Crypto Week: CEO Series – Blake Cassidy – The Next Evolution Of Crypto Investing

Bryce Leske: [00:01:27] Welcome to another episode of Equity, it's a podcast that follows our journey of investing, whether you're an absolute beginner or approaching Warren Buffett status, our aim is to help break down your barriers from beginning to dividend. My name is Bryce and as always, I am joined by my equity mate, Ren. How's it going? [00:01:42][15.0]

Alec Renehan: [00:01:42] I'm very good, Bryce. Very excited for this week that we're halfway through crypto week. Yes. The week your dreams are made of. [00:01:50][7.5]

Bryce Leske: [00:01:50] Yeah, it's going to be great. Yeah. A few episodes to come to close out a crypto week. But this one I'm excited about as you are. [00:02:00][10.5]

Alec Renehan: [00:02:01] I'm, I'm always excited [00:02:01][0.7]

Bryce Leske: [00:02:03] because we're joined by an expert and we're going to be talking about what is going on in the crypto ecosystem, which is something that I claim to know very little about. [00:02:14][10.7]

Alec Renehan: [00:02:14] Yeah, I think so. We've got Blake, who will introduce us in a second here today, and then we've got Alex on the show tomorrow. I think after these two episodes, we're going to realize just how little we know about crypto and [00:02:27][12.9]

Bryce Leske: [00:02:27] then we won't talk about it. But it is our pleasure to welcome Blake Cassidy, who is the CEO of Bamboo Blake. Blake, welcome to the show, guys. [00:02:36][8.7]

Blake Cassidy: [00:02:36] Thanks so much for having me. Excited to be here. [00:02:38][1.7]

Bryce Leske: [00:02:39] So Bamboo is Australia's first crypto micro-investing app allowing investors to invest in bitcoin Ethereum gold and silver. Blake took over as CEO in November 2020 and is working to scale up Bambu in Australia and preparing to launch overseas. So a lot going on over at Bamboo lately. [00:03:00][21.6]

Blake Cassidy: [00:03:00] Yes, thank you very much. It's been pretty crazy over the last year and we're excited to grow the business and take things forward. [00:03:07][6.9]

Bryce Leske: [00:03:08] If you missed our episode on Monday, head back and have a listen where we go into Bambu and a little bit more detail and explain why we like it. But yeah, we think it's a great app. And here at equity mates. We're all about making markets accessible and we certainly feel like bamboo is doing that for, you know, people looking to not only get into the crypto market, but dollar cost averaging to things like gold and silver as well. So we have a promo code. [00:03:36][27.7]

Alec Renehan: [00:03:36] We do. We do. So if you want to download bamboo and use the code, equity mates are bamboo. Will Blake personally, we'll give you ten dollars towards the asset allocation of your choice so you can split it across Bitcoin, Ethereum, gold, or silver. You know, there's a lot of noise in the crypto space, but we think Bambo is a good one. You know, dollar-cost averaging, don't try and time the market because if you try to time the Bitcoin market, you probably lose a lot of sleep and a lot of hair like me. Um, so, yeah, we think bamboo is a good one. If you want to dip your toe in the water, it's a good way to get started in crypto. [00:04:12][35.9]

Bryce Leske: [00:04:13] So we're going to approach this episode a lot like our CEO series because we obviously have a CEO in the room. So we're going to understand a bit about bamboo from Blake's point of view and then, as we said, dove into the world or ecosystem of crypto. So, Blake, are you able to describe bamboo in your own words? [00:04:31][18.8]

Blake Cassidy: [00:04:32] Yes. Bamboo is a micro savings platform that allows anybody to easily get access to digital assets. Now, the crypto sphere has notoriously been difficult to enter and exit. And we provide a very simple and safe onramp for people to get exposure to this exciting asset class. And buying digital assets can often be confusing and complicated. And we really try to take that out of the equation, you know, so people don't have to think too much about, oh, what do I do with the private keys? You know, am I buying at the right time? And we take a lot of these questions out and give people a safe environment to have exposure. [00:05:10][38.2]

Alec Renehan: [00:05:11] So we'll talk more about Bambo throughout this interview. But let's start with you, I guess. What's your background like? How did you come to be involved in crypto? [00:05:21][9.7]

