The Wolf Of All Streets - Preparing for Mainstream Adoption: Andrew Elliott, CEO of RoundlyX

Episode Date: August 6, 2020

Andrew Elliott, CEO of RoundlyX, has changed the way that people buy Bitcoin. His unlikely introduction to Bitcoin began in between military intelligence patrols in Iraq and Afghanistan. As he witnessed a failing, poverty-stricken government, he realized that crypto could help bank the unbanked. His passion for the crypto space led to the founding of RoundlyX, the simplest and most accessible app to invest in crypto. Andrew Elliott and Scott Melker further discuss military intelligence and high-value targets, Iraq’s high-speed internet via satellite, fly-ridden meat and SIM cards for sale, the simplest tool for mainstream adoption, a digital cold war, Bitcoin only being the size of Comcast, poverty at the root of all issues, Peter Schiff’s emotional hatred toward Bitcoin, kids being inherently inflationary, a honeybee business, and so much more. --- CHOICE IRA by KINGDOM TRUST Don’t be part of the 7.1M Bitcoiners who have bitcoin and a retirement account but don’t have bitcoin in their retirement account. With Choice IRA by Kingdom Trust you can hold bitcoin in your retirement account. The first 1,000 users to open a Choice IRA will receive $62.50 in free BTC - visit RetireWithChoice.com/WOLF to join the waitlist and secure free BTC. --- VOYAGER This episode is brought to you by Voyager, your new favorite crypto broker. Trade crypto fast and commission-free the easy way. Earn up to 6% interest on top coins with no lockups and no limits. Download the Voyager app and use code “SCOTT25” to get $25 in free Bitcoin when you create your account --- If you enjoyed this conversation, share it with your colleagues & friends, rate, review, and subscribe.This podcast is presented by BlockWorks Group. For exclusive content and events that provide insights into the crypto and blockchain space, visit them at: https://www.blockworksgroup.io

Today's episode is brought to you by Choice, by Kingdom Trust, and Voyager. We'll learn more about them later on in the episode. What is up, everybody? I'm Scott Melker, and this is the Wolf of All Streets podcast, where two times a week we talk to your favorite personalities in Bitcoin, crypto, finance, politics, art, music, and basically anyone with an interesting story to tell. This show is powered by Blockworks Group, a media company that has over 20 podcasts in their network. You can check them out at blockworksgroup.io. Now, if you like the podcast, you follow me on Twitter, then you absolutely need to check out my new website at thewolfofallstreets.io. And you can also subscribe

to my newsletter there, which is a great resource. I think you guys will really, really like it. So now that's all out of the way, let's get to the important part, which is a great resource. I think you guys will really, really like it. So now that's all out of the way, let's get to the important part, which is today's guest. He is a Georgetown MBA, former Marine Intelligence Officer, and most importantly, certainly to me, the founder and CEO of Round the X, who I'm proud to say are one of the sponsors of this podcast. Now, I was using Round the X long before they were a sponsor. I was a very happy customer and we'll get into why when we speak a little bit more. But I'm really interested in hearing Andrew's background, why he founded the company and why he's so passionate about dollar cost averaging into Bitcoin. So welcome, Andrew, and thank you for being here.

Thanks for having me. So I touched on before that you were in the Marines and that you were stationed both in Iraq and Afghanistan. Can you talk about a little bit about why you chose to go into the military, that experience and how it sort of puts you on your path to where you are now? Yeah, I am. So it was it was, you know, that era of our history. I was in high school, a junior in high school on 9-11. I remember that day. And then a lot of my friends enlisted in the Marine Corps right out of high school. I'm from rural Virginia. So it's a very military-friendly area, lots of family history in the armed forces where I'm from. But my family, other than my grandfather,

my grandfather was the only one who served in World War II in the Army. But we were always kind of pro-involvement in American policy. Virginia's, you know, most of the founding fathers were British exiles, I guess, during the English Civil War that became aristocrats here in Virginia and were in the position to lead the early republic. So, the area is just steeped in history. I mean, coming from you from Richmond, Virginia, which still institutionally has all kinds of problems around all the relationships, you know, how our country

was founded. But the area itself is very much involved in what the national policy is. And at that time, I was a young man and very interested in what we were doing overseas. I opted to go to college first, although I almost enlisted right out of high school. But when I went to college, I wasn't ROTC or anything. Actually, I kind of just got into college life for about three years before I did. Who wouldn't? Right, right. How could you not, right? It was so awesome. I had a great time at University of Virginia. And by my third year, I started to think more about the future. I didn't really know what I wanted to do. I had some ideas of maybe law school.

