0:00 there's a moment that clicked that was where we're headed is my generation It's 0:07 the generation that comes after me right and we're building a future for them And it's not going to be built on what is 0:13 being handed to us And if you can appreciate that that you're not living in today you're living in 20 years from 0:20 now And what's that world look like you know it increased my rate of 0:25 understanding So you look at bitcoin and you go there's 53 million millionaires there's or something of that sort 0:30 There's 21 million bitcoin Not every millionaire is going to get half of a bitcoin Is that scarce right That feels 0:36 scarce to me And that cost $50,000 to get your share of what a current 0:42 millionaire in fiat money could af you know could afford one day It's a lesson in scarcity If you want to reach you 0:49 know the 7 12 billion people that don't own bitcoin you know you got to go to places where they're at And so 0:55 collectibles to me is the opportunity to breach that bitcoin: Still Early? 1:01 on your LinkedIn on the banner it says live bold adopt bitcoin begin today 1:07 we're early what does that phrase mean to you and why do you believe we're still early 1:14 yeah so this came from I I updated I updated this literally this morning and 1:20 it's because of two days ago I presented I'm a UCLA MBA student I'm involved in 1:25 the entrepreneur association there It's the the big student community for entrepreneurs which bundles up to the 1:31 Price Center for Entrepreneurship and we had a board meeting I got invited uh due to my role and I got up in front of a 30 1:40 person board of entrepreneurs and where when I was supposed to update them on 1:45 club events I did a five-minute pitch on bitcoin And the reason I did that was 1:51 because they had spent about 45 minutes talking about how the school needs to get quote sneakily creative in finding 2:00 funds uh you know over the next however long right and the feedback was the most 2:08 well-received you know pitch that I had given in bitcoin at UCLA over I've been 2:15 here 18 months um every single board member wanted to reach out and learn 2:20 more and it was the president of the board that got up in front of the room and said that was bold and he he just 2:27 takes a moment and and says you know I appreciate it's it's refreshing to 2:33 experience somebody that is so you know excited and passionate and is willing to 2:40 communicate their ideas and so this morning I was like you know you got to live live bold right And with bitcoin 2:47 for what it means to me this is an opportunity to be bold be proactive see 2:53 opportunity and take you know an act And we are early Uh we're at 0.085 million 2:58 today You know we're 95% bitcoin mined but 500 million users or holders maybe 3:04 and there's billions more to come Um so I feel we're we're quite early Yeah I 3:11 mean that just propped up an idea Jason and I were talking about earlier about 3:17 breaking the rules and authenticity and the importance of that And I think that's where a lot of the bitcoin space 3:23 really lends itself to that So my question when going in front of a board like that did you feel like you 3:30 were breaking the rules but also like how has the entrepreneur community and 3:35 the academic community at UCLA been 3:41 accepting and curious about bitcoin and how and have you seen that shift in your 3:46 18 months there um as the price of bitcoin has uh appreciated 3:52 yeah Um to to start with the second question is bitcoin at UCLA I I came to UCLA Bringing bitcoin to Campus 4:01 because I wanted to be surrounded by a community of learners people that were looking to grow and and UCLA is worldclass institution uh number one 4:08 public university There's 40,000 faculty and 45,000 students I came to learn about bitcoin And what I found was I was 4:16 the teacher I am the teacher And when you stick out you know when you go into 4:23 the MBA program a lot of your peers and and the faculty are focused on career 4:30 risk averse you know developing driving impact But it's not about 4:35 entrepreneurship all the time It's certainly not always about digital assets right and and the new the new 4:42 technology I mean AI of course is is a common topic but when I came to Anderson 4:47 I knew that I was a bitcoiner I knew that I wanted to drive bitcoin into the entrepreneurial community That's why I 4:53 started bitcoin Bruins founded bitcoin Bruins within the entrepreneur association Um so that can live within 4:59 the entrepreneurs uh both the faculty and the students that engage there But 5:04 what I've experienced has been um students are interested They want to learn right many more students actually 5:13 approach it with an open mind than I would say faculty um and just general 5:18 community And that's nothing against you know faculty that the academic staff at UCLA is is incredible Um and it's tough 5:26 to approach an asset um where I don't talk about crypto I talk about bitcoin 5:32 And when I say I want to do bitcoin research I don't want to do crypto research I don't want to study ICOs I 5:38 want to target one thing And for some people it's difficult to appreciate that somebody has such focus that 5:46 there's only one thing that they want to you know pay attention to Um I'll tell a 5:51 a story where in my financial statements analysis class I got up and I presented I was the only student to present their 5:57 their actual homework Um but it was doing financial statement analysis on a 6:03 public company and I picked Micro Strategy now strategy and I got up there 6:08 and 15 minutes of of presenting and a lot of students are very engaged the professor and I have a great 6:14 relationship of this was in the fall so he would always start the class with asking how the markets are doing and I 6:20 first day of class was like well bitcoin's doing well and then by the end of class it touched 100k but there was a 6:26 student in the middle of my presentation that yelled out can we talk about a real 6:31 business and I've never experienced that before right um and that's not you know nothing 6:39 against the student that it's to have to rece perceive that as you're presenting 6:44 you're sharing success you know I came to Anderson their their pillars are drive change think fearlessly and share 6:50 success if you don't think bitcoin embodies that entirely right you know it is it is so core to that um I came 6:58 specifically for the share success I wanted to share it with others with peers I wanted to create