Blake Cassidy: [00:05:21] Yeah, good question. So my background's insane, completely unrelated. I studied urban planning and I studied sustainability in Sweden. Then when I returned to Australia, I realized that sustainable urban planning wasn't really a thing here in Australia and couldn't find a job that I wanted to take. But I was lucky enough to get a research role in China. I'm working with a Chinese urban design firm. I'm helping them do sustainable urban planning. And when I was in China in 2016, working there, I saw that Bitcoin was getting a lot of attention there and that there was an opportunity to purchase bitcoins in Europe and in America and then sell them in China. And I didn't know this at the time, but this was called arbitrage trading. And I was doing triangulation, arbitrage trading and moving cash out through Chinese crypto exchanges, through the banks and doing the trade again. There was about a 10 per cent premium on some days and the. The reason for this is that Chinese people were using crypto to move money outside the country and because of the capital controls in China. So that was my introduction to crypto and trading. And I learned a lot through that process. I was then came back to Australia and was at a Bitcoin meet up one day and met some guys, some hedge fund guys, and they were starting a crypto investment fund. And they I told them the type of trading I was doing. They were pretty interested. And one of the guys said, you start Monday. And. And I thought he was joking. You know, I thought it was just a nice guy, had a beer with him, no problems. And I ran. I didn't end up going on Monday. I thought it was a joke. And then about three months later, I ran into these guys and they're like, oh, you never rocked up for work. So I ended up going in doing some work with them. They started one of Australia's first crypto investment funds. I'm fully licensed with an official and that was really interesting, learning about all the compliance that they had to build into what they were doing, researching new assets to invest into, and startups as well. We were investing in many early-stage crypto and Blacktown-based start-ups, and this was in twenty eighteen and Bambu was one of those projects. So not only did the fund invest into Bambury and we all personally invested into Bambury thinking it was such a great idea, the founding team built an amazing product. I consulted to them for some time and worked with the business and then went off and did my own start for 18 months after that. And in the process of selling that now and there was an opportunity to purchase Bamburgh back off the founding team. So the seed investors came in and got together and put some cash together and bought the company, recapitalized it. And that was about seven months ago. So since then, we've reestablished the teams and started growing the company from there. [00:08:22][180.5]

Bryce Leske: [00:08:22] It's pretty a pretty interesting story about how you have become CEO of Bamboo. A lot going on there. You know, crypto within the equity markets community is, I guess, pretty divisive. You know, I think stats show that I think 75 percent of our audience don't invest in crypto. So we have a lot of work to do to educate the equity mates audience as to what crypto is. Why from your point of view, invest in a crypto business and more generally, why crypto? What's the bull case from your point of view? [00:08:52][29.7]

Blake Cassidy: [00:08:53] Yeah, really good question. So what we're seeing with cryptocurrency and block chain technology is a lot of innovation. It's creating possibilities for new business models that weren't previously possible. And because of the excitement around this technology, it's attracting a lot of talent, a lot of talent that you could potentially want to back. And there's a lot of innovation happening in the space. Right. So I think this is one of the key reasons why we should invest because it's disrupting existing business models, things like Ren maintenance, things like banking, things like brokerage, things like settlements. You know, previously we needed all these services to sit in the middle of things that we do to act as trust bankers now that we have block chain technology and it can be used as a mechanism of trust. You know, we're seeing things that previously weren't possible. So it is exciting. [00:09:44][51.0]

Alec Renehan: [00:09:44] Yeah, nice. So there's a lot going on at the moment. It feels like every day there's more stories about, you know, crypto bitcoin hitting all-time highs. Elon Musk selling a song about nonrefundable tokens as a non fungible token. There's a lot of noise. What I guess how do you think about what's going on in the ecosystem at the moment? And I guess what do you think are the important trends? And then like what do you sort of ignore as just the noise? [00:10:09][25.2]

Blake Cassidy: [00:10:10] Yeah, really interesting. So I think when there are new opportunities for new products and services, they receive a lot of hype. You know, I think the market overextends and then they scale back and there are a few winners out of out at the hype cycle. You know, what we're seeing with NFTE, which are basically digital representations of real-world things that can't be copied on the Internet and people can trade this. So the NBA just released some NFTE NBA cards and I think they sold about 250 million dollars worth of these things. And, you know, this represents a new business model for them that previously didn't exist. And, yeah, there's a lot of hype around it. But know at the end of day, I think technologies like this are here to stay. You know, we're seeing other trends as well, like companies that are starting to look like a modern day investment banks and banks. Coinbase is an example of this. So Coinbase is a cryptocurrency exchange that's been around for since about 2012, 2013 and led by Brian Armstrong. And they're about to undergo a hundred billion dollar IPO, which is pretty ridiculous. You know, these guys are starting to knock on the door of HSBC, UBS and Goldman Sachs valuation wise, and I think the reason for that is because they're accessible to anyone globally. You know, the market is so big and their growth trajectory is so strong that we're seeing, you know, Sankt, that hadn't hasn't happened before in this in the banking system or at least for 100 years. So it's really fascinating. And we're going to see more and more groups like this. [00:11:51][100.7]