But reality was, I knew I liked to invest. I've always been fascinated with financial markets. But a big part of that is like the macro environment. And at that time, the big macro thing, we weren't printing trillions of dollars yet. I had my own personal ideas around whether the Iraq war should have ever even happened or even how we went to Afghanistan. But, you know, the country had said this is what we're doing. So I thought I'd like to be a part of history there. Did it. Just not ROTC, but went to the officer candidate school, made it through, and ended up as an intelligence officer in Iraq running a drone detachment. You know, for young officers in the Marine Corps, you really just got to figure it out. So I had about one week of drone training. Trial by fire. Right. Yeah. It's like, hey, go run this drone detachment in Iraq. So I had to rely heavily on those who were experienced. And that was a great learning

point, right? Because you're put through this pipeline where you're in your early 20s, and you're supposed to be the boss. And in reality, you don't know. And you need to learn quickly about just basic leadership and the ability to look out for your people. Yeah, it's a bit scary. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we don't really think about it, but we just kind of send young kids over there and say, figure it out. And meanwhile, lives are on the line while they're figuring it out. So. Yeah. I mean, it's a lot like, yeah. I mean, beyond the, the lives at risk, I mean, the learning curve is not unlike business where you, you know, you've got to figure it out fast and stick to your customer segment. Yeah.

So we figured it out fast and stuck to our mission out there, which was running surveillance missions on high value targets. So I did that. I came back. I thought I would be doing something different in Afghanistan, but I ended up being a part of a small team that embedded with Afghan border police in Southern Helmand province and just ran essentially, you know, ground operations there out of Garmercer District. Crazy. Really crazy. It's interesting. I just interviewed Pomp recently, a few days ago, Anthony Pompliano, and he also was in the military and told effectively the same story, except for that he was younger. He was in eighth grade when 9-11 happened, but he committed himself that day to go and fight and defend America. And I asked him a similar question to this.

And you've already sort of hinted at the fact that you weren't necessarily a supporter of both of those incursions or wars or however you want to call it. But I said to him, you know, you originally went with the idea of defending America, right? Like we've been attacked, I'm going to defend America. And I find that when I speak to a lot of people in the military, they come back with, well, we were really more sort of advancing American interests than we were defending our borders. Do you have any feeling on that sentiment?

Yeah, I mean, that's what we were doing. I mean, but that is ultimately many layers. It doesn't have the passion and appeal of defending America, but many layers under that almost more jaded view of the world. It's a very realistic view. That is the grand strategy. If you believe in American values at their core, based on what we've seen in other great powers around the world, at their governance core, I'm not talking about the core people. I think people, at a very basic level, people are both good and bad. You can be good

and bad in the same day. Some people are better at knowing when they're being good or bad. That's just awareness of self. But governance, you know, governments have certain values themselves that may or may not reflect the will of the members of their society. But I think when you look at core American governance values, despite all of the divisiveness that we currently face and the dysfunction really in government that we see at a basic level here, you know, especially with kind of seeing the storm coming and, you know, four months later, we're all still inside. You know, we do reflect the idea that we should try our best to make everyone have equal opportunity. And I think that's many layers under advancing American interest, but ultimately...

Well, I mean, advancing interest can be certainly skinned as, you know, defense, because obviously it's basically getting ahead of a problem. Spending time, I guess, especially in Afghanistan, because you were embedded with Afghanis, what did you learn, I guess, you touched on it, what did you learn about people like, you know, I mean, it couldn't be a more polar opposite culture, but you sort of touched on that all people share similar qualities. And what was the experience of actually interacting and living with them and working with them like? Yeah, so there was a language and cultural barrier. You know, as younger people in the Marine Corps organization, we would have wanted to do faster, but we couldn't because there were so many layers above us who had interests they had to balance at the national political level on down to reflect, you know, the will of Americans in general. So there was a lot of balancing at the very, you know, rubber meets the road. They were just human. And so were we, we had a certain way of doing things that I think we could have adjusted more to maybe go a little bit more native. It's kind of the same, right. You know, kind of like the French in Canada, when they when they first were colonizing,

you know, like kind of get involved more culturally, do more commerce, spend, be out in the community more, kind of live in the community more, but we were a little more separated. But, yeah, you know, the good and bad of people is just human nature. People will look out for their family. They will look out for those around them, and sometimes that puts them on different sides that have different outcomes. Sure. What do you think about the fact that

we're still there? I think, you know, you got to be, you got to choose. You got to, you're either in it to win it, or you're in it to keep a status quo. I don't think we ever really approached the occupation of Iraq or Afghanistan. Well, actually, you know, there was a choice to occupy. And then once you have made that choice, then you have to choose to occupy in a way that actually ends resistance. So, you know, in World War II, we chose to occupy Germany and we chose to occupy it in such great numbers of physical presence that we ended resistance, you know. We made the choice to occupy those two locations and then we didn't really choose to occupy them in a way that would stop resistance. We did it with a very light foot,

and it was very hard to run operations, you know, be gone one day. It's hard to build relationships with other human beings who can benefit you in those societies if you're not constantly there to make sure as soon as you leave, someone else doesn't come in and hurt them. Right. So, you finished your military service service and then what happened? Oh, I mean, you know, it's funny. We'd go on patrols in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is when I was first learning a little bit of technical analysis. And I very quickly learned I was a terrible trader in and out. Everyone is.

