WEBVTT - Is Crypto Going Extinct? with Stacy-Marie Ishmael #583 0:00:00.080 --> 0:00:02.920 Welcome to How the Money. I'm Joel and I am Matt. 0:00:03.120 --> 0:00:06.600 Today we're asking the question is crypto going extinct? With 0:00:06.840 --> 0:00:28.960 Stacy Marie Ishmael. That's right, Joel, we are diving into 0:00:28.960 --> 0:00:32.320 cryptocurrencies today because guess what, Uh, there's a very good 0:00:32.400 --> 0:00:35.640 chance that if you're listening, your crypto holdings are worth 0:00:35.800 --> 0:00:38.760 much less and you might be a little concerned. Um. 0:00:38.800 --> 0:00:41.240 And if so, it turns out you're not alone because 0:00:41.280 --> 0:00:44.000 a recent bank Rate survey show that only about thirty 0:00:44.360 --> 0:00:47.479 of millennials are comfortable investing in crypto today, which is 0:00:47.680 --> 0:00:50.960 down from about a year ago. There's just not as 0:00:51.040 --> 0:00:54.360 much confidence in crypto as there used to be. And 0:00:54.400 --> 0:00:57.240 so we're excited to be joined by Stacy Marie Ishmael 0:00:57.640 --> 0:01:00.520 for yours. Stacy, she used to work at The Finance Times, 0:01:00.520 --> 0:01:03.720 where she started the block Alphaville. She's worked as a 0:01:03.800 --> 0:01:06.560 senior editor at Apple, and now she's a writer and 0:01:06.600 --> 0:01:10.440 podcaster over at Bloomberg, where basically she eats and drinks 0:01:10.440 --> 0:01:14.440 crypto every single day. So, Stacy, thank you for joining 0:01:14.480 --> 0:01:16.920 us today. Thank you so much for having me. I 0:01:16.920 --> 0:01:19.759 wouldn't say that crypto is like super delicious as a mean, 0:01:21.400 --> 0:01:23.240 I was wondering. Yeah, bacon eggs in a side of 0:01:23.240 --> 0:01:25.520 cryptos like that that sounds like a nice breakfast and 0:01:25.520 --> 0:01:29.080 and well balanced, probably too. Uh Well, the first question 0:01:29.160 --> 0:01:32.280 we ask everybody that comes on the show, Stacy, is 0:01:32.680 --> 0:01:34.320 we want to know what they explored John Matt and 0:01:34.400 --> 0:01:36.319 I we sported John beer. We already showed you ours 0:01:36.360 --> 0:01:39.360 before we started recording. It's uh an expensive like twenty 0:01:39.360 --> 0:01:41.880 dollar bottle craft here that we're enjoying on today's episode 0:01:42.080 --> 0:01:44.360 and very much looking forward to talking about this at 0:01:44.360 --> 0:01:47.319 the end. Yeah. Well, and so we we sporge on 0:01:47.360 --> 0:01:50.640 that while we're saving and investing well for the future. So, yeah, 0:01:50.640 --> 0:01:52.040 what's that sport for you? What do you like to 0:01:52.040 --> 0:01:53.920 spend money on where people might think you're you're a 0:01:53.920 --> 0:01:58.520 little crazy for for doing it? Fountain pens. Oh, very nice. 0:01:58.800 --> 0:02:02.880 It's basically like the sit of cryptocurrency, like what is 0:02:02.920 --> 0:02:08.240 the most Yeah? Absolutely? Was this something you've always been 0:02:08.240 --> 0:02:11.280 into or was it because you needed something to juxtapose 0:02:11.840 --> 0:02:15.480 against cryptocurrencies and all the digital stuff that you're into. Oh, 0:02:15.520 --> 0:02:19.120 I've always been into it. So I'm left handed and 0:02:19.800 --> 0:02:22.200 a curse of being left handed, as you find that 0:02:22.280 --> 0:02:25.480 most pens don't work for you, and so I kind 0:02:25.480 --> 0:02:28.440 of fell down this path relatively early on of trying 0:02:28.480 --> 0:02:31.280 to find the perfect pen and