TFTC: A Bitcoin Podcast - #514: The Rise of Botev Plovdiv with George Manolov

Episode Date: June 14, 2024

Marty sits down with George Manolov to discuss how Bitcoin changed the game for Botev Plovdiv FC. George's Website: https://georgemanolov.com/ Botev Polvdiv: https://botevplovdiv.bg/en 0:00 - Intro 0:50 - First involvement with Botev Plovdiv - Cut fuckup 7:06 - Starting a bitcoin plan for the club 13:38 - River & Unchained 14:54 - Communicating reasons for bitcoin 22:34 - Fanbase reception 27:40 - Gradually, Then Suddenly & Zaprite 29:17 - Challenges of a sports business 34:56 - Bitcoin financial plan 41:05 - Bulgaria 47:20 - El Salvador 58:50 - Sound money mindset 1:02:26 - The players 1:10:11 - Plugs Shoutout to our sponsors: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠River⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Unchained⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Zaprite⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Gradually, Then Suddenly⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ TFTC Merch is Available: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Shop Now⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Join the TFTC Movement: Main ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YT Channel⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Clips ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YT Channel⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow Marty Bent: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Newsletter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Podcast⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

this rip of tftc was brought to you by river it's the best place to buy bitcoin go to river.com tftc and enjoy this episode you've had a dynamic where money's become freer than free If you talk about a Fed just gone nuts, all the central banks going nuts. So it's all acting like safe haven. I believe that in a world where central bankers are tripping over themselves to devalue their currency, Bitcoin wins. In the world of fiat currencies, Bitcoin is the victor. I mean, that's part of the bull case for Bitcoin.

If you're not paying attention, you probably should be. And it looks like Logan pushed the button. We're live, George. Welcome to the show. all right thanks good to be here it's uh i'm a little jealous that you're in prague i've been seeing pictures of people parading around prague over the last week and it looks like it's a beautiful time of year there yeah it's it's lovely it's it's nice to you know be at another event and keep seeing familiar faces yeah excited for the next few days excited for the next few days in Prague and I'm excited to talk to you because I think what you're doing in Bulgaria with Botev Plavdiv is that how you pronounce it yes exactly so the oldest football club in

Bulgaria you were the director of Bitcoin within the club how did all this come to be yeah so a couple of years ago i i would say i i became like a bitcoin maxi thanks to to alan uh farrington and his uh and his uh only the strong survive piece and ever since then i've kind of been tinkering around you know how to get like a hundred percent involved in in bitcoin and uh last year i first started doing my educational project um bitcoin ready.me where i was just like blogging creating educational content meanwhile have been working on my um like publishing books here in bulgaria uh published the bitcoin standard price of tomorrow a little book about bitcoin and now we're translating also fiat standard and broken money

And last summer, it was like July or early August or something, I was put in touch with the owner of Botev Plovdiv, Anton Zingarevich, who bought the club three years ago in 2021 because he saw a huge opportunity in developing the club. At the time, the club was not performing very well on the field, business-wise. But still, he saw this big opportunity because, like you said, it's the oldest football club in Bulgaria. It has a very significant third-largest fan base in the country. It has had its quite glorious days. Actually, this season, we're celebrating 40 years since we played in Europe And we had a big win against Bayern Munich in the 80s in Plovdiv.

And there was a lot of kind of that was going on. Plovdiv is also a great city. You know, it's one of those cities that is not that well known, but very much appreciated. It was also, we just recently also got a completely new stadium created that is the most modern facility in the country. in in terms of soccer in terms of just like a sports uh sports stadium and uh and anton you know has been doing like this these two three years lots of improvements on the sort of like

the traditional side just like doing all kinds of best practices from you know developed uh football nations to improve the club on a business level to improve the club on the on on like the sports level football level just just leveling up the structure and organization of it all but he also got orange built by by some people around him and they they gave him this bug this idea of like hey you can you can do something with bitcoin bitcoin can be your um your strategy to um reach uh back this european uh level that the club used to play at four years ago or so uh by sure implement all these best practices but on top of it uh add this uh this bitcoin ingredient and and get people excited about what you're doing and uh and well what's even more interesting about this whole

thing is that not only you know there's this opportunity to level up the club and how it's doing but but because the club has already this very large footprint in uh in the country in the city for sure you know you can have this extremely positive impact uh on the people on the community around the club um as as you kind of you know bring you know especially if if you if you manage to successfully integrate bitcoin within the club educate people around the club and just like bring this this um conversation about bitcoin from a completely different angle you know from a sports entertainment angle as opposed to just like uh you know the topic of just money and finance which is which is kind of the standard way in which people go about it and so and so he was looking for a

person to to lead this effort right to project manage it and uh and that's how we got connected i was like like frankly i couldn't believe that that's even happening because plovdiv is my my home uh city i was born there i grew up there and uh past 10 years i've been living mostly in sofia which is the capital of bulgaria but still you know plovdiv is where my heart lies um and uh and i couldn't say no you know it's it's just been it's just been one of those things you know like as uh as steve jobs said it in this famous speech if he's like just like looking back at everything i did for the past 10 and years of my professional life and so on and so forth kind of like putting me in this position to to be able to to to give a serious try at um at um

integrating bitcoin and making something something big for for this club for for for my city and And, you know, hopefully for sports in general, I feel like. Yeah. It's so cool to see. Obviously, we were mentioning before, obviously, Peter McCormick and Bedford have done this with Real Bedford. With all this in mind, being approached and asked to handle the Bitcoin operations uh within the team i'm just really curious you're coming to it from an educational standpoint for