Right. I guess me, especially because I had no discipline around, got caught up in a lot of revenge trading when things would go against me. But luckily I got out of that kind of in and out type training and got to like leap options and kind of longer term plays on trends I saw evolving. But I was doing that in between patrols. You know, we had high speed internet via satellite. It was a great way to kind of get out of that world for a little bit and advance your future and just stay involved.

And so, I got out of the Marines. I moved to Richmond, Virginia. I joined a small firm here in Richmond as an investment advisor. And that's what I did for a little bit. And I was kind of hard at 25 years old after everything that had just happened in financial markets to get some big accounts. So I ended up- Yeah, what year was that? I mean, it must, yeah.

Oh God. During basically the recession, right? Yeah. Yeah, 2010, 2011 is during the just total, you know, when we almost defaulted on our debt. Yeah. So I left that, you know, they gave me a great recommendation to Georgetown Business. I got back into intelligence work at U.S. Cyber Command at NSA headquarters.

And that's where you really see advancing American interests, you know, again, at a more strategic level versus the tech level running around the desert. Right. That's interesting. So you're an investment advisor and which and you have a background, at least a little bit in technical analysis. So what led you from there to I mean, you've effectively gone all in on a company, a crypto company. So what led you to Bitcoin and that path? Yeah, I think it was a weird path, but little seeds along the way. I'm on patrol in Afghanistan and mud brick houses, abject poverty, which is always, this has never been about religion. If you want to know the truth, it's poverty. Poverty creates desperation. Human beings will look out for their families. That's what's the fertile nesting ground for issues. So, if you want to fix terrorism, you fix poverty. Interesting.

But what I note, and that's why I love Bitcoin. So I'll get to it. There was one thing that nobody ever messed with. We didn't mess with it because we put it there. It was the cell tower. The Taliban didn't mess with it because they needed it to communicate with each other to mess with us. And the people didn't mess with it because they all had a mobile phone. So, you know, abject poverty. I walked through the bazaar. I see the cell tower in the distance. There's a SIM card shop in the bazaar. And the next shop over, there's, you know,

meat hanging out in the open with flies all over it for sale too. So, it's this weird juxtaposition of old world, new world. And, you know, I started to think, you know, Africa jumped landlines and went straight to mobile. Yeah, they did. No one is going, you know, Bank of America is not going to open up a branch in Afghanistan. These people are going to jump bank branches and go straight to something like the Bitcoin network. At that time, I didn't know what it was, but I knew if they had access to mobile, they could access these

networks. And Bitcoin was around then. I remember hearing at first about Bitcoin when I was in Iraq about a year and a half prior to that. So that was a seed planted. Then my time at Cyber Command, I was witnessing the weaponization of cyberspace and the idea that every time somebody uses one of the cyber weapons in their arsenal, it's kind of out live there. And other people scoop it up, revamp it, and now you've upped the ante again. Eventually, you're going to start breaking the web with all these weapons flying around. So I thought, you know, somebody's got to come up with a different security architecture. You know, we created this awesome decentralized communication layer,

but it was built for communication, not for security. So we've got all these issues now. Still, I hadn't put it together. About two years later, I finally, unlike most mainstream investment advisors who spent all this time, you know, we spent all this time trying to figure out the next stock to buy, the next thing. And like, we're all like totally being like, oh, Bitcoin's stupid. You know, just blowing it off. I finally started to do my homework. I'm like like holy shit it's not bitcoin and then everything trying to be bitcoin there are myriad of use cases

with sectors just like the equities market and somebody's got to build a platform to service uh all of these various allocations that you could have that don't necessarily compete with one another as a use case and that's when when, you know, then I read the Ethereum white paper. I'm like, okay, that's the US Cyber Command lesson. And then I was hooked, man. You know, like, that's when I sold my house and went all in on this business. I just, I am 100% behind this because it's foundational to solve the next generation of problems with the next generation of solutions, I think. So it was more about initially your view that it was a way to sort of bank the unbanked and skip an entire basically step that those parts of the world just didn't have access to. I mean,

fiat currency in places like that and ATM, I mean, it's just there's huge barriers to them even being able to use money at all, I would suggest. So you basically, before it was even about Bitcoin, you just identified that there was a need for a way for people to transact who didn't really have bank accounts and access. Is that accurate? Yeah, I think so. I don't think at that moment, I was still trying to figure out what it would mean and was still way behind on what a solution could be.