trying to find, you know, 0:02:31.760 --> 0:02:34.680 something that would make my handwriting look a little bit 0:02:34.720 --> 0:02:37.320 less like chicken scratches. And somebody was like, have you 0:02:37.320 --> 0:02:39.040 heard of fountain pens? I was like, no, but I'm 0:02:39.040 --> 0:02:41.400 going to find out everything there is to know. And 0:02:41.440 --> 0:02:45.200 then I found out how expensive these can get, and 0:02:45.240 --> 0:02:47.120 it was a whole thing. So Matt and I we 0:02:47.120 --> 0:02:50.040 have a mutual friend who got so into fountain pens. 0:02:50.320 --> 0:02:52.040 He and I didn't. I was like, oh, that's cool. 0:02:52.080 --> 0:02:54.000 I'm glad that you're that you're interested in this, and 0:02:54.000 --> 0:02:55.919 he would talk about it occasionally show off his pens. 0:02:56.200 --> 0:02:59.160 But he went to a physical conference I have really 0:02:59.200 --> 0:03:03.080 wanted to go to. Okay, he had a really good time. 0:03:03.160 --> 0:03:05.200 So I think it would be worth the time and 0:03:05.320 --> 0:03:07.600 energy that it would take for you to get like, 0:03:08.760 --> 0:03:11.440 I didn't know that was a thing, but okay, So 0:03:12.440 --> 0:03:14.240 can I ask what is the most expensive pen that 0:03:14.320 --> 0:03:19.560 you own? It's okay, ask you can ask, um, the 0:03:19.600 --> 0:03:22.440 most expensive pen that I own is not the most 0:03:22.440 --> 0:03:26.200 expensive pen that I want, but I would say that 0:03:26.400 --> 0:03:29.720 I have spent at least there was one pen in 0:03:29.760 --> 0:03:35.360 particular that cost me more than all Right, I like it. 0:03:36.920 --> 0:03:39.160 I would love to just I mean, I've never held 0:03:39.200 --> 0:03:41.360 a pen like that before. It is I'm gorgeous, It 0:03:41.400 --> 0:03:45.800 writes beautifully, it's perfectly balanced. It is a work of arts. Okay, yeah, 0:03:45.840 --> 0:03:47.600 that's exactly. I have to follow up with this then, 0:03:47.800 --> 0:03:51.040 So how often are you writing letters to people? Because 0:03:51.080 --> 0:03:52.720 I would think if this is a sporge, like you 0:03:52.760 --> 0:03:54.920 don't want to get these pens just so you can 0:03:55.000 --> 0:03:57.120 you're not looking just look look at I'm putting them 0:03:57.120 --> 0:03:59.200 on the wall or something like that, Like are you 0:03:59.240 --> 0:04:02.560 are you often writing letters like old school style to 0:04:02.720 --> 0:04:05.200 fans and family? I even make wax seals for them. 0:04:05.960 --> 0:04:08.920 That's that's all. That is awesome. That is Can you 0:04:08.960 --> 0:04:11.680 send us a letter? We will send address. We'll give 0:04:11.720 --> 0:04:13.960 you our our millions, like put us on your your 0:04:14.000 --> 0:04:16.400 Christmas card list or whatever whatever in holiday card you 0:04:16.400 --> 0:04:18.760 send out. We would love to be on the receiving 0:04:18.880 --> 0:04:21.240 end of that beautiful writing. Well. I love that it's 0:04:21.240 --> 0:04:23.279 coming back to and and that you're helping bring it 0:04:23.279 --> 0:04:25.520 back because it's it's one of the like there's not 0:04:25.640 --> 0:04:28.599 much better than something handwritten from somebody to share to 0:04:28.680 --> 0:04:31.360 show that like you, you, you were thoughtful about you, 0:04:31.600 --> 0:04:33.479 you care about them. So I think it's cool. I 0:04:33.480 --> 0:04:36.080 think it's super cool as well. Thanks for sharing that, Stacy. 