the fans in the community obviously there's a financial component for for the club itself like trying to put bitcoin on the treasury so that you can reap the benefits of bitcoin going up in value and then reinvest that in the club but how do you approach this as the director of bitcoin like what what are the first steps that you take what are some of the first things that you do to develop a plan and then begin implementing it where do you start right right well to be fair we started from from very from the very basics because when i joined uh started formally in like last um september um and we were like okay we're now integrating bitcoin the goal of it being like you say over the long-term

financial benefits over the medium term internet yeah to internationalize the brand of the club um and so the club at the time was and and you know it was very bulgarian focused right even our website was exclusively in bulgaria right so we couldn't really kind of make any serious announcement and people taking us seriously if we have everything in bulgaria so you know there's all these bitcoin things but there's all these kind of traditional know, um, improvements, um, that, that needed to be done. And that's still, to be fair, like a lot of the things we, we need to, to work on, to improve in order to, like I say, introduce lots of best practices from, uh,

from clubs in general. So, so we get back to this European level. So first thing for me was really just, uh, just like creating a new website. So started in September and the goal was we decided, okay, like we need to move fast. We set a deadline that by the end of October 31st, when it was the anniversary of the white paper that we have this life. So it was quite hectic. I had the pleasure of working with a Bitcoin designer who has experience designing other Bitcoin products. He created the design of the website. They then found dedicated guys who actually built up the website, coded and

everything um and in the meantime obviously uh just doing the very basics uh which for us were as first steps integrating payments so people can can actually come to the stadium paying bitcoin in the fan shops paying bitcoin online uh for for our our store and so on and so forth So setting this up with BTC Pay Server, with our local partner, CryptoDesk, and these were kind of all the very basics, like just set it all. And also kind of actually introduced the organization, right, like onboard organization into, you know, why are we doing this? why is this um something that makes sense which to be fair was challenging uh because um at the time when i joined specifically the club was not doing particularly well on the field like literally like the end of august beginning of september

um we just had a streak of lots of losses there was very bad sentiment overall um um you know within the club around the club which is also you know added this this sort of hesitancy so like are we ready to do this because at the end of the day we're a football club for us right and first and foremost what people care about and that's how it should be is results on the field right and if there are good results on the field then you can do generally business um business ventures um or or any kind of like other other ventures around the club but but but football first it comes first right so this was not going well but nevertheless i was like okay um and we move as quickly as possible and we kind of keep fingers crossed that things start improving so

that we're able to by by the end of october we're ready to to launch to make this announcement um And if, you know, if for whatever reason things really haven't been good and we decided that timing is super bad, okay, we can postpone it. But fortunately for us, actually right around the time when I joined, we also got a new sports director, a guy that has quite a lot of experience with Borussia Dortmund. We got a new coach leading the team, both of whom actually played a very, very key role, and also a few other experienced players joined the club as leaders, so to say, especially our captain, who is very experienced. He's like 36 years old or something.

Many people disregarded him, but he, together with, again, the coach, sports director, and, of course, all the players in the team, managed to really level up the the squad uh to get the team back back on track to start winning and to put us in the position that you know October 31st we did launch we did announce um and uh and and from then on it's it's been lots of fun you know like several weeks after that we got uh Joe Nakamoto visiting to create like a small documentary about the things we've been working on. And, and, and, and it's been, you know, it's like you say, what is the plan to what is the strategy? How do

we define it? It's like a startup, to be fair, you know, like, we, we kind of have a direction we're going, we know we want to internationalize the crop. But we didn't have all the all the things at the start, right. And even today, I mean, today, we have a way, way clearer perspective, right, where we are where we're going but but lots of the things were kind of being defined as we go if i can put it that way this episode was presented by river river is the best most secure place to buy bitcoin in the united states go to river.com tftc set up an account today you'll be

able to dca into bitcoin without paying any fees you'll be able to give people bitcoin via river links you'll be able to send and receive bitcoin over the lightning network and you'll be able to to set limit orders. If you want to buy Bitcoin at a particular price below or above where it is now, you can set orders to buy Bitcoin when it hits that price. Go to river.com slash TFTC and set up your account today. This rep was also brought to you by our good friends at Unchained. Unchained is building a financial services platform for a Bitcoin standard. They have over 7,000 clients that are securing over 90,000 Bitcoin with 12,000 keys on their platform. their platform leverages bitcoin's native multi-sig properties their cornerstone product

is their vault product a two or three multi-sig vault which allows you to hold two of three keys in a multi-sig quorum that gives you full control over your bitcoin they also have an ira product a lending desk and they're rolling out a bunch of other products including inheritance protocol and sound advisory so go to unchained.com set up a call with our concierge onboarding team today Tell them that TFTC sent you and use the promo code TFTC at checkout, unchained.com. That's extremely exciting. It's a bit, I don't want to say odd, but it's funny how, like you mentioned, people typically talk about Bitcoin in the context of personal finance and growing your wealth. But when you begin to think about implementing it into a business, especially something like a soccer club, it's somewhat invigorating.

It's an intellectual exercise that I imagine is invigorating and extremely rewarding because it's such a unique angle in the sense that it's like, all right we got this bitcoin thing and like communicating it not only to the players the coaches the team but then the fans i can imagine people like why are you implementing bitcoin and it's yeah yeah no exactly and and that's true until even until today to a large extent uh still although it's changing and and and i you know i think it will change quite drastically with what we have planned and and the positive momentum that we've uh created on the field um in that um Yeah, you know, like I said, we started from the basic payments. And that's kind of what most people imagine when they're like,

oh, you've adopted Bitcoin, so do you just accept payments? And like, yeah, sure. I mean, that's the start. That's kind of the basics. But then, like you said, once you start thinking about it, especially when you have this organization, this really community of people around this cause, around this idea of a football club.