Alec Renehan: [00:11:52] So I think there's a lot to unpack there. But before we do, I think we should take a step back. We've obviously been doing crypto work on we did an equity market episode on Monday. We did a get started investing episode on Tuesday. So hopefully people listen to those. But if they haven't, maybe we should just establish some basic terminology and stuff, because I think that's going to become important as we talk about these trends and what's going on at Coinbase and all of that. So let's start at the very beginning. What's the difference between block chain and cryptocurrency? [00:12:21][29.5]

Blake Cassidy: [00:12:22] Block chain is the underlying technology in the ecosystem, right? And it allows us to transfer value. Now, crypto currencies are built on top of this or a representation of block chain. You can create digital tokens on top of block chains to allow people to exchange value. And these can be termed crypto currencies if they're used in that sense. [00:12:42][19.4]

Bryce Leske: [00:12:42] So when people hear tokens, I'm just thinking, you know, there's a lot of jargon when it comes to the crypto crypto land. If people are hearing the word token, can that just be applied just as the same as a cryptocurrency? [00:12:57][14.5]

Blake Cassidy: [00:12:58] Yeah, it can be. So crypto currencies are often tokens in themselves, but I think cryptocurrency describes how the token is being used as currency. Now, tokens don't have to be used as currency. They can be used as other things. So, yeah, in some sense, cryptocurrency is a token, but I think it comes down to the use case. Another example of this is a non fungible token or a token that you can exchange that is unique. Right. And this can be used for something else. For example, you could stamp today's headline of the newspaper inside of it and give that a unique number. And then that would be a unique token that you could use for any particular purpose. [00:13:40][41.2]

Bryce Leske: [00:13:41] So when people are buying through Bitcoin or Ethereum, through Bambu or many of the other digital currencies, through other platforms, generally speaking, are they buying it to trade in and out of or the actual use cases for these tokens? [00:13:59][17.9]

Blake Cassidy: [00:13:59] Yeah, really good question. So there's a lot of traders. There's a lot of speculators in the space. I think when I first started using Bitcoin, I used it for utility. So when I was living in Sweden, I wanted to transfer money home to Australia and transfer money to a friend in Portugal. And I found that using money transmitters was clunky and expensive. So I used Bitcoin and there's a lot of people using it for remittance, particularly in Third World countries who, you know, maybe. [00:13:54][-5.2]

[00:14:31] using transfer wires or PayPal. It's too expensive. So there are a lot of different people using it for all sorts of different things, really. I think it depends on where they live here in Australia. I think a lot of people using it as a long term investment. But we also look at that portion of investors that are that are speculating and trading. [00:14:51][20.3]

Alec Renehan: [00:14:52] Yeah, I think one more question around establishing the basics, and I think pretty relevant given Bamber has both Bitcoin and Ethereum on its platform. Here's what I don't know how many crypto currencies there are thousands and thousands and thousands. Um, I guess the big two are probably Bitcoin and Ethereum. But for people who are unfamiliar with the crypto world, like, I guess the first question is why are there so many coins? And then maybe what's the difference between the big two? Hmm. [00:15:21][28.7]

Blake Cassidy: [00:15:21] Yeah, good question, sir. Bitcoin functions as a store of value or sankt analogous to a digital gold, has many similar qualities to gold. People park their money there. They don't really move it around because it's a bit expensive. And the storage costs is the storage is a bit arduous when you want it to be really safe, whereas Ethereum is really interesting because it allows us to not only exchange value but also run code on top of the block chain. Now, this allows us to do interesting things that have never before been possible. And an example of this is building an application for voting for in politics. And this allows us to not have to trust any third party for counting the votes. The votes are permanently locked into the block chain and no one can alter this. Right. And what we're going to see over the next decade is our most important software be built on this technology. Another example of this. Would be remittance or property settlements or large financial transactions. Sir, it's been referred to as programable money so you can write in how you want the money to interact. And maybe another example of how this could express itself is that if I'm transferring, you know, my colleague 50 bucks and they need to pay a portion of that for their parking fees, you could potentially program that in and automatically distribute to the parking lot. So similarly for taxes, if I needed to transfer you guys some cash and a certain amount of that need to go to Texas and then that could automatically be credited and the tax laws coded into that transaction. [00:17:09][108.4]

Bryce Leske: [00:17:11] So it to be a coder to understand in your face? [00:17:13][2.3]