dialogue in the classroom so um long answer to say you 7:07 know students want to learn I think faculty today after my Price Center 7:13 experience with the board You know a lot of the entrepreneurial faculty want to learn um and I'm giving them an 7:19 opportunity to do so later this year uh which I can touch on in a bit 7:26 Had many of the students heard of Micro Strategy were they familiar with the business no 7:33 Um most everyone had not also not heard of Michael Sailor Uh yeah Wow Yeah 7:41 I experienced I wanted to join a club my first year and I went to the club kickoff and the president asked me what bitcoin vs Crypto: Not the Same 7:49 my background was and I said bitcoin and he goes crypto I said bitcoin and he goes oh like crypto and I was like no I 7:56 don't think you understand like I'm interested in bitcoin He goes well I'm a computer scientist bitcoin is crypto 8:02 like it's the same thing And I was like I don't think I want to join your club I was like I you know and can you go ahead 8:10 Kyle can you can you touch just briefly for our listeners the differences in your mind between bitcoin and crypto 8:18 yeah I mean that there's so many um but I'm a purist right uh I'm a collector at bitcoin vs Crypto: A Purist’s View 8:26 the end of the day I love communities I love uh people and and collectibles but 8:32 um I love those things in in their purest state right and when I think 8:37 about money when I think about technology you know you look at bitcoin 8:42 and then you look at digital assets at large right and and what's what's the most pure right from an external just 8:50 objective right like we're going to approach this and say this was designed this was almost divine right it was 8:57 almost so beautiful is just dropped into our laps And from that standpoint you 9:03 know whether it's the Satoshi remaining anonymous whether it's the you know there's no VCs involved and there's no 9:08 marketing team to you know um for me it's the peer-to-peer aspect the freedom 9:14 money you know there's such purity in its design and the way that the community engages with one another that 9:20 when I look at crypto and I look at and this is just talking my personal experience in the academic world right 9:26 now uh you know you look at how other programs have their crypto or digital 9:31 asset initiatives their conferences and you wonder why And it's like well people put money you know into that They want 9:38 to get students thinking about crypto because you know there's companies in crypto that need their attention And 9:46 um for me it's it's painful to see um 9:51 people get swayed because of just this this marketing play Um but maybe that's 9:57 you know there's always more you could talk about about the differences between bitcoin and crypto but 10:02 yeah And I think when you're talking about the that difference right of bitcoin and 10:10 crypto I'm curious if we want to like rewind and you know go back to when you first discovered uh bitcoin crypto and 10:17 all this stuff And was there like an aha moment for you was there an instant 10:23 where you were like "Oh this is a perfect money or there this is like fundamentally 10:30 different than anything I had seen before." Yeah that that's so funny Um Engineer to bitcoiner 10:36 you know thinking about and everybody's got their different experience understand their learning journey in 10:42 bitcoin Uh I was introduced in 2017 October some friends at my undergrad 10:48 university um getting involved in helping parents of of students buy bitcoin Um and many of those original 10:56 founders of that that team had been my best friends And so they onboarded me to Coinbase and they told me Huddle right 11:02 they were like bitcoin and Huddle right and I'm like at the time well you know like Coinbase good friends Yeah I was 11:09 like you know yeah good friends Very good friends they're still best friends still in the industry uh today you know 11:14 contributing and driving impact Uh you know wouldn't be here if it wasn't for them So for me it I was a mechanical 11:23 engineer I I love you know understanding things at its root and even then I 11:28 didn't read the white paper right away You know I didn't look and and understand that it was freedom money 11:34 until really 2020 and the kick in the butt was one of those original friends COVID happened and he goes all in and 11:41 you're like I mean I'm in but I'm not all in That's crazy And then at if somebody goes all in you're like you got 11:48 to know something You have to you back the truck up like you know something that that I need to understand Um and 11:55 so it was around it was 2020 was really my learning journey of going through and 12:00 appreciating you know what the problems with money is you know that was Clubhouse days That was you know um 12:08 really just trying to learn from the community Um read Sovereign Individual 12:13 you know the bitcoin standard of course but um it was it took a long time right and um 12:20 it didn't happen overnight but eventually you can appreciate that our 12:26 society is broken What's at the root of society is money You know is money good 12:32 you know are the people that print that that manufacture whatever you want design the money Is it perfect you know 12:39 not really Is it backed by technology and math and science that as an engineer I I appreciate that no And so um there's 12:48 a moment that clicked that was where we're headed is my generation It's the 12:54 generation that comes after me right and we're building a future for them And it's not going to be built on what is 13:01 being handed to us right and if you can appreciate that that you're not living 13:06 in today you're living in 20 years from now and what's that world look like you know it it increased my rate of 13:13 understanding Yeah And I think that's what's so interesting about asking that question of what got you into bitcoin 13:19 what was your aha moment or whatever it may be because everyone has a 13:25 different start at the rabbit hole Everybody looks at that door and arrives 13:30 there from a different journey whether it's you know your background in mechanical engineering your background with collectibles Um but then once you 13:37 kind of take a step in and do some research you start to see these common 13:43 themes show up and up again uh to the point where now you're getting involved 13:49 in communities and you're building in the space and you're you're really progressing forward um the promise of 13:55 what sound