In our case, like a very, you know, not just any football club, but in our case, the oldest football club happened to be also in the oldest continuously inhabited city in the whole of Europe, a club that our patron, again, quite coincidentally and symbolically, the club Botev was named after Hristo Botev, who is uh easily you know the most renowned um historical figure in bulgaria as about 150 years ago he he was a revolutionary who fought for bulgaria's bulgarian's freedom from the ottoman

empire at the time and uh and not just bulgarian's freedom but he was like you know he was a true freedom freedom lover like because uh outside of just revolutionary uh he was also a poet so he has many many poets and um and he has these quotes uh every every now and then that are you know obviously much of it is about you know getting bulgarians free but but but some of those are so kind of like in in harmony with with bitcoin's philosophy you know uh i guess for example one of this thing was like um only one who is who is free can can truly be called human um he has this other quote that um you know well i can't remember the top of my head but it was something like um the the fight for freedom that the struggle for freedom requires many minds and

brains um many many hands and brains many many people involved right um which which you know that and and people are very connected to this mission here right you know like like the fans the community that they're very connected to to the figure of to this historical figure of christopher and now you know we commemorate uh his birth we commemorate uh the date on which he was shot uh we we like to say you know there's this saying that uh he never truly died um because people who fight for freedom they don't die they they continue to live um and and he definitely continues to live in in the memory of our fans in in spirit of our club and then and again like um so so in our case you know this is just one example how i see as to how

you know we can over time and we're starting to slowly incorporate bitcoin in this in this identity really of the club because there is this natural match between what what this uh pattern of ours stands for and what you know 150 years ago a bitcoin essentially stands for right it's again this this new um this new frontier uh for for for humanity uh to to regain their freedom So this is one thing, you know, identity-wise, but there's, like you say, so many ways in which you can integrate Bitcoin. So, you know, obviously kind of like payments is kind of the basics. Then what we've done is obviously started to integrate in terms of branding here and there. We've got like the Bitcoin logo on our official jerseys on the kids.

uh we we have um we've been starting to do education here and there by having bitcoin books added to the fan shops by starting to do regular meetups where we we invite you know bitcoiners in general a couple of times to also have this these very excited football fans like like butter fans who are who are also bitcoiners so we're trying to create this match um uh we We partnered with Jantree, too. They've been a great partner of us now for like five, six months or so. And we got their Aqua wallet, which is a non-custodial on-chain lightning and liquid wallet that supports Bitcoin and USDT. We got it to be tailored to both.

So basically, the phone has the regular light mode, dark mode. and then we added a body of mode which kind of turns the phone into uh the iconic uh yellow black hours of the club as well as you know you have the the club's um the club's um well the stadium shows when you open the app and of course we introduce bulgarian language so it's so it's easily accessible to um to fans and in general to the to the bulgarian audience um and and multiple kind of other to such you know such small things here and there and and but but frankly i think the most exciting is is still ahead because like you said there's there's so much you can think of it's just that in our case and i'll say the case for almost any large club that he does it

um it's you have to there needs to be a right timing and the right pace in which you you kind integrate and do things with bitcoin so it's it's well accepted and understood and and and you don't like create let's say um friction too much friction with uh kind of the existing culture the existing understanding the existing community right because there's these people you know who are extremely passionate about the club in many different ways so you want to onboard them but but like you know you know with with orange spilling anyone you know it takes time and and if you go to to kind of hard on people or too too abruptly it can also have counter effects yeah with that in mind how was the reception from the fan base been to the strategy overall

so it's been it's been actually significantly better than i expected at some point because like some people are like yeah people are gonna be like what the fuck is this people could be also negative uh i was frankly a bit concerned or quite concerned especially before we announced it like last week or so how it would be perceived or or i expected some negativity let's go this way i expected some negativity but but on the positive side um especially when we announced it there was zero negativity whatsoever like like there were zero negative comments on social media and and and either no comments no interest or or or positive comments because there's been a small group obviously like uh bitcoiners in the country were immediately very excited about this there was

a small group of um um of uh you know uh real hardcore fans i would say like five six seven people that i connected to that that also were bitcoiners right either mining or or using or huddling in in one way or another and just like being very very actively following bitcoin so they were excited and positive and you know we have this group with them where we're brainstorming uh and kind of bouncing ideas uh what and how to do and and how to kind of grow you know uh this this virus so to say right within the community but the vast majority of people didn't really didn't really have any opinion whatsoever they they didn't care they they didn't understand and and even until today i would say in vast majority of people still still don't get it still don't

completely understand what is what is the relation um but but kind of you know as we like to say and as we created these these jerseys the best is yet to come um one one go at a time so um so so we've been very fortunate to be fair we've been very fortunate to have uh mostly positive wins behind us with the club going better with the price of bitcoin going going positive also obviously obviously helps i had many people you know when i first joined i i did this onboarding session um to the club administration and people were like like the most people were just like what the hell does this have to clue uh with to do with the club at all um they were let's say you just didn't see the connection and weren't particularly curious about it

and fast forward you know several months later because at the time the price was just think about 28, 29,000 or something. Um, and fast forward, you know, price goes to 40, 50, uh, and, and then, you know, basically all time high people just like look at you a bit more seriously, you know, or some get more curious. Some even ask me, Hey, how do I buy, you know? Um, so, so, so that has definitely helped, you know, kind of the, the environment internally in the club in terms of, we're starting to win on the field

and we'll win significantly with us eventually winning the cup this season and then also kind of the external factors of just coincident, having the timing when the price also goes up And number

go up solves a lot of things Timing Yeah, it's kind of also like what got me into So number go up is like what gives me energy to do kind of Bitcoin related things. Like even back in the day, my first Bitcoin, let's say, endeavor was contacting Seyfedin to publish his book in Bulgaria. And I was like, I mean, it's going to take some investment of mine.