0:04:36.680 --> 0:04:39.440 Uh So, your background, right, like, you've lived, You've gone 0:04:39.440 --> 0:04:41.960 to school all over the world, just generally speaking, How 0:04:42.000 --> 0:04:45.560 has spending just a significant amount of time, you know, 0:04:45.560 --> 0:04:47.720 on a few different continents, how has that impacted your 0:04:47.760 --> 0:04:51.320 perspective when it comes to just economic matters that we're 0:04:51.320 --> 0:04:54.880 dealing with today. I think I've been very fortunate to 0:04:54.880 --> 0:05:00.080 be able to live what it feels like to not 0:05:00.200 --> 0:05:03.680 just like think about things like foreign exchange in the abstract, 0:05:03.839 --> 0:05:07.400 but actually go from one country to another where you know, 0:05:07.440 --> 0:05:10.560 all of my savings were in the Trinidad and Tobago 0:05:10.640 --> 0:05:14.160 dollar and I was paying bills in the the British 0:05:14.200 --> 0:05:18.240 pounds sterling, or to experience what it's like to have 0:05:18.920 --> 0:05:21.000 in one place, what would be considered kind of like 0:05:21.000 --> 0:05:23.440 a very comfortable standard of living that costs X y 0:05:23.520 --> 0:05:26.160 z amount, and then you moved to say San Francisco, 0:05:27.240 --> 0:05:30.599 where for exactly the same amount and rent you essentially 0:05:30.600 --> 0:05:33.760 live in a closet with no window. Um and it's 0:05:33.760 --> 0:05:37.640 it's really made me appreciate how important having a range 0:05:37.640 --> 0:05:40.560 of understandings of local contexts is as a as a reporter, 0:05:40.600 --> 0:05:43.680 as an and as an editor. Okay, talk to me, 0:05:43.760 --> 0:05:46.599 talk to me about your how you got interested in cryptocurrency, 0:05:46.680 --> 0:05:49.760 because yeah, you're at the point you host a daily 0:05:49.760 --> 0:05:51.919 podcast about it. Like Matt said at the beginning, you 0:05:52.000 --> 0:05:54.960 eat and breathe crypto and so like, what what got 0:05:54.960 --> 0:05:58.719 to this point where Stacy Marie Ishmael is now like 0:05:59.520 --> 0:06:03.839 that enthusiastic, that interested in the space where you hold 0:06:03.839 --> 0:06:06.599 client sinker that's your day job. Now, this is a 0:06:06.640 --> 0:06:09.960 reasonable question, and it comes from, I think the confluence 0:06:10.000 --> 0:06:12.520 of several of my interests. So when I started as 0:06:12.520 --> 0:06:17.040 a finance report to financial journalist, I was responsible for 0:06:17.839 --> 0:06:21.760 covering structured finance, for covering things like derivatives, for covering 0:06:21.839 --> 0:06:26.000 things that were called credit default swaps, um. I was 0:06:26.080 --> 0:06:28.960 looking at mortgage backed securities, you know, all the things 0:06:28.960 --> 0:06:30.400 that in two thousand and eight seemed like a good 0:06:30.400 --> 0:06:33.520 idea until they stopped seeming like a good idea. And 0:06:33.920 --> 0:06:35.800 so I've been I've always been interested in, like what 0:06:35.920 --> 0:06:38.960 is the nerdiest possible corner of a financial market and 0:06:38.960 --> 0:06:41.279 how can I make that interesting and accessible to people 0:06:41.279 --> 0:06:44.680 other than me and my immediate editors. And I've always 0:06:44.680 --> 0:06:46.560 also been the kind of person who is super interested 0:06:46.560 --> 0:06:50.279 in technology, Like I've worked at large and small technology companies. 0:06:50.440 --> 0:06:53.479 I was definitely the friend that would build your website. 