money can can provide So it just that always interests me of of 14:00 whether no matter what your background is you you you generally fall in at 14:05 least looking at the same picture Yeah And I I want to add and this is 14:11 something that I don't think enough people appreciate where for me bitcoin is a blank canvas right bitcoin 14:17 entrepreneurship I don't see anybody having one right and I see you're able to take any existing fiat business 14:24 meaning any business that currently exists today and tweak it literally just 14:30 by putting bitcoin on the balance sheet But you know that changes the brand and the signal But you know you can create a 14:37 whole new world Whatever interests you there's an opportunity in bitcoin for you to go and do that And I say this 14:43 because I've experienced at you know UCLA and just academia in general or 14:49 just communities in general saying there's not much to do in bitcoin right and I I don't like that statement 14:57 because I'll tell you I've devoted my career to it I did it three years ago and I participate in bitcoin every 15:04 single day I'm doing something in bitcoin every single day And so for somebody to tell me and and their peers 15:10 and their students um that go to crypto because there's more to do right there's 15:16 there's more in gaming there's more in entertainment there's just more to do And that's not a good enough you know 15:24 answer That's not a fair answer either um or pitch But anyways 15:31 one thing that you said Kyle that I thought was really beautiful and profound was that you're not building 15:37 for yourself and your generation you're building for the next And that I think 15:45 is it really hits me at like my aha moment when I realized I've spent the last 15 15:52 years supporting small and mediumsized businesses with accepting money right 15:57 running a payment processing company And then it dawning on me that like my kids 16:03 are going to be entering in this world running on legacy fiat when I could be 16:09 putting my time and resources and energy into clean hard sound money that's 16:14 better for the business better for literally everyone 16:20 Um and uh yeah I just thought that was really beautiful thinking about it that 16:25 way not even for and I think that's again like one of the differences between like kind of crypto and bitcoin 16:31 it's like such a long-term time horizon and thinking more about how does this 16:37 fit in with the larger picture rather than like how much money is my VC giving me so I can pitch this crypto venture 16:43 right um and I I can elaborate on that I mean 16:48 And there's two things that you made me think of which is one my origin story is you know I wanted to I grew up I wanted 16:54 to be a kindergarten teacher right i I loved people I loved youth And at that From the Classroom to Global Change 16:59 point maybe it was high school where it was like I wanted to scale my impact right and in a classroom I can touch 30 17:05 kids and and maybe on the back end of my career I get back and find a classroom But at this point it was how can I touch 17:13 as many people as possible in a way that positively affects you know their lives right and I grew up in a you know it was 17:21 a beautiful childhood it was you know very full of love and it also I I 17:26 experienced the world I' I've traveled and and I got outside of my local community and in doing that there was a 17:34 desire to help others no matter where they are right and no matter what stage of life they're 17:40 um you know whatever their background whatever part of their journey they're in and especially those who are not in a 17:48 position to do that for themselves right to you know and that's when I think of youth right when I think of that next 17:53 generation there's there's people who are not in control of the this future that we're building um and you can play 18:00 a direct role in that and so for me bitcoin was the scale the impact right 18:05 you you're attacking the root problem you're attacking a global problem Um and 18:11 you're able to fix a lot of societal problems as a result And you're building something that with low time preference 18:18 you know I'm not worried about my NFT market going up being built tomorrow and the fun and entertainment that the next 18:24 5 to 10 years may provide It's great Yeah Yeah That provides value But is it 18:30 providing value a hundred years from now you know that we've you know built a society that 18:37 sustains a beautiful way of life right um so it is very I go to you know 18:44 there's the number go up side everybody's in bitcoin for a different reason I think you know there's number go up and there's the impact and and I 18:51 feel like I've won just by being here and having this conviction I'm here to share that that win that success with 18:58 other people and especially on that you know how can we help others Okay 19:04 I'm on the same journey man I I' I've been fortunate enough to to uh get to a 19:09 place where I don't need to just work just to feed my family and you know put 19:15 food on the table And the impact piece is now it's the most important thing And 19:20 I I'm excited to dig in a little deeper and hear more about what you're building because it really is wild how 19:27 much you know money and and economics impact so many things And there's that 19:33 common phrase fix the money fix the world Um ah look at that right there Yeah 19:41 that's awesome One other thing you mentioned Kyle is that you view bitcoin as a blank 19:48 canvas and 19:54 how how much opportunity there is within every business to utilize 20:02 bitcoin What's the biggest misconception businesses have about bitcoin you 20:10 think I say and this is something I think even bitcoiners have a Transforming a Business with bitcoin 20:15 misconception about Um and I I know the name of the show Medium of Exchange 20:20 right we're going to get into that for sure but is people today feel like you 20:26 have to use it right you have to medium of exchange it right you have to be able to take payment 20:33 And there's such a friction with that right i see the we're still in web two 20:39 You can talk web three you could say web two and a half 99% of the world their brains are in web two right they want to 20:46 live in a web two world still And if you want to onboard businesses if you want 20:53 to onboard people you have to approach it as you know the least you know frictionless the most frictionless way 21:00 possible which in in my opinion