And at the time it was a meaningful investment of money. But I'm like, I understand this number is going to go up. and this is essentially the marketing of the book so it it will pay off right so so so it's a good investment and kind of the same i i look at it here in the club right eventually earlier or later the market will be with us so we just have to do the hard work so we're there the number go up just reinforces the work we've done yeah and that's a very important point um historically because of the price volatility people just stay on the sidelines like oh wait until it stabilizes but um once you understand it's like yeah it's probably not going to stabilize

uh anytime soon we'll probably got like another decade or two maybe um but with that in mind it's like all right then you have to internalize like time in the market is much better than timing the market so you just got to start and get after it at some point quick break here freaks this rip is brought to you by gradually then suddenly a framework for understanding bitcoin is money by Parker Lewis. I wrote the foreword to the book. I'm honored to have done so because it's the best zero to one primer

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ZapRite.com slash TFTC, $40 off. And Botev will be in the European Cup finals due to the fact that they have the hardest money in the world. Yeah, well, no, that's actually quite hard, you know, as I started to understand. You know, the football business is complicated, like in sports business in general, on a big level. It's hard. but it takes a lot of, it's not like a, just like a startup because, okay, you have your product there. Here you have many people involved, right? Like personal things, people things, you have the coach, you have the director, you have the pure sports side, then you have

the business side, which is there to reinforce the sports side. And, and, and it's also, You have also the sourcing players, developing players, you have this balance because like the football business is a lot about as you grow the club, there's this factor where you have to sell players, you have to buy new because a large part of the business revenues of a football club are just like selling players, right? But you also have to do this in the right pace or in the right way. you don't sell to too many of your good players so at the same time you keep attracting um uprising stars for people with potential when you develop them so that you at the same time prove the

financial situation of the club as you improve the squad right um and and and so there's there's so many so many things that get it get in in in the success of a of a club and especially over over over the years it's a lot of work it's a lot of hard work it's a lot of consistent work from the players from the people who manage the players um like it's a lot of sports work it's a lot of like psychology um and then and then the business side is obviously kind of the traditional hard work that anyone has to uh put and the processes and structures that have to be in place there um to to have a you know like a good business with good products that that clients fans are are happy with satisfied with that so it's good and they you know purchase products and

services on the club they they um they get others involved and and so on and so forth so it's it's a long game you know and um in our case i as i see it you know we could very well so frankly like my my belief is uh and as we discussed you know with with other key stakeholders in the club like with this bitcoin strategy we can make within let's say a year the club um to be largely uh recognized as as the professional uh you know bitcoin club globally within three to four years uh if you know if we execute well and if we continue developing the team and if we stay true to through this bitcoin strategy you know within three to four years hopefully we can become like a significant like a serious and well-known player on the

on a European level, you know, starting from this year, hopefully after winning the cup, we are now next month entering, um, the Europa league games, which is kind of the second biggest lead in, in Europe, uh, after the champions league, obviously wherever the top top teams play. And then, you know, with lots of, again, hard work consistency and you know, bitcoin is as kind of this supercharger on the back end i think it is possible you know eight to nine ten years down the line uh to really become one of those to play against the biggest teams um in europe like like we did you know four years ago again against bayern munich it's just it just takes a lot of time and but but i think it's totally worth it because this this can be

an amazing story this can make a huge difference and you know to be fair the more the more i learn about the sports industry the more i see what others are doing and obviously understanding bitcoin i think it's kind of inevitable for other clubs and established clubs to basically do a lot of what we are doing or at least obviously to adopt bitcoin as a uh, some sort of a treasury as an asset. Um, but yeah, we just have this disadvantage, um, kind of similar to, to, uh, El Salvador in a way in that we were a serious club of Salvador is the real

country. Right. But, but, you know, we're both underdogs. Right. Um, and so if we, if we see where things are going as we do, And if we adopt them earlier and we kind of, yeah, combine this with hard work, we can catch up, hopefully even outpace the leaders who are today sleeping in their comfort zone, you know, just because, okay, you're a successful country or you're the successful club and you don't have to think much outside of the box or do you think just the world is going to be the way it's going to be?

Which is not. No, it's changing rather quickly. And in terms of that, like utilizing Bitcoin to help leapfrog the club back to the success it had many decades ago from a corporate finance perspective, like actually using Bitcoin, what does that look like? Is it taking ticket sales and merch revenue, rolling a portion of that into Bitcoin to sit on the treasury? Once the Bitcoin's on the treasury, do you utilize it in any particular way? Are you going to sell Bitcoin in the future to get cash to pay for players or new amenities or simply use Bitcoin as collateral in loans or simply as a treasury asset to build the value of the club over time?