Blake Cassidy: [00:17:14] Well, at the moment, yeah, you would be. But, you know, the user experience will improve over the next decade. [00:17:19][5.4]

Alec Renehan: [00:17:20] Yeah. I mean, in theory the development path should follow like the Internet where it's like early days of the Internet. You had to be a computer scientist or an engineer to really understand like what you were building. And now we have Squarespace and WordPress where it's drag and drop and everything's, you know, pretty straightforward. [00:17:38][17.3]

Blake Cassidy: [00:17:39] Yeah, that's really interesting that you bring that point up, because I think block chain technology, we have about one percent of the global population that owns crypto and the Internet. When one percent of the global population was using the Internet, this was about 1997. So it was still very early. And generally technology like this takes 20 years to fully develop their own. [00:17:58][19.5]

Bryce Leske: [00:17:59] 1997 led to the 2000 technology. So we are heading for another one. You have [00:18:05][6.8]

Blake Cassidy: [00:18:06] potentially. [00:18:06][0.0]

Alec Renehan: [00:18:08] But then companies like other than. Yes. And all that came out of it. I mean, is that the trend like you were talking about Coinbase before or which is a crypto broker? So for people who are unfamiliar, unfamiliar, I guess think of like a comsec or a stake, but for crypto. But is is the trend that we're saying like other companies that are positioning themselves as like, you know, the Google block chain and I was on a blocked I like do we expect to see big companies emerge out of this or will it just be big cryptocurrency? [00:18:41][32.7]

Blake Cassidy: [00:18:42] Yeah, 100 percent. We're seeing incredible growth from some companies. I'm Coinbase is one of those and they're, you know, reaching 100 billion dollar valuations. We're also seeing other groups such as Celsius and Blackfire, which are starting to look like crypto banks or modern. You know, the next evolution of banking. They're providing, you know, remittance services, loans, yields on people's crypto and Celsius. His model is bank yourself. Right. And these guys are seeing incredible growth. You know, they've 25, fixed their valuation in the last year and getting a massive adoption. And there's lots of opportunity for organizations like this because they're not bound by, you know, states or countries, you know, they global. [00:19:32][50.0]

Alec Renehan: [00:19:33] So let's talk about the finance space, because, you know, I'm hearing DFI a lot decentralized finance. But when we were talking recently, you were also telling me about, say, fly, which I guess is centralized finance. Is that right? [00:19:46][13.6]

Blake Cassidy: [00:19:47] Yeah, exactly [00:19:47][0.2]

Alec Renehan: [00:19:47] right. So, yeah, maybe. Can you just tell us what's going on in the financial landscape and how a layperson like me should understand the changes? [00:19:55][7.5]

Blake Cassidy: [00:19:56] Yeah, for sure, sir. Centralized finance is very much like the Celsius block fly and Coinbase. That's their businesses, centralized businesses that are built that are used using block chain technology to create value and building business models around that. Now, decentralized finance is when it's exactly the same services. But you're not interacting with the business, you're just interacting with code that's built on top of block chains. So they're fully decentralized, they're not regulated, and anyone can do things like get loans, get a yield or do remittance through them. So it's really interesting. And we, you know, we think that they're going to scale comparably. But there is a lot of debate in the ecosystem, you know, of what people should be using. The purists think you should be moving towards decentralized finance because it aligns more with the ideology. But, you know, we are seeing massive growth of support from the centralized finance. [00:20:55][59.5]

Alec Renehan: [00:20:56] Again, not to just harp on about the Internet analogy, but like early days of the Internet, it was the same thing. There were like, you know, Internet purists who were talking about how it's like completely free, completely unregulated. But then as it grows and, you know, the big companies come in and it gets regulated and it feels like there are the crypto purists. But more and more, as more and more money moves into the space, that change will happen. [00:21:19][23.5]

Blake Cassidy: [00:21:20] Well, yeah, I certainly think there's a. Allan, Sam, we've seen the prevalence of the open source movement and, you know, we see big companies like IBM and Google using a lot of open source software. But, you know, there's also there's a lot of centralization there as well. They're hoarding data and the like, or I think these things move in tandem as the ecosystem matures. [00:21:43][22.8]

Bryce Leske: [00:21:44] So there's a lot around the decentralization of the finance industry, but what other industries do you kind of see being disrupted by this sort of block chain technology over the next 20 years or so? Are there any that are ripe for disruption? Are we going to see the downfall of Google or Amazon, for example? [00:22:02][17.9]