is not tackling let's give you a poss lightning 21:07 so you can you know for the 1% of people in your community you know take take payments from them in bitcoin It's you 21:15 know how can your business benefit if your bottom line is you know as a 21:20 business besides impact you know there's that aspect but every business you know needs revenue needs cash flow and and 21:26 needs a balance sheet a healthy balance sheet right um I prefer that businesses understand 21:35 how bitcoin can support you know the the sustainability of their runway um you 21:41 know their operations how they can leverage to retain assets on their balance sheet and not you know constantly be spending them Um so I 21:50 would just say the misconception is that you have to you have to use it you know as a as a 21:56 Yeah Yeah onboarded to this community So you kind of start with the store of value use case and retain your hard work 22:06 Absolutely so that your your savings are not being diluted and and then you can kind of get 22:13 to that point where you're opening up your your revenue cycle for uh other new 22:19 forms of money like bitcoin Yeah And and on the point of the white canvas and 22:25 where you can take any business right entrepreneurship through acquisition is a very common or it's becoming more 22:30 common uh in today's world And for those that don't know you know entrepreneurship through acquisition is you see an existing business often it's 22:36 an aging you know founder and they don't have you know family to pass it on to or you know they're they're past they're 22:42 they're prime and they're just done They want to retire Um and you come in and and you buy it from them right and these 22:48 are operating businesses They don't have to be uh glamorous It could be you know laundry services It could be trash right 22:55 um but they're operating They're profitable They you know generate revenue And it's typically the best ones 23:00 are contract based So you know you have expected income right um and you can 23:07 take in in entrepreneurs with acquisition take a cash cow and you 23:12 change its future by putting bit you know starting to put bitcoin on the balance sheet right you've you've 23:18 changed the business at its core from a financial you know standpoint um by 23:24 doing one thing you've changed no operations but now you're you know storing bitcoin on your balance sheet and you've separated yourself from 99% 23:32 of you know your industry from your peers Um and that to me is really powerful Um it doesn't take a lot of 23:40 work It takes a little bit of creativity and and you know an action 23:47 Yeah And Kyle I think one of where my head goes to that and it just all keeps building on it on 23:53 itself from your background in a mechanical being a mechanical engineer the blank canvas piece 24:00 of what bitcoin is and what it can be And one of the things that I think we're 24:08 constantly looking for whether it's making a business decision or a life decision is like the data right and we 24:14 want to we want to make at least what feels like an informed decision Um and I think you know a common uh 24:22 parallel that people will try to equate it to is like sports and you know analytics in sports and how has baseball 24:28 scouting gotten um much more precise because we now have new metrics right we now have new ways to to measure if a guy 24:35 in AAA is hitting the ball hard enough where it's an expected hit in the majors And the reason why I bring that up is 24:41 because you recently wrote on your LinkedIn uh about a metric that's I 24:48 think starting to get a little bit more traction in the industry but is probably pretty um unknown to most of most of the 24:54 people listening to this is this is the idea of the bitcoin hurdle rate uh and what that might look like So tying this 25:01 all together of acquisition entrepreneurship putting bitcoin on the balance sheet and then 25:08 the idea of run rate hurdle rate whatever you want to call it How do you look at financial analysis whether it's 25:15 Micro Strategy Metanet or the next mom and pop business adopting bitcoin and 25:20 adding those metrics for future financial whether it's projections or 25:26 performance or whatever it may be Yeah it's an incredible topic that I 25:32 actually just reached out to the director of research uh at UCLA within the entrepreneurial center to I wanted 25:38 to spend the next last three months of my time at Anderson doing research on bitcoin in entrepreneurship and startups 25:46 and entrepreneurship through acquisition and on the investment side because I even I don't understand well enough of 25:52 of how you can incorporate this and um how you need to um analyze you know 25:58 businesses that are adopting bitcoin in some way shape or form or being invested in with 26:04 bitcoin Um and so bitcoin hurdle rate right or bitcoin as your hurdle rate as 26:11 an entrepreneur right with my startup I could go out and I could mine fiat right 26:16 and I could take somebody else's money and add and stack to my balance sheet right bitcoin I chose not to do that 26:23 right so I'm taking my investment um you know my my assets I'm investing 26:30 it into a business And for example I'll give you a concrete example I bought inventory of of cards of bitcoin trading 26:38 cards Um November 1st bitcoin was 70,000 right 26:44 and I bought transparently it was.3 bitcoin I bought $21,000 worth of 26:50 product right 3 bitcoin at $100,000 is 30K right so as 26:56 an entrepreneur who cares about bitcoin as my unit of account I'm already down You know I'm fighting against the 27:02 machine I'm fighting against the bull market right um and there's something to be studied there of the timing of 27:08 investment right of leveraging loans right uh you know delaying your payment 27:14 not having to spend the bitcoin or the cash upfront um and depending on that 27:19 time of the market But businesses should begin studying their cash flows They 27:26 should begin studying you know how their assets on their balance sheet are are performing when they you know have an 27:32 opportunity to dive into um making more 27:37 strategic capital allocation you know to to strengthen that balance sheet Um it may not be you know you can do it 27:43 tomorrow because you have costs coming up right um but if you have lines of 27:49 credit that you can use to fund the business and you know your profits can go into bitcoin I'm not sure right i I 27:56 have more research to do and more understanding uh to