Right. So in our case, the way it goes is the following. So when, you know, the owner bought the club, the president of the club bought the club three years ago, the club was at a loss, right? Um, and, and, and the club is still generating a loss, but it's, it has been improving a lot over, over the past, uh, three years. Right. Um, so we've been improving on the field. We've been improving on the, on the business side. Um, but still, you know, we, we are not, we're not breakeven as, as an organization as, um, as unfortunately is the case with, with many, with many other sports clubs and particular football clubs. And so the strategies, is you know for us to get to break even as quickly as possible and then you know to grow the profit that involves again best practices improving getting more people uh on the on the stadium

before getting just like introducing many many things that are standard let's say in western europe and then the us i guess in sports here we're like not standard at all just like engaging more people getting the stadium to be full because we've got like this this amazing facility 18 600 people uh which however for various reasons um like last season we literally got the stadium full full twice on two games right i think with the success next year is going to be next year i i think hope we can uh i'm pretty confident we can do it like at least six seven games or more and increase you know consistently the the average attendance until like hopefully at next season or so we can we can start getting all games filled but anyways uh coming coming back to

to kind of the strategies when it comes to bitcoin so um the strategy at this point is because we're still not like we don't have a strong balance sheet as uh as some other clubs um the strategy is really to you know grow our brand to grow our revenues and at the same time to to sell a part of the business, to sell part of the shares of the business to external parties, to investors, to the fan base, who can then get a stake, who can become co-owners of the club. And with those proceeds that we'll generate, on the large part, we'll build a capital base in terms of Bitcoin and a smaller part we'll use to level up the squat.

And specifically within one year, we hope we aim to get to this break-even level where the club can sustain itself, where the club can continue growing its profitable position. And at the same time, we can keep this Bitcoin as a key treasury asset, as a buffer. And as you have Bitcoin on the balance sheet, and as you know the trajectory that Bitcoin is going, over time, this can also enable you, and in our case, part of the strategy is to, well, find the right moment to leverage some of that Bitcoin, potentially. be true bonds. It can be true kind of strategy that Michael Saylor has pioneered, right? And many others are following. We plan to do on a football level. So that's kind of

the corporate, let's say, overview strategy of kind of where we're going. Yeah. Which really highlights that it's a long game. It's like taking care of the basics, getting to break even and rolling profits in and reinvigorating the fan base, getting them in the stadium. How many seats does the stadium hold? 18,600. Nice. Yeah, so it's reinvigorating the fans,

but it's also growing the fan base internationally. From next season, we aim to start broadcasting our games internationally. I mean, the European games are going to be broadcast, but also home games, we're working to get them broadcasted so other people can watch. We're also like, one of the key things is because we're located in Europe. Traveling in Europe is kind of easy. The city is actually worth visiting for many, many reasons.

You know, just as a tourist, it's quite loved for digital nomads because it's quite affordable. So we want to position it as a place where you come over a weekend or you come over several weeks or a month, watch a game, do other things around the city. So that's also part of the strategy of growing revenues. And also by internationalizing the brand, there's so much more in terms of sponsors, in terms of digital products that we can sell to. So, yeah.

Yeah, I was looking at pictures of the city on Google Maps before we hopped on here. It's a beautiful city. A lot of stone buildings, stone walkways, a lot of fountains. Yeah, I know. Especially downtown is amazing. Lots of pedestrian areas. Everything is close by.

um lots of cultural life too um so there's like the roman uh lots of roman entration uh remnants so it's it's really like i i have this one second i wrote it down um we we got we got quite some bitcoiners actually coming here we have like a couple of international bitcoin conferences and I had Knut Svanholm you probably know him he's the author of Infinity Divided by 21 Million like he said

this is the best city I have been to that I never heard of before I went there and I feel like that's that's how a lot of people feel about it which is yeah

I'm looking at pictures now it looks like you guys have a beautiful empathy theater in the city as well that's why i need to travel more i stay i stay put in the u in the u.s quite uh quite often um i'll be in latvia be up in the baltics later this year but i've never been in the balkans um for the honey badger or for the honey badger yeah okay so so i might meet there yeah um and that being said just more generally in bulgaria being just north of turkey like are bulgarians awake to the value prop of bitcoin uh to be honest i'm a bit ignorant of the state of the bulgarian economy itself but obviously turkey is your southern neighbor

they've had hyperinflationary events are people paying attention to that at all kind of i mean they go to buy cheap stuff there yeah they like that i don't think they think too much about it but but we've had our hyperinflationary episode too like not too far away like 25 years ago we got like like brutal hyperinflation in 97 um and um yeah people lost almost everything which is why there's there's a quite good community here of early bitcoiners or you know even even people who get it now because they either remember or they've been told or they're general a little more skeptical let's say about you know the state uh so there is that but and then there's a lot of happening actually to be fair i'm quite happy with what's happening you

know we just had like last week at the conference organized here by by the biggest local youtuber uh we have over the last year we have two two events for bitcoin merchants um we have meetups in in three four of the largest cities every month um there is there is also yeah content creators several several youtubers that are that are quite active and have easily oriented orange built like i mean probably 20 30 000 if not more uh people um there's um there's also like a decent amount of uh companies you know if you look at the wider crypto space that that have been um that have been built here so so so it's it's quite good it's quite good i'm relatively to be fair very happy especially when i hear around the other countries you know in the balkans i

don't think there's any other country that's have that so much stuff is happening and at the same time however all of it is is still like very grassroots right which which is good and bad i mean it's bad because okay it could be better but but i think it's actually better um because it's it's like stronger foundations for for it to mature and and my hope like quite frankly is also that with what we do now we bring bitcoin into the conversation from a very again non-monetary directly perspective non-financial just like hey we're a football club and you know we embrace bitcoin in so many ways um especially with with what now is happening and after you know i i just came out of el salvador man it's like the future there seriously