0:06:53.920 --> 0:06:55.840 I was definitely the friend that you'd be like, I 0:06:55.839 --> 0:06:57.800 can't get by pre ne to work, like try this. 0:06:58.360 --> 0:07:03.279 And you know, crypto is essentially the confluence of risk pricing, 0:07:03.600 --> 0:07:09.679 financial arbitrage and speculation, and interesting underlying technology smashed together. 0:07:10.360 --> 0:07:13.600 M Yeah, that makes sense. Okay, So I mean, on 0:07:13.600 --> 0:07:16.200 that note, can you maybe just give us a brief 0:07:16.440 --> 0:07:20.440 cryptocurrency history or just like an evolution, And obviously there's 0:07:20.440 --> 0:07:22.800 a lot to cover, but cover and kind of like 0:07:22.840 --> 0:07:25.120 go over the aspects of crypto that you think are 0:07:25.200 --> 0:07:30.280 most important given where we are with crypto today. So 0:07:31.600 --> 0:07:34.160 in a historical context, the main thing to understand is 0:07:34.200 --> 0:07:38.280 that crypto, which started as bitcoin, started as a rejection 0:07:38.600 --> 0:07:42.800 of traditional banking, started as a rejection of the idea 0:07:42.960 --> 0:07:46.240 that governments should have a say in your ability to 0:07:46.320 --> 0:07:49.600 transact with somebody else, and started as a rejection of 0:07:49.640 --> 0:07:53.200 the idea that you should have to trust big centralized 0:07:53.200 --> 0:07:57.560 agencies like central banks or banks in general, to be 0:07:57.640 --> 0:08:00.520 an intermediary in those same types of trans actions. And 0:08:00.560 --> 0:08:03.760 this was all written out in a relatively short white 0:08:03.760 --> 0:08:07.480 paper about thirteen years ago that was the origins of bitcoin, 0:08:07.600 --> 0:08:09.800 and it was based on you know, like some some 0:08:09.880 --> 0:08:14.800 political theories, some philosophies, some mathematical proofs, some conspiracy theory. Toadah, 0:08:14.920 --> 0:08:18.680 you've got a bitcoin white paper. And since then what 0:08:18.920 --> 0:08:22.480 it has evolved into is absolutely for a lot of 0:08:22.480 --> 0:08:26.320 people are kind of an ideological expression of other deeply 0:08:26.440 --> 0:08:29.240 held beliefs that they might have. For some people it's 0:08:29.240 --> 0:08:32.680 a means of transacting. For some people it's a means 0:08:32.880 --> 0:08:35.720 of you know, kind of speculating and generating some kind 0:08:35.720 --> 0:08:38.520 of financial yield. And for other people it's just like 0:08:38.600 --> 0:08:40.920 an interesting problem to be solved. They're like, oh, this 0:08:40.920 --> 0:08:42.840 this is a cool piece of technology. What what can 0:08:42.880 --> 0:08:45.760 I build on top of this? Yeah, So it seems 0:08:45.760 --> 0:08:48.880 like there's definitely some we mentioned political elements are certainly 0:08:48.920 --> 0:08:51.960 some like libertarian libertarian leaning elements right in a lot 0:08:52.000 --> 0:08:55.120 of the crypto space. And and we we take a 0:08:55.120 --> 0:08:58.080 look step back and you look at maybe decentralized finance 0:08:58.080 --> 0:09:00.800 as a whole um I guess what what do you 0:09:00.840 --> 0:09:03.080 think what makes it worth striving for? Or what do 0:09:03.120 --> 0:09:06.840 these people, the people who are who are crypto enthusiasts enthusiasts, 0:09:06.840 --> 0:09:09.600 what what what makes them think that the centralized finance 0:09:09.800 --> 0:09:12.120 is worth striving for. I guess to our listener, the 0:09:12.120 --> 0:09:15.559 average American, right, it feels like the current system works 0:09:15.559 --> 0:09:18.600 decently