Now getting to that process is very difficult
Speaker 1: to try to get the approvals, but it's also the
Speaker 1: regulatory bodies try to ensure that we are protecting these
Speaker 1: investors all we can, So we have the safeguards in
Speaker 1: place to protect investors. We have notifications for everything they do,
Speaker 1: investment confirmations, following up with these companies. So there's Q
Speaker 1: and A forums for example, that where you can talk
Speaker 1: directly to founders ask questions. There are reporting requirements, and
Speaker 1: the best part for investors is it's a give and take.
Speaker 1: Right for these founders to be able to access to
Speaker 1: all these investors, they have to meet certain requirements, so
Speaker 1: they have to pass background checks. They have to file
Speaker 1: what's called a Form C with the SEC. And for
Speaker 1: investors that's a great thing because if you look at
Speaker 1: a Form C on the SEC, you get everything you
Speaker 1: would possibly want about that company, information about who's the founders,
Speaker 1: their financial situation, the background checks, like I mentioned previously,
Speaker 1: So the key here is trying to give investors as
Speaker 1: much information as possible so they can make informed decisions.
Speaker 1: That's what the SEC and FIN really care about once
Speaker 1: you get non credit investors involved, is investor protections, and
Speaker 1: so we take a lot of care and caution to
Speaker 1: make sure that that happens on our platform.
Speaker 2: That was going to be my next question, how do
Speaker 2: you vet these folks? So I appreciate you explaining that,
Speaker 2: and it's great that they have to file with the
Speaker 2: SEC as well, and all of that is buttoned up
Speaker 2: with regards to and you know, the shares, and so
Speaker 2: folks are buying shares? Is this like private equity essentially?
Speaker 1: So the best way I would explain it to people
Speaker 1: is that most people understand equity in terms of the
Speaker 1: stock market. Right they look at say Tesla or Google
Speaker 1: or Apple, and those are shares of companies that they
Speaker 1: can buy on the stock market. What some people don't
Speaker 1: realize and some do, is that these companies were private
Speaker 1: long before they were public. Oftentimes a company takes five, seven,
Speaker 1: even ten years before they decide to go public, and
Speaker 1: in that time that they're private, they are still accepting
Speaker 1: investments but likely not from you. Yeah, So there's a
Speaker 1: lot of people that are insiders. That are people that
Speaker 1: are venture capital funds or angel investors, people that are
Speaker 1: in the know that have I have the opportunity to
Speaker 1: invest in these companies and benefit from the growth and
Speaker 1: so by the time they go public, these are people
Speaker 1: that make a significant amount of wealth just based on
Speaker 1: being early. And so what this offers is that same
Speaker 1: opportunity to people to get involved in these companies early
Speaker 1: when they are private. And so for these startups, and
Speaker 1: all startups are risky, right because they're ventures. Right, like
Speaker 1: anything that happened, a founder can go off track and
Speaker 1: do decide that maybe the one product is better than
Speaker 1: the other and make a wrong choice. They can make
Speaker 1: bad hires, et cetera, et cetera. There's a million reasons
Speaker 1: a startup can fail. They are risky investments in a sense.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, there are also investment opportunities
Speaker 1: that have a ton of potential, especially if you're early on.
Speaker 1: So it's a trade off there. But the key here
Speaker 1: is the ability to be able to access them and
Speaker 1: have the choice. We want people to have the choice
Speaker 1: and then what they choose to do with it is
Speaker 1: up to them. So when it comes to these startups,
Speaker 1: the key here is for the founders, they can raise
Speaker 1: in a variety of different ways. They can raise via safes,
Speaker 1: convertible notes, priced rounds, revenue sharing agreements, and when it
Speaker 1: comes to investors, they're able to view all of the
Speaker 1: offering documents on the platform and review the entire offering
Speaker 1: in detail to understand what exactly they're signing up for,
Speaker 1: what they're getting, and to be able to track it
Speaker 1: and manage it over time, so they're not left out
Speaker 1: in the dark. They actually have the ability to track
Speaker 1: and manage this over time and be able to see
Speaker 1: the progress over time, whether it's through company milestones or
Speaker 1: the updating of share prices or whatnot, or the notification
Speaker 1: of the exciting acquisition or going public of a company
Speaker 1: which ends up being a very profitable moment for a
Speaker 1: lot of investors.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely, so, tell us a bit about some of
Speaker 2: the companies that are the earlier folks on your platform.
Speaker 2: Is it like wallet services, Layer twos for bitcoin to
Speaker 2: anything along those lines.
Speaker 1: So so far, it's been eight companies that I've signed
Speaker 1: up with us in just a couple of weeks, which
Speaker 1: is just it shows you just the excitement around the space.
Speaker 1: And so what I find with bitcoin is it's now
Speaker 1: grown enough where you're seeing different avenues of entrepreneurship that
Speaker 1: you didn't necessarily see in the first few years. In
Speaker 1: the first few years, the goal was to just try
Speaker 1: to build something so people can access bitcoin itself. So
Speaker 1: a lot of the stuff people were building were exchanges, right,
Speaker 1: just trying to get people liquidity access to bitcoin. But
Speaker 1: what we're seeing now fifteen years later is that there
Speaker 1: are so many different branches of bitcoin. You can have
Speaker 1: bitcoin mining, people that are building hardware walls, people that
Speaker 1: are building phone wallets. There are people that are building
Speaker 1: AI services. So we have two companies actually on our
Speaker 1: platform that are building AI services that use private bitcoin
Speaker 1: payments as part of their flow, and so it offers
Speaker 1: an alternative to some centralized services like chat GBT. For example,
Speaker 1: there's a company called Satlantis who's the founder is a
Speaker 1: well known person named Alex Sveetski. So he's building a
Speaker 1: travel on social app that's built on Noster, which is
Speaker 1: a decentralized protocol. So we're seeing so many innovative, interesting
Speaker 1: founders that are building these companies and they're looking for
Speaker 1: this outlet, and now all of a sudden, you see
Speaker 1: the company's flooding in, and now you're seeing the investor
Speaker 1: interests flooding in as well. And I encourage people to
Speaker 1: go to the platform and see all the different types
Speaker 1: of offerings that are coming onto the platform so that they
Speaker 1: can understand what is happening in the ecosystem, even if
Speaker 1: they don't decide to invest. It's a great way to
Speaker 1: actually learn about what's being built in the ecosystem.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. Yeah, it's amazing to see all the
Speaker 2: different innovations that are happening on Bitcoin to your point,
Speaker 2: like things we wouldn't have thought of five six years ago,
Speaker 2: but now folks are really thinking outside the box. And
Speaker 2: you know, a bigcoin getting mass adoption, it makes sense.