in so many ways and and and i i want to create this connection uh between el salvador this future and and us the football club here and as we you know as we show this as we show why it makes sense and and what what it it it you know it will do for the club and it it will start doing for the club very soon um that that other people more and more grassroots adoption happens here until it hopefully becomes like a topic that that many people care about and want to discuss because i've like really came to this point like where i don't think it it like obviously it makes sense to argue to you know to um debate to explain to people to educate but the end of the day you know as as a doer as an entrepreneur just like go and do stuff and and and then prove to people

you know that that what you're doing makes sense with with your work with the results with the direction you're going and with time others will see it that that's kind of what what i i'm focused on and what what my team and and i think for a lot of bitcoiners it's just like okay Don't just complain. Don't just argue and stuff. Go do things. And then we time these are going to get noticed. In our case, because we're really just like this public institution that tens of thousands of people look at, I think it's really an amazing opportunity to drive this conversation. No, and it's funny hearing you describe all this because number one i agree like roll up your sleeves go do stuff but then

bringing back to like el salvador it's so funny to think that the country in the balkans in a country in central america or a football club in the from the balkans like i'm gonna i want to go down to el salvador and and set up shop here so you guys officially incorporated part of the business at least el salvador as well what was the reasoning behind that yeah well so um so like said a key part of the corporate strategy is now to decentralize the club ownership to enable our fans to enable bitcoiners to enable anyone really in the world to be part of this right because we realize that for the success of this we want to get people involved we want to get people to have skin in the game uh because that's when they care that's when they talk that's when they

become ambassadors that's why they can also help in small and big ways right um and so um you know we we looked at how we could do this and how we could do this scalably how we could do this internationally and really the well there's different ways but i would say like not the only way has been the el salvador part but el salvador has been the clear part for us in which we utilize uh to to decentralize the club ownership to to get the opportunity for anyone to become involved of uh to become part of this of this journey is because first of all salvador has um um has bitcoin as legal tender right it's money um it's a currency there's no capital gains taxes on it as it should be right um and then they just introduced last year uh a

new digital asset regulatory framework that is crystal clear right that that is there that is okay it's still early but but but they've done this right they've set the rules according to which you can raise capital whether for that for equity um and also they have created uh incentives for companies um to to incorporate there and to issue their um well digital securities there by essentially removing all taxes so if you are if you're a salvadorian business so you could in theory like we could in theory use our bulgarian entity to raise capital um in in salvador however if we use a salvadorian entity um and we raise capital again through any sort of security instrument like that or equity

uh you become a digital asset issuer locally there and you get exempt from uh any taxes right um and so it's economically it's a no-brainer for for you to think about okay like why don't we just move the economics obviously you know we're real business real people uh based physically you know in in a in bulgaria in a balkan country uh but then economically currently with this strategy that we have uh and with the approach that el salvador has is legal tender clear regulatory framework and then obviously there's the bitcoin brand of the country too right uh which which is big right and which which is also like people there are super open to be to be helping you you know um in realizing your vision then it's just like a no-brainer for us to yeah to make

it like a focal point a central point of our of our economic activity at least for the foreseeable future um and that's why i say it's they literally live in the future man bitcoin is money there and super normal and and i'm impressed seriously i i like one of the you know simple but still kind of crazy things in in the traditional uh all parts of the world i met this this law firm there i think the guy is like yeah we just hold bitcoin on our treasury it's like our main treasury assets um and when we need us dollars or when we need to pay somebody i just convert some bitcoin to usb and that's about it and i'm like aren't you worried about volatility he's like no that's just part of it you know bitcoin is is the hardest money so so we hold bitcoin you know it's that

level of how much ahead there are because like you know in in europe or probably in the states It's like, this is so, this is so not traditional, not accepted. You know, most people would think of you like you're, you're totally crazy. And there it's, it's becoming like, I wouldn't say it's like it's complete normality, but, but you have this, you have the setup, right? You have the, the, the landscape that is there. And then it's up to every individual business, to every individual person to grow up and to realize it and to make it kind of part of their strategy.

But then also, as they have set up this framework, it also becomes attractive for, you know, us being anywhere else in the world. And curiously, like at this point, you know, it seems like we're the first to be doing this because everything is quite new, right? This digital securities law, I'm not sure exactly when it was introduced, but it was sometimes later last year. So it's relatively new, and we seem to be the first to be doing this type of structure of like creating a holding entity there, specifically for the Bitcoin strategy. But I definitely think others will follow in these footsteps because, again, it just makes economic sense. if you're looking to raise capital and if bitcoin is kind of significant part of your strategy you know like i mean there's no taxes there right and bitcoin is money whatever where else would you go yeah and just the anecdote you shared of the lawyer is like yeah we hold bitcoin

on our treasury i think it highlights and i think people really underestimate the the power of just a country particularly its government putting support behind bitcoin i mean that was i mean you even mentioned before we hit record that you were a bit skeptical that that it would be as good as it is down there and you had to see it for yourself to really recognize that and i mean it's been four five or four short years since el salvador came out and said hey we're we're going to make bitcoin legal tender and they begin um when they begin positioning that way i think the law officially went into effect in 2021 but i mean in three short years since the law went into effect you already have lawyers who you would not have expected to be holding bitcoin on their