well. Sure, the banks, their credit card companies, they 0:09:18.640 --> 0:09:21.160 make lots of money on every transaction that we make. 0:09:21.480 --> 0:09:24.080 But you know, the system, it meets our needs pretty 0:09:24.080 --> 0:09:26.120 well and it seems to hold up. So why in 0:09:26.160 --> 0:09:28.520 the world do we need defy in our lives? Well, 0:09:28.559 --> 0:09:31.120 if let's jump back to two thousand and you know, 0:09:31.200 --> 0:09:34.920 the sort of late two thousand's, early two thousand tens, 0:09:34.920 --> 0:09:37.520 when for a lot of people, particularly people in the 0:09:37.559 --> 0:09:40.079 United States, they wouldn't say that the financial system was 0:09:40.120 --> 0:09:43.280 working particularly well. There were tons of people that had 0:09:43.520 --> 0:09:47.560 lost their homes to mortgage foreclosure. There were people who 0:09:47.559 --> 0:09:51.480 had lost their savings to bank failures. There were people 0:09:51.520 --> 0:09:55.720 who were looking at those same banks that they were saying, hey, sorry, 0:09:55.760 --> 0:09:57.480 we we can't pay you back. We're out of money. 0:09:57.720 --> 0:10:00.240 Their ceo s were like flying around in private It's 0:10:00.280 --> 0:10:03.960 like there was this real perception on both ends of 0:10:03.960 --> 0:10:07.720 the political spectrum that you know, banks, the financial system 0:10:07.760 --> 0:10:11.560 was not serving the quote unquote average American and a 0:10:11.600 --> 0:10:14.880 lot of the belief system of crypto is well reject 0:10:15.160 --> 0:10:18.520 that system that wasn't serving you, and let's create a 0:10:18.559 --> 0:10:24.160 different one that is based on much more egalitarian principles. 0:10:24.679 --> 0:10:28.120 And that idea of we don't need to rely on 0:10:28.200 --> 0:10:31.000 somebody else who is just like looking to monetize us 0:10:31.559 --> 0:10:33.560 to you know, to be able to participate in a 0:10:33.600 --> 0:10:36.160 financial system was really powerful for a lot of people 0:10:36.200 --> 0:10:38.760 and remains really powerful for a lot of people, even 0:10:38.760 --> 0:10:41.400 though a lot of people are doing just fine and 0:10:41.440 --> 0:10:44.560 are not facing foreclosure and actually are using banks to 0:10:44.600 --> 0:10:47.640 store their considerable assets that they may have generated from 0:10:47.640 --> 0:10:50.839 bitcoin or otherwise. You know, this narrative, the story the 0:10:50.840 --> 0:10:54.320 white paper behind crypto, like our bitcoin specifically, like it's 0:10:55.120 --> 0:10:57.160 it's been like like you said, it's been around for 0:10:57.200 --> 0:10:58.600 a while, but I think a lot of folks have 0:10:58.640 --> 0:11:00.880 kind of jumped onto it within the recent years. Um, 0:11:01.280 --> 0:11:04.400 do you think that that story, that narrative combined with 0:11:04.559 --> 0:11:06.760 than what we experienced with the pandemic, right, like the 0:11:06.760 --> 0:11:09.520 pandemic coupled with stimmy checks. Do you think all those 0:11:09.520 --> 0:11:12.160 things combined contributed to the to the rise and the 0:11:12.200 --> 0:11:15.920 fall that that we've seen cryptocurrencies and door Absolutely, So 0:11:15.960 --> 0:11:18.040 I have a um, my friends will have heard me 0:11:18.080 --> 0:11:19.400 say this, So if any of them are listening, they're 0:11:19.440 --> 0:11:21.320 about to rule their eyes. But I have I have 0:11:21.400 --> 0:11:28.440 a unified theory of like video games, meme stocks, crypto reddit, 0:11:29.240 --> 0:11:32.320 which is that all of these things kind of tapped 0:11:32.400 --> 0:11:36.280 into a desire to be a part of something. They 0:11:36.440 --> 0:11:39.240 tapped into the fact that a lot of people were 0:11:39.240 --> 0:11:41.360 just spending a lot of time staring at computer screens 0:11:41.520 --> 0:11:45.880 because they couldn't go outside, and that for various reasons, 0:11:45.880 --> 0:11:49.000 some folks had like an above average amount of disposable income. 