gain but I think it's a really interesting field of 28:02 research I I think businesses are going to really benefit from people that that pull this data out to your point um and 28:10 share it Yeah And that's the that's the paradox of bitcoin right where you can 28:15 buy you can use the dollars that you have today to buy more bitcoin or do you want to work on something that you 28:22 believe is bigger or potentially can help grow that mission uh to then hopefully not only accumulate more 28:28 bitcoin in the future but then also spread the that message particularly for uh bitcoin focused businesses But um 28:36 yeah it's there's there's just so much that goes into it But I'm I'm definitely uh excited to see where where that 28:42 research continues to to flow Well I'll I'll share it uh as I have an update 28:48 We'll see We'll see if I can make We'll have to get you back on the pod Yeah absolutely Medium of Exchange is 28:55 sponsored by the bitcoin Payments Advisor If you own or run a business and 29:00 you'd like to accept bitcoin but don't know how the bitcoin payments adviser can help From specific software 29:06 recommendations and accounting implications to training employees and 29:11 marketing so your customers know you accept this new form of payment The bitcoin Payments Adviser can help 29:17 simplify your journey in accepting bitcoin for your business Check out bitcoin 29:23 paymentsadvisor.com and get 10% off if you pay in bitcoin Again that's bitcoin 29:29 paymentsadvisor.com Now let's get back to the show I think it was Preston Pish I heard say 29:35 if you're a business owner the hurdle rate is conservatively 50% Like if you if you're going to invest $100 into your 29:42 business or bitcoin well you should you know that this is going to be worth conservatively on average 29:49 $150 if you put it in bitcoin And so you need to be you need to outperform that if you're going to invest it in your 29:55 business right and there's obviously there's a lot of different goals There's like it's not just all about you know 30:02 making that immediate return in your business There's longer term goals and stuff with your your business and what 30:07 kind of impact can you make with your business as well not just you know hodling and extracting your dollars out 30:13 of the fiat system But I just thought it was like a pretty compelling framework 30:19 and succinct you know Yeah and Ego Death Capital what they're doing out there is really great with Jeff Booth Preston and 30:25 Lynn and you know something I find very 30:30 interesting but there's um h no I would go back to one of my thoughts was was 30:35 running back to how you can you know my mom always told me there's power in your voice right and and there's power in 30:42 your vote and and a lot of bitcoiners have a um viewpoint on on voting and in 30:48 the way that we know of as a society which is you placing your vote in in government right that's what you think 30:54 of when you hear the word vote Um but my mom taught me at a young age and this Teaching bitcoin Through Culture OR bitcoin, Art & Education 30:59 was when the BP oil crisis happened Um or you know a lot of oil entered the 31:06 ocean and she went you know that's messed up I'm not going to support BP I'm voting with my money right and 31:14 bitcoin for me is an opportunity to vote in the best way I know how which is 31:20 taking my money and saying "I I don't support you and what you're doing." Um and I'm going to go over here and and 31:27 build my world Um and so there's a lot of power in that and I think you know people can feel empowered in that 31:36 Kyle I think a lot of our listeners may not even really know what the problems are with fiat From just quickly from 31:44 your perspective I'd love to hear you know with an oil spill that's pretty obvious Um there's a 31:51 lot of industries that you may not want to support for obvious reasons Um but what about fiat and like literally just 31:58 money itself um why would you not want to support the US dollar let's say yeah Um 32:07 it's funny and again I I'll plug this So I love bitcoin trading cards We'll get into this in a bit but it's this series 32:13 specifically is Wars versus Villains right and we didn't put villains in here 32:18 by name We we put them in here by almost industrial complex right military industrial complex censorship the WHO 32:26 the WF And I got to get some of these cards Oh we'll I'll make sure I'll ship 32:31 some to you guys and we'll make sure that you guys can can um for sure But for me 32:40 fiat a lot of people know 1971 Nixon goes off the gold standard Fiat is 32:45 something that you know has a has a much longer life than bitcoin does And when 32:51 you look at human behavior right you have to study incentive structures You 32:56 have to study you know choice architecture and how people make decisions And you have to appreciate 33:02 that when a lot of people find money as you know a driving force in their life 33:08 and and they're able to be convinced um by you know a dollar an extra dollar And 33:14 so when you look at the way for me that that actually tying back to our earlier 33:20 question of what was that moment that I really you know felt something was when I appreciated the separation of church 33:26 and state and I went you know somebody went separating money and state right and there's there's no real reason the 33:34 US government deserves the right to control the money right um and there's 33:39 no real belief on my end that they're looking out for all of our best 33:45 interests And not only are they looking out for it they know how to do it right you look at the Federal Reserve and and 33:51 you go are they guessing like are they are they just 25% base like I don't know 33:57 you know um and so fiat money at large its core 34:04 problem there's no consequences to spending it right there's no proof of 34:09 work behind creating it And therefore if I can press a button and create trillions more of it to fund whatever 34:17 you know current government believes is worthy of that spend then we can do that 34:22 and there's the only people that face consequences is society is at large right your savings which right there's a 34:30 numerator and a denominator you own $100 there's $1,000 out there well when that 34:36 $1,000 becomes 10,000 becomes a h 100,000 becomes a million and you go well now I have $1,000 up here instead 34:43 of a hundred Well this grew this outpaced your you know growth by quite a bit right and you feel smart because 