Blake Cassidy: [00:22:04] Yeah, I think it's, you know, Google and Amazon I don't think are going anywhere. But, you know, people that generally acted as intermediaries or someone that we could trust in a financial transaction, I think their role is going to change. People like banks, people like remittance services, brokers, even accountants and lawyers, because a lot of what they did can now be replaced by these protocols. And I think these roles are going to take on more advisory roles if the hard lifting can be done by code. [00:22:43][39.2]

Bryce Leske: [00:22:44] What about fund managers [00:22:44][0.7]

Blake Cassidy: [00:22:46] who I think fund managers need? There's a certain amount of expertize there and I think it'd be pretty hard to replace what they do with code. But yeah, [00:22:56][9.8]

Bryce Leske: [00:22:56] the idea what can happen in 20 years. [00:22:58][1.5]

Alec Renehan: [00:23:00] I mean, between I and Block change, some of those professional services companies should be getting very worried. You know, like there's all this talk about lawyers being disrupted by I because I can like search precedents and all that stuff really quickly. And then at the same time, if, you know, you can execute like smart contracts on the block chain and stuff like that, it's just getting attacked from all sides. [00:23:22][21.2]

Bryce Leske: [00:23:22] Mm hmm. Before we move on, we're just going to take a quick break and hear from our sponsors. Ren, you are all about getting fit, you've bought the garment, you bought the golf membership, you bought the gym membership and you're on the mind MasterChef and even in lock down last year, you bought those resistance bands of Instagram that from memory didn't even come. [00:23:43][20.4]

Alec Renehan: [00:23:44] No, look, they didn't come. But all of that effort really was canceled out by the numerous menu log orders that were a real staple of my lockdown experience. [00:23:53][9.5]

Bryce Leske: [00:23:54] Well, we've just headed into a new financial year, so I think it's time you get money fit with Virgin Money, our latest sponsor. [00:24:01][7.0]

Alec Renehan: [00:24:02] That's right, Bryce. With a high interest savings account bundled with a seriously rewarding everyday transaction account, you can manage your money easily on the go smash your savings goals and be rewarded for it. [00:24:14][11.9]

Bryce Leske: [00:24:14] And with the Virgin Money Go transaction account, you can earn rewards on your everyday spending with zero monthly fees. Sounds like just what you need. Ren. [00:24:24][9.3]

Alec Renehan: [00:24:24] Yeah, the FBI twenty one get Ren didn't quite work, but if y 20 to get Ren money, it might be to go [00:24:33][8.4]

Bryce Leske: [00:24:33] back to your own Bayt Virgin money terms and conditions and monthly criteria apply. Now let's get back to the show. So in terms of other trends that we're seeing a couple to touch on and let's perhaps walk through them is the I guess the adoption of Bitcoin on the balance sheets of some of the big companies over in America. What are you sort of saying there, the likes of Tesla and Co.? [00:24:56][22.8]

Blake Cassidy: [00:24:57] Yeah, this is really interesting, sir, because of the quantitative easing and all the stimulus checks that have happened in the US over the last 12 months. I think it was 23 per cent of all US dollars were printed in the last 12 months. Many of these large companies with big treasuries sitting in cash are starting to think, you know, take a take a real hard look at what these actions by the government, how that affects their treasury. You know, is there Treasury with 23 per cent less after these actions? And that's saying that they have to consider. So they're looking at options to hedge out of currency. And some of these companies have come to look at Bitcoin, which is a deflationary asset, and no more coins can be printed. So they're using this as a hedging mechanism. So a couple of prominent people, such as Elon Musk and Michael Slager have put quite a lot of money in over a billion dollars each, and they're encouraging other companies to do the same thing. Michael, SLAPP, particularly, he held a conference with, I think, a thousand other CEOs in the US giving them basically the game plan of how to do it, how to how to manage the custody, how to change internal policies, you know, so all these other groups can move into the space. Now, what potentially could happen here is that we see, you know, dozens or hundreds of, you know, the largest companies in the states move in this direction as a hedge against quantitative easing. [00:26:30][93.0]

Alec Renehan: [00:26:31] Well, equity mates have I think we did it before, Elon. So Elon followed us. But our equity mates has a bit of crypto on the balance sheet. Fantastic. We'll be hedging against the deflation as well. [00:26:43][12.2]

Bryce Leske: [00:26:45] We should also hold a conference to tell people the podcast. [00:26:49][3.9]

Alec Renehan: [00:26:50] It was actually super easy. We just contacted someone to ask if they could set up a business account. They did. And we bought. That's funny. [00:26:56][6.2]