But I noted that moment because I thought there's something to fix here. And if it would be fixed, it would be pretty huge. So you could have built anything in the cryptocurrency space, right? And so what you decided to go with was the most vanilla and simple and perfect in my mind, because those are good things, right? Platform to allow people to basically, I mean, you can get into what round the X is, but it's a way to round up small transactions and consistently dollar cost average, you know, with small amounts into Bitcoin or other assets of your choice. So why did you, which is something that I'm just personally a huge proponent of, it's the way I've always invested. And I think that it takes a lot of the guesswork out for

people and a lot of the emotion, which I think is huge. You know, why did you decide to focus on something that just simply dollar cost averaged into Bitcoin? Well, I mentioned I'm a terrible trader. So that's number one. So you built it for yourself. Yeah. I needed a way to not go totally broke. So, you know, I knew that. I knew there was precedent for the behavior. At the time, everybody was talking about decentralized networks and all these great things that seemed out of my own strengths and limitations at, you know, my mid-30s now, I knew maybe my part of it all is just making it easier for people to get involved. Yeah. And, you know, what's easier than spare change. And I also, you know, just by the way,

the different assets were coming out at the time, I had several accounts. And I was like, dude, it's really hard to like log into each of them separately. It's so annoying. Yeah. So I thought, why don't I just pull them all together and let you interact with them in one place with the tool? Yeah. And so can you, I guess, get into the specifics of exactly how it works for someone? Like the step-by-step, I visit roundly X. Now what do I do? Yeah. Yeah. So you just go to roundly X.com. Uh, you sign up, um, you're then prompted to connect your, uh, banking institution via plaid and whatever cryptocurrencies, uh,

cryptocurrency exchanges you hold. We support four exchanges, Coinbase, uh, Voyager. Um, you know, we're really excited about their fee structure and the assets they list. Kraken and Binance. Kraken and Binance right now are view balance only. We'll eventually add the ability to round up into those accounts too. And then you're up and running.

It takes like five minutes. And every time you swipe your card, say it's $1.80 for a cup of coffee in the morning, that'd be round that up to $2. That's just such a simple way. And I mean, I guess it's basically the Acorns model, right? I mean, were they in existence before or was, I mean, was that the inspiration? Is that where you got the idea? Yeah, I was a user of Acorns. I liked what they were doing. You know, Acorns does a little differently because they're essentially rounding you up into more of like a portfolio that they manage right they're like little etfs yeah yeah yeah um but yeah i knew there was opportunity and there's you know there's an opportunity too to go really uh to round up

into really anything that's digital um so i see that as kind of a longer term vision. NFTs, all these various assets beyond cryptocurrency and kind of put them in one easy to use place. And I think it's important to note one of my favorite things is that you guys don't really hold anyone's crypto at all. Like, you know, it's on the exchange. You're just basically facilitating the transaction between, you know, their roundup source and the exchange, right? Yeah. So that was the other thing. We wanted people to feel comfortable using the exchange that they currently use to custody their funds. Yeah, these are multi-million dollar exchanges. They've built out adequate and robust security apparatus. So we just want you to connect the exchange you already have and you're up and running. If you want to withdraw it, you can go through all the security of your exchange to move it around. But the worst thing anyone could do by hacking

into your roundly x account is help you uh buy more of the crypto you're trying to buy yeah you just round up faster uh they can't take anything from you and actually you know man i gotta sleep at night you know so like i don't want to put anybody at any kind of risk. I just want to make the world better. Here's a tool. Go out and thrive. At least you won't lose Bitcoin in their retirement account. Seriously, you can hold Bitcoin in your retirement account and not just GBTC. How can you do this? Through a self-directed Choice IRA by Kingdom Trust. The first 1,000 users to open a Choice IRA will receive $62.50 in free Bitcoin. Visit retirewithchoice.com slash wolf. That's R-E-T-I-R-E-W-I-T-H-C-H-O-I-C-E dot C-O-M slash W-O-L-F. Podcast listeners receive extra points to move up the waitlist and get their choice IRA first. Do it right now. It's time to take control of your financial future and free yourself from the restrictions of classic retirement accounts. Are you sick of paying ridiculous fees to trade crypto? It's time you try Voyager. It's hands down my favorite place to buy and trade crypto, and it's 100% commission free. Voyager gives you easy access to more than 30 top crypto assets, and you can instantly transfer cash from your

bank account so you never miss a trading opportunity. Even better, you can now automatically earn interest on your crypto holdings. Currently, they're offering 5% interest on Bitcoin and 6% on USDC. Yes, you heard that correctly, 6%. And there are no limits or lockups, which means your funds always stay liquid. Find out why so many people are making the switch to Voyager. Visit investvoyager.com or search for Voyager on the iTunes or Google Play Store and get $25 in free Bitcoin when you use the promo code SCOTT25. That's investvoyager.com, promo code SCOTT25 for $25 in free Bitcoin and start trading today. When it goes to a million dollars. I love the surgency because, man, that would be a great moment

for all of us, certainly. It seems that... Go ahead. Yeah, I've been very fond of telling all the haters the past couple of years. It's a nice period to round up for two years of crypto winter where you have this basing. I've had this round up. But now