34:51 your your wealth you know grew nominally but in in real terms 34:57 you don't see what's happening Um and you don't appreciate that the world has 35:02 just taken your savings and went you know all that hard work you did to save 35:08 you know earn all the value you created for the world well it's gone And if you want to pass that on to your next 35:14 generation if you want to spend that in certain ways you know we took that from you and there's no no problem for me as 35:22 as the printer of that money You know I sleep sound at night Um it's kind of a 35:27 stealth a stealth theft as well right because you go "Oh wow My home value just doubled Like look at me go Like my 35:35 net worth just doubled in terms of my what's in my home." And that's the collectibles angle that I 35:42 have the perspective right you look at real estate and collectibles at large right real estate fashion you've got 35:48 cars and I'll touch on cars which is or trading cards even I love the trading card now 35:54 So trading cards as an industry you know there used to be a scarcity about them 36:00 There's what's known as the Junkwax era which was 80s baseball They printed out you know just so much so many trading 36:06 cards you can't even fathom right and where we've gotten today is a fiat 36:11 mindset of printing a bunch of trading cards right um there 36:16 are literally billions of packs of you know Pokemon cards and and there's no scarcity at all right but what drives or 36:25 what drove trading card values um to be hundreds of thousands and then to 36:30 millions right and it was COVID and the liquidity injection and people went I 36:35 have cash now and I'm going to spend it on things that are fun And so those are 36:40 collectibles The car market took off Trading cards took off And people don't 36:46 appreciate that Well you know there's going to be more Ferraris that are going to come right there's going to be more 36:53 trading cards like Otani rookie cards that or not rookie but you know Otani one of ones is that there's going to be 37:00 more that'll be printed and what you have maybe used to be special right it 37:07 might have really been a one of one if it was printed in 2006 but in today's world your trading card your one of one 37:13 is is one of 63 Otani one of that year And that set alone right your Ferrari is 37:20 you know one of so many that isn't that unique and that collectible at the end of the day that it doesn't hold value 37:27 And that's why we're seeing the markets come back down because liquidity is getting a little bit tighter and people are appreciating that They're not that 37:34 scarce So you look at bitcoin and you go there's 53 million millionaires There's or something of that sort There's 21 37:40 million bitcoin Not every millionaire is going to get half of a bitcoin Is that scarce right that feels scarce to me 37:47 And that cost $50,000 to get your share of what a current millionaire in fiat 37:52 money could af you know could afford one day Um it's a lesson in scarcity That's all 37:59 it is Totally No I I I love I love what you're 38:04 everything that you're saying there and and I do want to dive in to what you're working on with the with the trading 38:09 cards um with some of the you know art collectibles that you have and your background in collectibles and how you're uh pivoting that to uh bitcoin 38:17 and and really bringing you know what I view as the culture of art and 38:23 expression of you know even the the canvas behind you um into the bitcoin space So do you want to just give us 38:30 like a background in what the trading cards are what the game is uh and then also a little bit into KB and your and 38:37 the marketplace that you're building out absolutely So we'll start with the trading cards and I'll just um you know 38:43 I'll bring set some down next to me I've got I've got some next to me uh as well Let 38:49 me change my setup here So now you can't see my face That's okay 38:55 You guys you guys don't need to see my face too much but what these trading cards are is 39:01 basically and and it says on the f front art education fun right in bitcoin I I 39:07 love bitcoin culture It's what I'm ingrained in I'm not a money tech person I am a people person I'm a culture 39:12 person And I'm supporting that renaissance you know with with the financial renaissance that's happening 39:18 right and what I see is a need to reach people where they're at you know normies 39:24 as we say they're not in your echo chambers on the podcast on Nostr on you 39:30 know that it's great to to engage on those platforms right but if you want to reach you know the 7 and a half billion 39:36 people that don't own bitcoin um you know you got to go to places where they're at And so collectibles to me is 39:43 the opportunity to breach that bitcoin trading cards is a way to learn about bitcoin in a very fun and familiar way 39:51 right um with artwork on the front of it and I'll show this is uh a bitcoin 39:56 versus crypto card So it's you know you got Satoshi attacking that's ETH down there Um we've got our boomers in 40:02 bitcoin card so that you know you've got Lawrence Leard and Bob Bernett and you got you know a lot of lot of the 40:08 favorite ugly old goat Um we've got this is a pretty special card This is a 40:13 series one loss card and it's hard to see but you got Hal Finny and you got uh Max Maybe Max is in there somewhere But 40:21 um this is you know kind of the Charizard I would say of of ours uh bitcoin trading cards And it's a series 40:28 1 Satoshi um photo But to the art point 40:33 um you know this is from what we call the having edition whale pack It was made specifically for the having And 40:40 this is an artwork called Penny Orange right it's made by uh British artists Rebel Money And it's absolutely 40:48 beautiful right so it's a physical painting or physical creation artwork And what bitcoin Trading Cards is able 40:54 to do is disseminate this this knowledge this beauty this culture get it into the hands of people that I I don't have a 41:00 print I don't have you know the original but I have his trading card right and 41:06 and I get to appreciate a little bit of that Um at that same time on the backs 41:12 of these is written education right so for any given topic it's not just Satoshi it's not just bitcoin focused 41:19 We're really targeting uh you know bitcoin adjacent topics right so there's a tyranny category there's a freedom 41:25 category there's your resources that help you learn from the books or