treasury holding bitcoin on their treasury and understanding why and doing it in a way that makes sense where it's like all right when we need cash we'll we'll sell some bitcoin but we're going to try and hold most of it for the long term and i think many people underestimate the power of just support from the government and what that does to give people peace of mind to to actually learn more about it adopt it and incorporate it into their businesses which is insane to think about if that were to be getting to be applied across the world in many different countries like how quickly could all this happen yeah well in in their case like to me what is and again i have this very interesting

parallel kind of between between what we do and what else our work has done because like you know like there's this lawyer and there are these people that that are advanced but let's be frank you know the vast majority of else out there it's still not like adopted bitcoin like most people still just work with dollars right um but because they're not there like you cannot force people to bitcoin right um like it's just it's it's a free market right for money it's essentially a free market especially like okay people were concerned with with bitcoin being legal tender but practically like like being forcibly becoming a legal tender but practically it's just whoever wants in in el salvador uses it and everybody else is just using for us dollars right uh but

the important part is in in what i see in in president bukele's strategy is that you know he understands what are the short-term needs of the of the local people and he understands um how to address this and at the same time he's thinking longer term as to how to set the rails for uh you know the more visionary people for the more entrepreneurial for the more productive both within el salvador but also internationally to go there and to build stuff there so that over the medium and long term they can start reaping the benefits that you know the vast majority of people are not thinking about or are not realizing early on so in the case of bukele uh he you know the biggest problem and the reason why people love him so much is because he solved crime and it's

absolutely astounding when you talk to any all types of people there from you know taxi driver to people in the hotel to um like like literally everybody there is things is a miracle you know for entrepreneurs also salvadorians who have come from u.s moved back to to the country to work there because three four years ago they were like you couldn't walk on the street because of the gangs because of of the extreme level of um danger that was there and and fast forward three four years that's solved and that's why people love him not because of his bitcoin thing they love him because of that but he realizes this is important right and so that's why he focused on this in the meantime he's working on bitcoin and some law firms are adopting it and we're going

there you know other entrepreneurs and and and proactive productive people are moving there so that you know this next level of leveling up the the country can can happen and it's kind of interesting because it's as i as i hear and see what's happening there it's kind of similar i like the thing as to what is happening within our club because you know within our club what what most people care about is winning on the field right that's the most important and so you know our our president has worked a lot to attract the right people to build the right team so we start working on the field and so this year you know we won the cup okay we started adopting bitcoin we started doing things with Bitcoin, we've done a lot to

kind of set the groundwork. So that although people don't see it, you know, in our eyes in our strategy, Bitcoin can play a huge role in really leveling up the club like next year, the year after three, four, and many more years down the line. So I think that there's still this opportunity for all kinds of businesses and countries and in general to be like, like, you to be cognizant what are the short-term pains and most what people care mostly about um address those but in the meantime have your bitcoin strategy because that's kind of the medium to

long-term um yeah like tool that that can really supercharge all the other good things that that you're doing and again bring the bitcoin standard and time preference back into it when you have have the idea and the implementation of Bitcoin on your balance sheet as a treasury asset that anchors your long-term vision, it's like, okay, if we have Bitcoin on this balance sheet, we can expect in four years, that'll be worth a lot more and we'll be able to do a lot more with the value that has built up in our Bitcoin treasury. But in the meantime, there's obviously time between now and then. we got to work hard to make sure that it's worthwhile to to spend that bitcoin in the

future so we have to get everything right you have to get the club yeah winning games get it back to breaking profitable get more bitcoin and so it is crazy how something as simple as having bitcoin on your treasury as this long-term planning anchor that allows you to really focus on shorter term medium term goals that that will increase the value of the club and the quality of the club it's just really interesting socially psychologically how um having hard money just really reorients how you approach things yeah right no but that's also kind of frankly that's the thing i most dislike about fiat and dislike is like a soft word And it's just how many people are focused on the today and the now.

And I see this even across the club, right, to be fair, even today, because it's, you know, other people and stuff, which is normal, right? I get it. It's just, unfortunately, it's how the whole society works. It's all about today. It's about the very next day. You know, it's not about thinking long term. It's kind of the reason also why all of these large other football clubs

or clubs in general um they're not really thought of bitcoin right because you have to understand you have to see it in order to put in the work because we haven't weaved up many financial benefits uh you know so far right um but um but other clubs you know go for the easy thing they go for oh let's issue a fan token and let's sell it to our fans which okay you're making some short-term revenues but in the grand scheme of things um it's it's just a waste of time and energy because okay you've milked literally some revenue from your loyal fan base one time there's not going to be like a second time um they have lost some money essentially because fan often tokens like 50 60 80 80 clubs or so have issued fan tokens and not just fan tokens there's all

these other type of examples in our industry of just short-term thinking because again like when you're in this field world you're constantly thinking of how to maximize revenue system as quickly as possible as short-term as possible and then this just just breaks breaks incentives breaks the possibility to yeah for you to have a vision to build to to tell you how what can we do you know to really level up this club over three four five years um and uh and it's it's true across society across literally everything right yeah yeah i mean i've seen it personally in my own life in the businesses that i run now that you're talking about el salvador i'm like god should i go set up a holding company in el salvador

the uh tax benefits down there but with all this in mind too like uh let's talk about the players a bit right obviously the players most important part of the club they are what can actually get the club winning and back on track to begin climbing the ranks within the clubs in europe um and they also trend younger younger individuals who yeah many would assume are more receptive or understanding of bitcoin due to the fact that they grew up in the digital age are any of them hardcore bitcoiners anybody getting or asking to get paid in bitcoin um do they understand it i wouldn't say we're there yet uh but i again because like i said earlier for us a lot of the things that we do is about timing and when we do it right uh so that the time for this can