Bryce Leske: [00:26:56] Yeah. We just need to I mean, it's not surprising that, you know, they are holding conferences and everyone's tweeting to its 46 million followers to buy Bitcoin because inevitably everyone's going to pile in. His fortune is going to skyrocket. So, yeah, for sure. I'm surprised. [00:27:13][16.3]

Alec Renehan: [00:27:14] So you touched on the inflation hedge there. And I think, you know, a lot of people you know, a lot of people who listen to our show for a while would have heard us talk about it, you know, mainly in terms of what it has meant for the equity markets. And, you know, you can sort of draw a very strong correlation between the amount of money printing and a lot of that money flowing into the stock market since covid here. But, you know, Bitcoin people often talk about Bitcoin as the hedge against inflation. There are other hedges, gold being one of them. And, you know, bamboo as a platform offers both crypto in Bitcoin eleftheria and then precious metals in gold and silver. So you're really covering your bases in terms of hedging against inflation. Um, I guess how do you think about the difference, the choice between Bitcoin and gold? [00:28:07][53.2]

Blake Cassidy: [00:28:08] And they're very similar in their call. It is. Traditionally, gold has been used as a hedge and similarly silver. But gold and silver, there are costs associated with the storage. So, you know, I don't know if you guys have bought any gold or silver lately, [00:28:24][16.7]

Alec Renehan: [00:28:25] but what price has a few necklaces that he keeps saying, yeah, [00:28:30][4.8]

Blake Cassidy: [00:28:32] okay. Yeah. So there's a lot of costs associated with storing them. There's generally you lose a few percent as soon as you buy it. You know, it's okay if that's a long term, long term investment, but it is clunky and no one walks around with gold with them. Now Bitcoin similarly is a deflationary asset, but it's far more portable and it has, you know, potentially more utility if people can use it for the day to day purposes. And gold has traditionally been seen as a hedge and many countries all around the world have gold as part of their treasury. But what we may see over the next decade is that Bitcoin also forms part of government treasuries. And it's going to be really interesting if this happens. So, for example, if Germany or the US or your Brazil comes in and say, hey, you know, we need to have half a percent of this thing, you know, and a lot of other countries will follow suit if that sort of thing starts happening. [00:29:33][61.3]

Alec Renehan: [00:29:34] Yeah, there have been some articles and stuff about central banks creating digital currencies. I guess my question is going to be very general, like, what's the go with that? Is that something that would happen? Is that would you count that as a cryptocurrency if they did? [00:29:52][17.8]

Blake Cassidy: [00:29:53] They are certainly using block chain technology, the groups, the countries that are planning on doing this. But it's going to be not decentralized. It's going to be very, very centralized. The first country with the most prominent country that's looking at this is China and with the Chinese yen and groups like Alibaba, you know, encouraging this sort of innovation. And we are seeing like the euro investigate it and other countries. Now, what this allows them to do once it's fully used and distributed for commerce is that they can instead of they know where all the money is at one time, you know, they can order the whole currency with a piece of code and find out how much have you spent, how much taxes have you paid? No longer would they need auditors for companies or individuals. It could be a piece of code. It creates extreme efficiencies. So I have no doubt that over the next decade will see many other large nation states moving in this direction. And potentially one day as we move towards a cashless society, every country will be using this technology. [00:31:02][68.6]

Bryce Leske: [00:31:02] It's also a political play because if the central bank of taking ownership of paying people direct, then the government on the ones having it on their balance sheet. Well, as [00:31:12][9.9]

Alec Renehan: [00:31:13] I understand that [00:31:14][0.8]

Bryce Leske: [00:31:14] well, because the government isn't coming out and putting a billion dollars in debt on their balance sheet because the Reserve Bank themselves are the ones that are pushing out the cryptid direct into a bank account. [00:31:24][9.7]

Alec Renehan: [00:31:25] No, the government would still have to raise debt, wouldn't they? [00:31:28][3.6]

Bryce Leske: [00:31:29] Now, that's one of the arguments, is that it can all be sitting within the central bank and they can just directly transact with you with their crypto if it is still in play. And the government don't have to be the ones to take on debt and also pay you that, right? [00:31:44][15.1]

Blake Cassidy: [00:31:44] I'm not sure. I haven't heard that. But it's possible [00:31:46][1.8]

Alec Renehan: [00:31:47] it feels like that, you know, isn't it, that just going to try and digitize the currency? I mean, the money system will still work the same way that the central bank will issue. [00:31:57][9.3]

Bryce Leske: [00:31:57] But like, no, I mean, to the point where they could have still Faya and the government still takes that sort of side of things. And then the central bank can also have their digital currency transacting as well. [00:32:08][10.9]