well there's an education category So that's 41:31 got your books Um but for me I have such a hard time 41:38 orange pilling people just from the standpoint of you can make money off of 41:43 it you know you can imp it's it's for the better of the society right and that 41:50 ties back to my point of for people to do something in bitcoin right this this 41:55 is doing something in bitcoin even though it's not traditionally like I'm not building tech infrastructure and I'm 42:01 not putting you know bitcoin on Micro Strategies or Metanet's balance sheet right but I'm going on to whatnot and 42:10 I'm going on to other platforms where from youth to just adults normies who 42:15 collect these types of things want to they're curious They go "Oh a new project Like let me learn about this Let 42:21 me engage Let me be part of their community." Um and so bitcoin Trading Cards just came out with series 3 It was 42:28 last week I'll give a shout of course btc-stc.com Um total transparency So if 42:36 I was I've been collecting trading cards for 20 years If I was to design a trading card project this is not my 42:41 business right i own a bitcoin or a business adjacent to this that supports the ecosystem but if I was to build a 42:47 project in trading cards it would be 99% 42:53 identical to this one right uh the founder Aladdin has just done an incredible job of of bringing you know 43:00 true quality um in the product and the experience to the community So coil 43:06 breaks or KB Um and we'll see how long that name sticks around We're going through a rebrand So we'll see Uh we're 43:12 going to see everybody at the bitcoin conference Going to try to get a booth there uh across from the bitcoin trading cards table so we can just be engaging 43:18 you know with our community Um for me is the opportunity to onboard you know 43:25 we're going to need to onboard billions of bitcoiners you know mint and onboard billions of bitcoiners over the next couple decades And for me it's there's a 43:33 current marketing focus towards aging financial individuals right you've a traditional finance you know marketing 43:39 angle and you have your personal finance marketing angle like fold and black rock being you know traditional finance you 43:46 know and for me that that doesn't do it right 43:51 a 20s you know uh person that's soft skill just loves community loves people 43:57 I don't really engage um in this kind kind of static environment I need 44:03 something a little more dynamic and fluid And so it ties back to my desire to be a kindergarten teacher right um 44:09 the opportunity to educate people in ways that are you know fun and familiar 44:14 I play at the intersection of entertainment and effective education right so you're going to watch my live 44:20 stream You're going to have a ton of fun You're going to be smiling You're going to be learning And it's going to be sticky you're going to want to come back 44:26 and you're going to want to you know learn about bitcoin on your own time so that you can add to the conversation You 44:32 can hit up the chat and you can participate with our community Um my version right now which is just the 44:38 streams where I take product bitcoin trading cards product that's sealed and I basically allow collectors I provide a 44:45 service where allow collectors to chase after specific cards that they're after 44:50 Um that's V1 right uh soon comes the media and marketplace for bitcoin 44:56 trading cards And you know that's something that I've been passionate about building kind of since early days 45:02 And not just bitcoin trading cards but I'm a marketplace person I like garage sales to Goodwill to you know Facebook 45:09 marketplace Poshmark eBay Sabes all across the map Marketplaces drive uh you know value both creation 45:17 and and capture Um and so when I look at the opportunity to onboard the masses 45:24 it's going to come through developing you know I don't want to give too much too much insight away but uh you know 45:30 developing the next generation marketplace that you know you're really going to create some stickiness um in 45:36 that experience [Music] Medium of Exchange is sponsored by Polaris Payments Let's face it for now 45:44 businesses still need to accept fiat and credit cards Polaris Payments helps with all your credit card processing needs 45:51 using a consultative approach Think of Polaris like a performance coach helping take your business to the next level 45:58 when it comes to accepting all forms of money For more information about Polaris Payments visit 46:05 polarispayments.com That's P O L A R I S P A Y 46:11 Ns.com Now let's get back to the show That That's all sweet And shout out to 46:17 Aladdin those cards that you showed that art was beautiful And I think that's 46:22 another thing that a lot of bitcoiners are realizing is the craftsmanship 46:28 that's coming back because of this low time preference approach that people are taking to whether it's their business art culture 46:35 etc is I mean that it it clearly stands apart from just another Pokemon card 46:42 that you can get in the checkout line at Target Let me see I I put my scissors away but 46:49 I was I said I was going to open one on on camera so you guys could experience 46:55 the the excitement Um of course this this series came out and they're um the 47:01 cards are just next you know nextgen from what we experienced with series 2 Series 2 came out and this is our 47:08 flagship product before I spend get take a really hard time opening this Orange pill in a pack is what this you know um 47:15 product is called this this set and it comes in the name right we're trying to orange pill you through packs of trading 47:20 cards right name of the game And end of day we're learning how to create you 47:26 know the best trading cards in the world right from protecting collector value by maintaining scarcity to the collector 47:33 experience through transparency Um also down to right the education that comes inside of it 47:40 But um these p what I was gonna say is these packs they're beautiful but they 47:46 came out a little hard to open So um just give me bear with me just a second 47:52 Um so here's your your Nico and Opti Simply bitcoin card Uh you got your base 47:59 right and so it's going to teach you about Simply bitcoin You've got Bob Marley That's part of the freedom 48:04 fighters category Nelson Mandela also part of the freedom fighters category We added parallels to 48:12 this So this is the simplest bitcoin book written by