has come literally so quite quite next week as as we're speaking i have um you know uh i have uh quite some meetings scheduled with with individual players with some key staff there uh to start getting uh people on board so we will uh we've already uh shared that we will be making educational sessions to players i'll be doing such but frankly like you know to people who are listening if there's people who are excited about it they people want to visit uh bulgaria if they want to like also like come talk to to our players and sports team um absolutely you know you are you're welcome to come and and we'll facilitate this because we see this getting the players on board um now is kind of the right time for us to do it because again like

season is very very heavy very complicated now we're like off season they've just started their training um training like pre-training sessions right they they have their training camp so so now it's kind of the right time with we have identified for for me to next next week and to like really really really focus individually as well as a group on many of these these key key stakeholders because as they again inevitably i think i don't expect all the players to get it from from the get-go uh but um but i i have you know i've already had talks you know with with with quite some so we're getting there again it's a process not pushy but but as we get there inevitably because again number go up technology always helps uh build our case and that's been

the case that will likely be the case you know in the coming weeks and months um as we as we get them on board this is where the really interesting and impactful work starts uh of of uh or follows of everything we've been doing because this is what the fans look up to right this is what other players also look up to and so for us it is very important because players they're like you know i mean you can call them influence influencers in a way right people people look at them they're their role models their leaders to to people within within our community but i would like to i would like to think that uh because of our position because of the branding because of the approach and the narrative of everything we've been building um these players are going

to have significantly more reach not just out within our community but also outside um as um as as they start uh you know doing bitcoin related things and then you know what they do it reaches the fans what they do reaches other players and i think it's just a question of time before other clubs and players start doing the same which for me is also the exciting part as to how we accelerate kind of this this adoption of bitcoin from a non purely financial angle or or or still financial but like like like the origin is is this this entertainment is this sports level so um so so if anyone listening is um passionate about sports is passionate about yeah helping um athletes realize you know what bitcoin could do for uh for their careers for their lives because a

lot of these guys right they they could make quite some money in their prime age some of them you know are able then to convert into into other roles within the sport after their professional careers but but many don't right uh many don'ts and uh and we want to um outside of just being successful as a club and i think we can become even more successful if we if we bring this culture uh and this understanding as to uh what bitcoin can do for for for these athletes individually so please please don't hesitate to to reach out uh come visit for a game come visit the city which as we said is worthwhile and um and if you have you know some something to something good to say if you have particular you know experience in in this field uh we

would love to facilitate um such such type of um conversations looks like i got to make a a pilgrimage to bulgaria still have to go to bulgaria and el salvador two places i have not been yet oh but i mean we've there was a big conversation here in the states obviously with russell lacoon soquan barkley a couple others in the nfl making big announcements um in 2020 2021 that they were going to accept part of their pay in bitcoin and hold that um but you think for these athletes are young they have relatively short careers if you're comparing it to somebody who goes to college gets a degree and gets into a corporate gig um they're typically going to be at the same place or within the same industry doing the same thing for for many decades and

these athletes have a short period of time in which their bodies are capable of performing at the level necessary to compete at the professional level and they're literally putting their bodies on the line. And that was something that really stuck with me, particularly from Russell Okun when he was describing how beat up his body got in the NFL. And you're literally putting your body on the line and getting paid in fiat that's debasing and somewhat disrespecting the sacrifices you made, the physical sacrifices you made. And to think like pairing this hard money with the the stress that that athletes put on their bodies to do what they do it just makes a lot of sense intuitively if you're going to go through all that um training playing um getting

nicked up you might might as well be saving and extracting the most value from that time spent putting your body on the line yeah exactly make this worthwhile make it worthwhile i want to make sure that your week in in prague is is worthwhile so i don't want to hold you up i know it's a probably happy hour there right now people congregating for drinks around the conference um but george has been an incredible conversation i'm really excited for what you're doing at botev and um i'll be following along and i i'm sure um there will be games played here in the states once you start streaming internationally. There'll be meetups at PubKey to watch ProTip.

Maybe we'll have to get something started down in Austin too and make sure that we're watching it in the commons when the games are on this fall. For sure. I would love to do that and see that happening. Yeah. All right, George. Where can anybody find out about you,

what you guys are doing at ProTip? How can they help? Sure. So I think the go-to place, when is this coming out? This will be out Friday. Friday, okay. Yeah, the go-to place by then should be, I would like to say, botev.sv.

We're creating it as we speak and it should be live. This is going to be the homepage of our, well, specifically the El Salvador entity, right? And specifically for this type of audience, this will be the easiest way. from there you can find links to our twitter our noster we've also adopted noster and it's been pretty exciting as the first sports club being being there playing with it um and looking to do more things with it so bodev.sv is is the place um this is also where uh where you can see a lot

of the highlights of the big things that we have happening this is where you can keep in touch with the really really exciting time stuff that is coming up this is where um you know if you're interested like i mentioned to to become part of this journey as a corner if you are uh looking to get exposure to our audience as a as a sponsor as a partner um go to pot of sv and uh we look forward to doing great things together awesome and i look forward to watching you guys do great things and and watching botaf play later this fall and maybe this summer in the year maybe i'll maybe i'll hop on the europa league start watching games this summer um george tell everybody in praga so what's up enjoy your time go enjoy some uh some incredible beers i will for sure

all right peace and love freaks thank you Thank you.