Alec Renehan: [00:32:09] Right. Well, I mean, let's not get bogged down in this, but I'm going to put something in the show notes. [00:32:13][4.5]

Bryce Leske: [00:32:14] I'll put a YouTube link. [00:32:15][0.7]

Alec Renehan: [00:32:15] OK, so what's happening in crypto at the moment? What's happened really since Bitcoin was started in 2011, if you think sort of five years, maybe 10 years into the future, what do you think is going to what do you expect to happen over the next five or 10 years? [00:32:31][16.2]

Blake Cassidy: [00:32:32] So first up, we're going to see more government coins. That's low-hanging fruit. And we're also going to see more block chain based clearing systems. So the ASX, for example, is moving away from their chest clearing system to a block chain based clearing system. And they've many other exchanges around the world for equities will move in this direction. We also believe that currently there's there's 20 per cent of Australians that own cryptocurrency. And over the next five years, that's going to move to to 50 percent or beyond and form part of many people's portfolio in the same way that equities do. We're going to see more large investment funds, endowment funds, and governments move into the space. And I think this is a self-fulfilling prophecy. As soon as a couple do it, then another doesn't do it. And then before you know it, there's hundreds and thousands. So that's certainly going to happen over the next five years. And in regard to price, you know, it's really hard to say where it's going. But if these large institutions do start coming into space, it is going to be very interesting as they move billions of dollars into a finite supply. [00:33:44][71.5]

Alec Renehan: [00:33:44] Yeah, well, it's just a supply and demand play. Really? Yeah. I don't have anything more to say. [00:33:50][5.4]

Blake Cassidy: [00:33:51] Exactly right. [00:33:52][0.5]

Bryce Leske: [00:33:54] So can I guess a yes or no answer is can governments ban Bitcoin? [00:33:58][4.2]

Blake Cassidy: [00:34:00] They could ban Bitcoin in the same way that they could ban the Internet. So, you know, I think what we would see to be a more likely scenario is it being regulated and restricted in some ways. And even in China, where the Internet is regulated and restricted, people still use VPN to have access to the full Internet. So I think, you know, that's kind of the worst-case scenario. [00:34:24][23.7]

Alec Renehan: [00:34:25] It wasn't quite a yes or no answer. The press tried to hide it, but I think I think it was a good answer. It's really like as long as there are people mining and the block chain is there, it can never be fully banned. [00:34:37][11.8]

Blake Cassidy: [00:34:38] I don't think it can be banned. You know, people always find ways to use it. I think, you know, if one country bans it, they're stunting innovation and they're locking themselves out of, you know, lots of commerce and business. So they'll be doing it at their own peril, in my opinion. [00:34:55][16.9]

Bryce Leske: [00:34:56] So there's one other component I quickly want to touch on, and that is the cold storage element. And this probably ties into bamboo because I want to understand what it means if you are dollar-cost averaging and building portfolios in these platforms. So firstly, do you want to address what sort of cold storage is or how you can securely store Bitcoin and then how that feeds into something like bamboo and if it's possible and how. Yeah, you can securely and safely start investing in Bitcoin. Hmm. [00:35:26][29.9]

Blake Cassidy: [00:35:26] Yeah. So cold storage is a way of storing your digital assets offline so they can't be hacked now. This is generally thought of best practice, but there are new technologies that provide things like warm storage that are just as secure but can still be online in some capacities. Now, at Bambu, we have ensured custardy wallets that hold up Bitcoin and are online, but they're extremely safe and they use military-grade technology to secure the wallets. [00:35:59][32.6]

Alec Renehan: [00:36:00] So like actually has an AK 47 behind the great. [00:36:04][4.2]

Blake Cassidy: [00:36:05] Yeah, that's our security. [00:36:06][0.7]

Alec Renehan: [00:36:09] So what you said, they're insured. So that means if my Bitcoin gets hacked on Bambo, I'll get paid that back from the insurance company. [00:36:18][9.0]

Blake Cassidy: [00:36:19] Yeah, that's exactly right. So the way that it works is that if the insured solution gets hacked or if there's some sort of fraud, then the insurance company would investigate and then compensate if there is a legitimate claim there. But the crypto can't be hacked off your mobile phone. It's completely separate. And the mobile app is more of an interface to allow you to buy and sell and manage your portfolio. [00:36:44][25.5]