I kind of get to talk a little shit now that we're uh pumping a little bit because i'm like you know tulips didn't 4x off the lows man you know yeah i switched from uh bitcoin to ethereum primarily um between round the x and voyager and also buying on the side and i'm up 70% this year on simple dollar cost averaging without even giving a thought to a chart or trying to identify an entry. I mean, it's pretty crazy. And I feel like it's just getting started. I mean, yeah. Well, you know, it's like a true believer, I want to believe in every pump. But now I've been around long enough to know like it only ends in tears if you

foam up. So you guys have basically built a tool for mainstream adoption. It makes it really unintimidating and simple. What other barriers do you see on a macro level, not for your platform to mainstream adoption of crypto? Well, I guess, you know, some very encouraging signs with OCC coming out a couple of weeks, huge news. Now it's you're just one step closer to adoption because most people in the United States or developed world at least already have a bank. So you don't have to go find a Coinbase or something first. So that just makes takes one step out of it. And let's face it,

the exchanges that we partner with and drive their own assets under management and transactability with the constant spare change order flow, we're strengthening them. So we strengthen our partners. But in reality, you can see the kind of the trend, the crypto exchanges are really becoming more type of digital asset type banks. Yeah, they are. And now traditional banks, if they're going to compete, let's find out if they're smart enough to compete because they've tried to naysay it so much that you wonder if their management teams are even up to the task of embracing something that's obviously a better product in a lot of ways. But at least regulators and organizations like OCC are giving them that opportunity now. Yeah. The barriers, though, I think it's still a little too hard for regular people to,

to send it back and forth. Some smart entrepreneur will figure that out. He's probably going to be on your show, you know, or he or she will be on the show at some point and have figured that out. And that'll be a very 16 year old. Right. Yeah. And I'll just be like yeah you know and have to go with it because i yeah and how they did it i'll just know it's easy to use um yeah and you touch on i mean security is one of the huge barriers to entry people don't want to

be their own bank they're afraid that they're going to get hacked i mean we just saw the whole twitter hack which had nothing to do with bitcoin beyond send me Bitcoin. But again, it just sort of exposed what people think. And they think, you know, largely that it's for criminals and it's easily hacked and all these things. But if you can custody in your bank and they'll secure and insure it, I mean, that sort of eliminates that. But to me, the irony of that is that if you're a real Bitcoin believer, the last place you want your Bitcoin is in a bank, right? I mean, just because like it's a hedge against the banks, right? Short the

bankers, you know, buy Bitcoin. Which would have been a great trade, right? I mean, if you had followed that trade, that's a great trade. Yeah, absolutely. I think at this stage, it's better to take what we can get with the banks, maybe doing our board more. But I think at this stage, it's better to take what we can get with the banks, maybe doing our board more. But I think ultimately, even if we could get 10% of the population to do that, it would be absolutely massive for something so small and nascent. And then, I mean, speaking of barriers to entry, we now have the news that, you know, PayPal and Venmo are moving to allow people to buy crypto, which is 320 million more people that can buy from a place that they trust, right? And that they're comfortable with. So, I mean, you got to think that this is really starting to snowball, right? Oh, there's so much more upside. And I was talking to someone the other day,

and they're like, well, how much more upside does it have? I'm like, dude, you know, Bitcoin's market cap is only like 10% more than Comcast's. Yeah, it's crazy. It represents a much bigger idea than cable television. So to me, it's just like, we really, they're going to be saying the same thing when we're in the six figures, right? Like how much more upside does it have? It's like, dude, just comp it to existing asset classes and you'll see

how teeny it is and how little bit of new fund flows it takes to make it go up a lot. Right now, I mean, outside of price, like understand that you should just have some as complete insurance against like disaster. I mean, I've never been one to be like a doomsday prepper or anything like that. But like, it's just dumb at this point not to have some Bitcoin when you see what's happening in the world. I mean, Venezuela, Lebanon, Argentina, all these places, their money is worth dirt. Right. And it's, you know, and so, and here's my other point on that. It's almost a breach of your fiduciary responsibility. If you're an institutional money manager. Just this past week, I was watching CNBC, and you're starting to get institutional managers actually understand what they're talking about, and it's very bullish for our sector. But every once in a while, you still run into one person who has just not done any homework for five years.

Hated in principle. Right. So this person says, no, I'm really not into Bitcoin. My kids in college a few years ago were just still using it to buy fake IDs. And that's the extent of his lazy research. Right. Because nobody's ever bought a fake ID with dollars. Right. Right. Because nobody's ever bought a fake ID with dollars. Right. Right. Yeah. Every time somebody gets scammed in dollars, nobody's like,

should we ban the dollar? You know? So it's all kind of ridiculous, but you know, it's, it's getting to a point where I think you're at more risk as a money manager, if you're not giving your clients exposure, not owning Bitcoin, then the risk you're taking on if you don't hold any for your clients. It's just kind of common sense at this point. And I think whatever your Bitcoin investing thesis is, there are pros and cons. So it's, you know, sometimes I hear Peter Schiff talking about all gold. And I thought, you know, I was a gold investor too, you know, even before Bitcoin. So my thought is I've always enjoyed Peter talk and some of his viewpoints. But I think it's a little irresponsible too to say that it's got to be all one or the other.