this is the orange parallel On the back there's total 48:18 transparency It says I know it's going to be tough to see and I'm covering it up but limited edition to 210 So you 48:24 know exactly how much you know how many exist This is going to be let's see is this this isn't the Canadian the papier 48:31 mark So I think this is a German German mark I actually first time learning about it Um the currency in use during a 48:38 chaotic period of hyperinflation in Germany So on the back is a quote um for 48:43 every card Oh this is going to be the WEF the W the World Economic Forum So we 48:50 try not to scare people but we try to make them feel something right and um 48:56 these cards definitely definitely make you do that Here's going to be your uh Nostr Dame Nostr your little your 49:03 peacock Um you've got private key verse public key right and if you can envision 49:09 where this art goes right this turns into comic books It turns into you know short stories on Netflix It turns into 49:16 Pokemon and Red Bull at large There's I think Damus Yep And then you're looking at 49:22 there's an ultra rare So that's Bitco's artwork Um and it's proof of work and of 49:28 course teaches you about it On the back there's the serialized uh out of 500 So 49:35 these cards just you know they're beautiful they're colorful they're fun they're engaging Um they feel very familiar for people that are used to 49:41 trading cards They have a secondary market that you can engage in right so what can you do in bitcoin well this is 49:47 it You're collecting trading cards and you're playing with them and that that counts to me 49:53 So those are my kids they were so obsessed with Pokemon and now they're 49:59 super into magic and they love like you know like reading and thinking and and 50:07 trading and and deciding how they're going to stack them inside their you know binders and and like this is like 50:15 what they do as soon as they get home from school They're like cards So um yeah this is I mean to your point of 50:22 like next generation you know you're basically a kindergarten teacher like 50:28 like you're you're doing it right at scale Like you know I'm in the classroom but the classrooms come to me you know 50:34 Exactly Yeah No I 100% got to get some of these cards for my for my kids No I 50:40 got you Well there's uh the non-collectible version and these I'll make sure get in your hands but these are for the masses We made these because 50:47 you know collectible ones I don't want to give them away because they're so collect what if there's a one of one So for sure we made these that and I'll 50:54 just really quickly show um these you can hand to your neighbors you can hand to your friends and family You don't 50:59 have to pitch them on bitcoin It pitches them on bitcoin So every pack contains a Y bitcoin card with a matrix cool in the 51:07 back about you know all the different and a resources right to you know here's your resources to to buy and read and 51:14 learn and um every pack has that and then it comes into the cards right so to 51:19 the average person go ahead Oh I was just going to ask can you show that matrix again is that how bitcoin stacks 51:27 up against other types of currencies or what is that yeah so um I believe there's gold there's crypto and these 51:33 are across the top There's the US dollar Cool Imagine all green is going to be bitcoin Um but yeah I'll just quickly 51:40 list the properties of sound money Truly scarce portable durable divisible fungeable secure neutral easily 51:47 verifiable easily verifiable supply easy to transact non-consumable decentralized 51:53 trustless immutable/inorruptible disinflationary over deflationary provides settlement 52:00 finality and peer-to-peer Those are the criteria So now you got a got a lesson 52:08 Yeah All right Well Kyle we'll connect on how how I can get some of those Um I 52:14 know you uh you got to run I don't want to be sensitive your time but thank you for for joining us Yeah both of you It's 52:21 been fantastic You know I uh wish you the best with with the pod and I know you guys are going to go out and and 52:27 build something great that'll share a lot of education um to a lot of people So uh appreciate the work that you do to 52:33 to support the community Thank you for all that you do like truly like it's really amazing and and so 52:40 special everything that you're doing um throughout the ages right like like with 52:45 the cards um and then starting um bitcoin uh Bruins Yeah Oh we didn't even 52:51 talk about it Yeah Yeah What's it give me the 30 seconds pitch on that just real quick bitcoin Bruins Um I founded 52:58 that to basically be a place for uh creating dialogue on campus right so uh 53:05 I didn't create it as its own club It's a community within the entrepreneur association All we try to do is say "Hey 53:11 we're available." Like you know there's people on this campus that know how to talk about bitcoin They have networks in 53:16 bitcoin If you want to learn about it you know we're here to do so And this is my I do want to talk about this which is 53:23 May 23rd I'm hosting uh or we're hosting the title still to be determined but I 53:30 basically took the Unchained blockchain business forum was supposed to be the week of the fires right so it was a blockchain forum um and there was a 53:38 bitcoin part because I was involved as the student event leader I didn't really feel comfortable uh totally changing the 53:45 entire program meaning making it bitcoin only but as my parting gift to to the university and my parting gift to the 53:52 students we are hosting a bitcoin only forum um the Friday before the bitcoin 53:57 conference in Las Vegas where we'll be you know bringing in top speakers making 54:03 sure the faculty that you know the board like I said of uh Price Center for Entrepreneurship the people that need to 54:08 be in that room will be in that room to learn about bitcoin um and hopefully inspire you know a lot of um change on 54:16 on that campus to support the next generation of you know business leaders 54:22 So really excited for that That's incredible That sounds every every student at UCLA whether you want to 54:30 start your own company or not should be attending that Yep We will No no 54:35 question I'm taking uh title recommendations I need to figure out the name So uh anybody have ideas we'll be 54:42 you know put in the chat I don't know if there'll be comments Yeah got to figure 54:47 that out So anyways thank you guys Thank you 54:53 [Music]