Bryce Leske: [00:36:46] So that kind of ties in nicely to, I guess, the end of this conversation around what Bambu can sort of offer in terms of investment strategies. You know, Alec and I often speak about the value of consistently just putting money into the market over a long period of time, taking the emotion out of it. And I think that's what is certainly appealing to us when it comes to Bambury, because you can micro invest into Bambu and then when that rounds up to, what is it, 50 bucks, [00:37:16][30.0]

Blake Cassidy: [00:37:17] 50 dollars, [00:37:17][0.3]

Bryce Leske: [00:37:17] 50 bucks, you then take it out of the account and divvy that between whatever the portfolio set up is used between Bitcoin, Ethereum gold, and silver. And obviously, you don't have to use this platform for Bitcoin or Ethereum. If you want to stick to the traditional methods of hedging inflation or whatever you might want to use gold for or silver, then you can also use the AT4 for that. So I think when it comes to an incredibly volatile asset like cryptocurrency, Bitcoin and Ethereum dripping into and taking the emotion out of these sorts of assets is a good way to, I guess, build a portfolio without having to time the market because good luck trying to time a 40 percent, 40 percent drop and then a 20 percent recovery in 60 seconds. Exactly. [00:38:05][47.5]

Blake Cassidy: [00:38:05] Yeah, exactly. Right. So not even the professionals can time it all the time. You know, it's very difficult and it's a very volatile market. So we've designed the app to help people be as successful as possible. But dollar cost averaging, buying small amounts every week or month so that they can get an average price into the marketplace. And I think this is really cool because when the price is down, you buy more of the asset. When the price is up, you're buying less of the asset. So we've had some people do really well. They have been dollar cost averaging over the last two years. And you have going increase their portfolio by, you know, five, six, seven hundred percent. So the strategy works and it's really great to see those success stories. [00:38:46][40.7]

Alec Renehan: [00:38:47] And then I guess. When I am putting my money into bamboo, are you then, you know, take the rounds up, gets to 50, you take it even buying those assets, are you just buying, like derivative products or, you know? [00:39:00][13.5]

Blake Cassidy: [00:39:01] Yeah, no, we certainly buy those products we API into a cryptocurrency exchange and execute those trades instantaneously as well as you sell orders and then, you know, deposit the money into a bank account. [00:39:15][14.0]

Alec Renehan: [00:39:15] And then let's say I build my million dollar crypto portfolio on Bambo and then I want to take it into cold storage or take it off the platform or whatever. Like what are the rules around that? Like, how do I do that? [00:39:29][13.3]

Blake Cassidy: [00:39:29] Yeah, that's a good question. So we don't allow people to move crypto off the platform. This is generally done on cryptocurrency exchanges and we're not a crypto exchange. We're a savings app and we package something up that allows people to dollar cost, average mockeries, save and, you know, hedge out of, you know, hedge against currency inflation in a very simple and easy way. And we try to remove the complexity. Now, once you start interacting with cold storage wallets, I'm sending crypto around to other people in other locations. There's a lot of opportunity of messing it up. And there's a bit of a learning curve there because if you send crypto to the wrong address, you lose it. You know, you can't call the bank or Visa and get the transaction reversed. So we try to make investment effortless and people can certainly go off and do that on other platforms, but not without. [00:40:23][53.9]

Alec Renehan: [00:40:24] Yeah, I think that's the main thing about Bambo. It's just it's the easiest one we found just in terms of like set and forget dollar cost average. Yeah. [00:40:31][7.8]

Bryce Leske: [00:40:32] So for those who want to get started on their crypto journey with Bambury, you can head across, download the app and sign up, use equity markets as the card and they'll throw ten bucks your way to start in whatever your portfolio set up is. So, equity mates, that's the card. Don't forget it. [00:40:51][18.9]

Alec Renehan: [00:40:51] I would be very surprised if anyone did ten dollars just in silver. [00:40:54][2.9]

Bryce Leske: [00:40:58] Well Blake, it's been an absolute pleasure chatting with you. You know, you've got a pretty interesting background and all the best with bamboo over the next few years. We're certainly going to be following this one pretty closely. Equity markets, as I said, is all about making markets accessible. And as you know, many, many sort of offers like this come into the market. And we're pretty selective in the ones that we talk about, because I guess you can't talk about the more important. [00:41:23][24.7]

Alec Renehan: [00:41:23] There's a certain other podcast that we won't name that has gone all in on crypto and we don't want to do that. But we are where crypto curious, as we like to say, and we think we think you want your building is pretty interesting. [00:41:35][11.6]

Blake Cassidy: [00:41:36] Fantastic. Thanks so much for having me, guys. Great to be here. And hopefully, we can speak again. [00:41:36][0.0]

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