The advantages to gold is that there's a physical presence of it. So you should have some of that. The advantages to Bitcoin is it's mobile, right? I mean, you're not leaving the airport in Venezuela with a bar of gold. Let's face it. No, right. All of your wealth in a suitcase full of gold that you need six people to carry. It's just absurd. I mean, gold is a subpar currency at best, if you even want to consider it a currency. And like you said, it's not borderless. I mean, you put your, memorize your private keys, you can go anywhere in the world and someone can't rob you, right? They don't know. I mean, it's not even comparable. And I mean, talking about Peter

Schiff, he has such a emotional hatred for Bitcoin, right? And you can tell when he and others talk about it, others like him, that it's just a principled hatred that's not based in any fact at this point. And it makes people who are that emotionally biased really look stupid. Right. Like you said, even if he wants to be a 99% gold, that doesn't mean that there isn't a place for 1% of it to be a 99% gold, and that doesn't mean that there isn't a place for 1% of it to be Bitcoin. Right. I mean, that to me would be a respectable disagreement. The only thing I, you know, I can't accept is all one or the other. Right. And so I want to touch back on, it's interesting, you were talking about obviously in Afghanistan that everyone had a cell phone,

you know, right out in the market next to the fly ridden meat. It leads me to believe and with all the things we're seeing with central bank digital currencies, that basically, all those places and most of the world is just going to soon phase fiat out, there's going to just skip it, certainly in Africa and places like that. And that the future of money is digital, one way or another, right? I'm not saying crypto, I'm saying literally like, you know, central bank backed digital currencies issued by governments. I mean, do you think that that's the inevitable path of money? I think it has to be. I mean, I think the genie's out of the bottle on settlement costs.

And one way or the other, we're going to have to eliminate those settlement fees. And that very bit, just doing that, you open up a myriad of new business models. When you, you know, when someone's not eating two or 3% on every transaction, just, yeah, there's so I mean, you know, we can't even think of them all. I mean, once you can move value that easily, that cheaply, then frictionless movement of value all over the world. I mean, you know, who knows what's going to come of that in five to 10 years. And I think we are even as fiat currencies go digital, we are in a multi-year, multi-decade movement towards some non-state backed alternative stores of value. And Bitcoin is obviously there.

And I think that's going to be more of a basket approach. And I even see like the geopolitical grand strategy, whereas tensions escalate amongst the great powers of the world, the U.S. and China being most obvious these days. But you're going to see countries make a move against the dollar reserve, at least as a point of leverage. Yeah, you're going to see some baskets proposed that may or may not include a digital asset component. Yeah, but would definitely I mean, the dollar even today's is not getting a strong balance off of support. The dollar is getting smashed and it's, if you're looking at technically, I mean,

this is the support, right? I mean, if you really believe in technical analysis, if the dollar drops here, I mean, we're into, you know, we're talking about 2008, 2009 levels for the dollar being in play. And now, I mean, talk about cracks in the foundation. We have like Goldman Sachs coming out and saying that the dollar is at risk of no longer being the world reserve currency to hear that from goldman sachs is pretty scary yeah absolutely you know and it's like it's it was surprised me because the past couple days i saw it approaching that uh support and i'm like we're gonna get a big bounce and

probably get a correction still dropping not seeing a violent bounce higher, which is, you know, kind of maybe telling. We'll find out. But, you know, but even, you know, everybody else is watching that, too. You know, everyone else in the world who is an adversary at a geopolitical level is watching that weakness. Intelligence agencies are built around desks, you know? So there is a... I've seen Homeland, so I know all about it. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So we're all educated on it. I know everything. But, you know, the Chinese or whatever adversarial desk for the U.S. is watching this, and they're going to start thinking of ways to pull apart. Force the issue? Yeah, absolutely. So, I mean, do you think that China is the next global superpower? I mean, you touched on

China and United States being the primary two. I mean, I guess people could argue Russia, but I mean, it certainly seems like China is trending up and the United States, certainly if we're talking about digital currencies, is trending down. Yeah, I think in the absence of a more united United States around all the various issues we're facing and some progress towards resolution on a lot of our internal issues. We are just not going to be able to be on the world stage and more holistic societies, their societies are all on the same page on certain things, will be able to fundamentally be more able to project power.

You know, I would hope that values that are good for humankind and our planet prevail in, you know, the grand strategy, the great struggle of world powers? I have to think that everything going digital is good for Bitcoin and crypto in that it will introduce people to the idea of using a wallet, how to transact digitally, all those things. But on the flip side, I mean, cash is really good for transacting privately. I mean, it's definitely its single greatest asset is that I can pay you in cash and nobody knows about it. Right. So you have to imagine that a central bank digital currency will effectively eliminate all privacy in people's national currency and using money of your country. Do you think? I mean, oh, yeah. I mean, I think just fundamentally, that's how it would work. Um, and as, as soon as that feature is enabled in government, um, it will,

um, eventually evolve into, uh, into a tool used to, to see what's going on. Um, and our society will have to find a balance between that if we choose any balance at all. But I think, you know, it's progress in one way and maybe not progress in the other. I think I can make local anonymous purchases and transactions and cash. Right. Maybe the IRS will actually be able to tell us how much we owe in taxes without making us jump through so many hoops to figure it out on our own. I've never, I don't know, a total tangent, but like, I feel like taxes and the IRS is literally just like,