Speaker 2: And I know there's a lot of like layer twos
Speaker 2: people trying to add smart contracts and do different things.
Speaker 2: So folks are getting creative. What's on your robbap? I
Speaker 2: know you guys just launched. What can we expect in
Speaker 2: let's say early twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1: So right now we are focused entirely on onboarding as
Speaker 1: many people as we can in terms of both companies
Speaker 1: and investors. What's exciting for us in terms of the
Speaker 1: start to twenty twenty five is we've actually partnered with
Speaker 1: club Lab, which is so club Lab is the leading
Speaker 1: bitcoin accelerator in Austin, Texas, one of the people I
Speaker 1: got to collaborate with early on, and so they have
Speaker 1: a lot of innovative people coming out of club Lab
Speaker 1: that are building these great projects and companies. They're holding
Speaker 1: an event called Top Builder in March twenty twenty, twenty
Speaker 1: twenty five, and in the lead up to that event,
Speaker 1: there is a competition for all these companies to It's
Speaker 1: like Top Chef but for companies is the best way
Speaker 1: you can describe it. So we're Last year, I believe
Speaker 1: they had over sixty different companies compete in this competition.
Speaker 1: This year, we're looking to do the same, have these
Speaker 1: companies compete, and Timestamp is going to be the flagship
Speaker 1: sponsor of this event. So we're very excited to support
Speaker 1: these companies as best we can, give them all the
Speaker 1: networking opportunities and give them an opportunity to get some
Speaker 1: mentorship as well.
Speaker 2: That's great. I love it, man, I love on multiple levels.
Speaker 2: One obviously allowing people to get involved with bitcoin, and
Speaker 2: these entrepreneurs and investors can meet each other. But also
Speaker 2: just a democratization of the investment space where like I said,
Speaker 2: the average Joe and Jane can can get access. I
Speaker 2: love that. I got some wrap up questions there for you. First,
Speaker 2: if you could create your own metaverse, what would theme be?
Speaker 1: It would be what we're building now with bitcoin. It
Speaker 1: would be us in fifteen twenty years. That, honestly, that's
Speaker 1: the best answer I could give. Is like, if you
Speaker 1: want to build something great and you want to see
Speaker 1: great things around you, you gotta do it yourself. You
Speaker 1: got to do it with the community. And I feel
Speaker 1: like the Bitcoin community is the best place to do it.
Speaker 1: You have some of the most interesting people here, the
Speaker 1: most driven people that are trying to build fascinating things.
Speaker 1: And one thing on timestamp I'll say related to this is,
Speaker 1: you know, part of the reason why I started my
Speaker 1: own company is I was just unemployable. Man. You know,
Speaker 1: I'm the type of person that I just need my
Speaker 1: own thing. I can't take orders from people. But then
Speaker 1: you know, someone gave me good advice. It's like, look,
Speaker 1: you'll always have boss, and in this case it'll be
Speaker 1: your clients. Right, So who are your clients? And for me,
Speaker 1: I chose the toughest clients in the world, which are
Speaker 1: founders of companies. They're neurotic, obsessive founders of companies. And
Speaker 1: you know what, that's the kind of stuff that drives
Speaker 1: me to build Timestam to be such a great company.
Speaker 1: That amis the standards of these founders. So when you
Speaker 1: ask me what I want to build, like in terms
Speaker 1: of a metaverse, I want to build this. I want
Speaker 1: to build a bitcoin standard. I want to do it
Speaker 1: with all these founders and all these people. The community
Speaker 1: that we're building.
Speaker 2: Oh for sure. Rapid fire questions.
Speaker 1: Favorite food, favorite food sushi.
Speaker 2: Favorite musician or band Radiohead, favorite movie Godfather too, favorite.
Speaker 1: Book, favorite book, divine comedy.
Speaker 2: And when you're not working at times, what are you
Speaker 2: doing for fun?
Speaker 1: Let's see watching the movies, playing guitar, hanging out with.
Speaker 2: Dogs, awesome, arman, amazing. I love what you're doing. And
Speaker 2: you know, as things progress, I would love to have
Speaker 2: you back on And obviously, folks, links will be in
Speaker 2: the description to go check out time stamp and you know,
Speaker 2: I wish you best of luck. And as we head
Speaker 2: into twenty twenty five, thank you so much for joining me.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for your time, Tony. Anyone that
Speaker 1: wants to check out Timesam they can go to timesamfinancial
Speaker 1: dot com. They can reach me pretty easily. I'm very accessible.
Speaker 1: I love talking to people that are in the space,
Speaker 1: so please let me know if you have any questions.
Speaker 1: And again, Tony, thank you for all that you do
Speaker 1: getting people's voices out there. It really means a lot
Speaker 1: to me and a lot of people that work with you.
Speaker 1: The tak