we know exactly what you owe now, go figure it out. Right. Yeah. Like we're, we're just imposing requirements. We may or may not be competent enough to help you at all meet our requirements. You owe us this amount, but go pay someone to prove that you understand that you owe us this amount. And I mean, digital currencies may actually help with that. But I find it really interesting that the digital dollar, the concept, it's been floated here and there. But like, this is being tested in China. This is

being tested in Europe. You know, the Bank of Japan is using it. We're so, so far behind. And this is the future of money. It just shows how far the United States is lagging on these huge macro issues. I know you've talked to me sort of in the past about the idea of this being somewhat a new Cold War. And it seems like money would sort of like be a really essential way to win that war and that we're just losing. We're just so far behind. Yeah, we've got, you know, a leaky ship here in terms of our ability to match with what other countries already are doing. My hope is that we adjust very quickly as competition enters the global stage. You know, up to the 90s, we had the Cold War with the Soviet Union. It was almost a unifying event for us,

where we had an adversary. Common enemy. Right. Yeah. And we lost that for a little bit. And, you know, but I mean, doesn't it suck that we would need a common enemy to like push the world forward? It seems. Nature of humanity, I guess. It is really sad. Yeah. You know, it would be nice if there was an element of competition that that never went hot and no one ever had to get hurt. But we could propel the world forward with some healthy competition.

Yeah. Tricky times, man. You know, just a lot of coming at us this year. So it's 2020 is a joke. And speaking of which, so I mean, Bitcoin obviously is a hedge against these things. There are other things that I know that you're passionate about that are hedges against sort of a potentially failing system? I mean, you're a beekeeper, right? Yeah, man, that's my ultimate hedge. I will at least have some honey if everything else goes to shit. I got into beekeeping during crypto winter, right? So like you had to have something to do instead of stare at the price for the first six months. And then you kind of went numb and just kept building the platform and getting away from it all and checking on the bees.

I know you bought a cow. Yeah, I mean, we bought a cow from my wife's family, our farmers. And, you know, I don't think we quite did the calculations necessary to understand that we have 600 pounds of meat coming that's likely going to spoil within a year in the deep freezer. So we're looking for some partners in our cow venture. Yeah, we did. And it seems crazy, but, you know, I want to have something if, which I don't think will happen, but if the supply chains go to crap and if it all goes down, at least we'll have something to either barter or eat, you know, in that situation. And I think that bees is one thing.

I just think everyone should have something, whether it's even a small garden in the backyard, just, you know, something that they're doing to actively protect their families and protect themselves if something like that happens. Yeah. I think, you know, like history and just understanding history, you can understand kind of like the rhythms of the human experience and like, you know, didn't people used to have victory gardens where they kind of grew their own thing and that kind of went away as we had a lot of sunny days in the world.

And now we're kind of seeing some cloudy days and people are kind of getting back to the roots of things. And yeah, you know, I've always kind of got an edge. I'm always trying to develop a business idea of some sense is what I'm into. And to me, all the money printing from the Fed will lead to inflation this go around. I know I was just listening to Chairman Powell speak the other day on TV. And he's like, oh, you know, this is not going to create inflation because he's comparing it to the last time, which was, you know, what, 11 years ago, like 12 years ago, every decade now. So that's going to tell everybody something about how things are working.

But, you know, he's comparing then to now. And he's making the assumption that the velocity of money will be the same this go round. Because, you know, you need the two things. You need supply of money and velocity of money to create the inflation. He's making the comparison to 10 years ago. Well, just even demographically speaking, the new echo, you know, the echo boom or millennial generation, whatever we're calling it, 10 years younger, weren't having kids then. They're having kids now. Kids are inherently inflationary because, you know, you like you can't wait two years to buy them a new pair of shoes

they need those today so that creates demand in this moment and you know increasing prices as that demand uh you know nobody's saving and hoarding their dollars and not getting their kids clothes um as they grow so like he's making that assumption. And then he's kind of making the assumption that like trade wars, breaking global supply chains aren't in and of themselves inflationary. Because if you're breaking economies of scale, there's that period in between, you know, where we were, and then where when we figure it out, where there's like people kind of creating, uh, producing things inefficiently, which will be at a higher price, hence inflation. So we're, you know, even at the top levels,

and this is why you probably don't want one small group of people creating your entire monetary policy. Um, the other reason why Bitcoin is awesome, it's just math. But we're making a lot of assumptions that I think are going to create inflation. And that goes into my B philosophy, because I get to sell honey eventually with inflation at a higher price point. But my input costs are flowers, right? That just come back every year. So I'm getting more profit

because I'm selling honey at a higher price every year but my cost to produce it- Well, that's a rare business where inflation doesn't affect your cost, right? Right, yeah. So I figured it out is what I'm saying. It's all figured out over here. And so now that we're four months into COVID, I mean, do you think that we're

still at risk of seeing, you know, supply chain failures and things? I know that there was a lot of talk about that. You and I have personally talked about that at the very beginning, you know, off air. I mean, do you think that we've got that kind of thing figured out? Or do you think that, you know, we could still see one massive wave of all the truckers or the meat plants or everyone working gets sick and all of a sudden we can't get the things that we need? You got it. You know, I hope not. I mean, it's just so many things, so many variables from a macro level to try to consider. And, you know, I mean, I even think a lot of, if anybody left, say China, for example, and move the supply chain somewhere more in Southeast Asia,

South China Sea is in and of itself a flashpoint geopolitically. So, you know, maybe even where you moved your supply chain out of china into could be at risk eventually if things really heat up um but yeah i mean then there's just the the very real prospect of um health breaking supply chains yeah which would you know ultimately only lead to more federal stimulus uh you know i think we're really experimenting with universal income now, which is what this all amounts to. All tremendous macro drivers for the asset class we're involved in.

And I think it would have happened anyway. I mean, you would have seen adoption of just a better product ultimately anyway. So it is kind of unfortunate it's happening in this way. But this is our moment, right? Yeah. So if it's not going to work now, it's really not going to work. And you talked kind of about global supply chains. And then I think you have like these sort of hyper localized supply chain issues, like in a place that is an actual hotspot, you may not be able to get what you need for a period of two or three months, right? And that's, you know,

and you'll have your bees, of course, in that situation. So all that said, coming back to RoundlyX, so what do you guys have planned for the future? What's next for the company? What are the future innovations? Yeah. So we're US only right now for transactability. And I hate that because it's a borderless asset class. So we want to enable our tool set all over the world. And that'll happen first in the UK likely, and then rest of Europe and onward from there. So that's on deck for this year. Expand exchange partnerships because we want to bring this tool set to everyone who wants to get involved, and the exchanges all benefit from that too. So that's the big part.

We want to make sure that coming into what seems to be the next cycle in digital assets, that the asset class is able to capture all the interested fund flows. Because there are a lot of people that are interested, but aren't going to throw 10 grand into this thing right off the bat. Or don't even know how to, right? It's too complicated. Yeah. Yeah. And they've got to get comfortable first. So we want to be a platform where they can onboard and become comfortable and then really participate as, uh, as time goes on. So what are you rounding into? Oh, just Bitcoin these days. I, uh, you can have really pissed.

I didn't buy more Ethereum at like 160. Uh, but, uh, yeah, I'm really pissed that you buy more Ethereum at like 160. But yeah, I mean, those are my two go-to and then I like some of the smaller ideas like, you know, I'm fascinated by Decentraland. I really like that one. Nexo, I really like that platform too. I'm not trying to give everybody a plug. No, I mean, any platform where you can park money and earn compounding interest on especially your earning compounding interest on a asset that's rising

over time is a pretty powerful and some of the exchange token I mean you know sorry I was going to say but you do that with Voyager with you guys so like I round into things on Voyager and then I just leave it there and it gains interest. It's incredible.

Right. Yeah. Even their token, man. I mean, we support. Oh my God. Crazy. We support the Voyager exchange on the platform. And like, I don't own any of these tokens.

I'm just watching them shoot up. And I'm like. I should, I like, I've, you know, I've been using Voyager for so long. I've been such a fan and proponent and spokesperson. And here I am watching their token, like do like three, four or five X's while I'm laughing, sitting on the sidelines, boringly buying Bitcoin. But, you know, that's kind of the nature of the beast, right? And their stock also has done incredibly well on the Canadian stock exchange. So it's like a double whammy for those guys who are who are participating it's really incredible company yeah i'm like so sick of all

of it i um you know it's it's tough because like it's at a certain point you just you like calling the future and being right on the future right as an investor of course and there's just so much opportunity in this uh emerging asset class that it's like you can almost never be happy because there's always something that's pumping harder than something else. It's a huge part about the emotional control, though, is just understanding that you got to kind of choose your horse and be patient and stick to it because they'll all go. You know what I mean? As long as you're not buying a complete garbage asset. So, well, that's awesome, man. Thank you so much. I definitely

suggest that everybody check out Brownlee X because it really is just the simplest and easiest tool for, you know, gaining even just minimal exposure and with money that you'll never miss. To me is the big part is because when people buy the first time crypto, you know, and like you said, it's like, do I put five grand into this right now? Then you're emotionally attached when you see the volatility. But when you're doing it $3 at a time, $12 at a time, you never miss it, right? Absolutely. Yeah. Awesome. It's great for people like me too. So where should everybody follow you after this or follow the company and yourself? Yeah, just follow us on at roundlyx on Twitter, or you just go to the website roundlyx.com. Awesome, man. Well, thank you again. And I can't wait to have this

conversation again, six months down the road when Bitcoin's at 40,000. That's right. Me too. Can't wait. From our lips to someone's ears. I don't know. Thanks, man. Thanks.