0:11:49.760 --> 0:11:53.200 And so you know, whether it was people suddenly spending 0:11:53.440 --> 0:11:56.280 a bunch of money playing video games or getting aggressively 0:11:56.400 --> 0:11:59.440 into online poker in the states where that's allowed, or 0:11:59.720 --> 0:12:02.600 you know, trying to persuade everybody that buying game stop 0:12:02.640 --> 0:12:04.680 is a good idea, or shares and game Stop was 0:12:04.679 --> 0:12:07.440 a good idea. It was the sort of the same fuel. 0:12:07.640 --> 0:12:10.480 Everything was fueled by very similar things, and none of 0:12:10.520 --> 0:12:12.640 those things really have to do with that sense of 0:12:12.840 --> 0:12:16.160 you know, pure libertarianism. None of that necessarily requires you 0:12:16.200 --> 0:12:19.319 to have read a white paper. It's just a sense of, Oh, 0:12:19.360 --> 0:12:22.040 this coin that looks like a sheba. You knew that 0:12:22.080 --> 0:12:25.280 Elon Muski is talking about. That seems fun and I 0:12:25.320 --> 0:12:27.439 need fun, and I'm going to do something like that. 0:12:27.520 --> 0:12:30.040 And you know, so there was it is impossible to 0:12:30.080 --> 0:12:33.240 separate some of the price increases of the past two 0:12:33.320 --> 0:12:38.400 years with the overarching macro reality of all of these 0:12:38.400 --> 0:12:40.280 other things that were happening at the same time. It's 0:12:40.280 --> 0:12:41.680 it's almost like it was just in the right place 0:12:41.720 --> 0:12:43.880 at the right time. Like it kind of makes me 0:12:43.920 --> 0:12:47.720 wonder if cryptocurrencies didn't exist, Well, what when we have 0:12:47.760 --> 0:12:51.280 turned to write like just as a world in particular 0:12:51.280 --> 0:12:53.600 here in the US, Like, what would all of those 0:12:53.640 --> 0:12:57.160 individuals have done instead of dumping that money into crypto 0:12:57.400 --> 0:12:59.560 As physical communities are kind of breaking down and you 0:12:59.600 --> 0:13:02.200 can't in time with people that you're close to in 0:13:02.240 --> 0:13:05.599 the ways that you're used to. It's the cryptocurrency is 0:13:05.640 --> 0:13:07.679 kind of filled a void and I don't know what 0:13:07.679 --> 0:13:10.600 they absolutely did, And it's you know, whether you look 0:13:10.640 --> 0:13:13.599 at subreddits like our Cryptocurrency, which is one of the 0:13:13.679 --> 0:13:16.959 largest on Reddit, or you know, Discord, which I tend 0:13:17.000 --> 0:13:19.480 to describe as like slack for video games. There were 0:13:19.520 --> 0:13:22.400 so many people in there that in between sharing trading 0:13:22.440 --> 0:13:24.320 tips or whatever they were talking about, we're just like 0:13:24.320 --> 0:13:27.280 talking about their lives and you know, just kind of 0:13:27.320 --> 0:13:30.760 sharing experiences and finding community in a way that also 0:13:30.840 --> 0:13:32.600 happened to be like, oh, by the way, I'm buying 0:13:32.679 --> 0:13:34.040 this thing is going to the moon. You should get 0:13:34.040 --> 0:13:37.400 in on that as well. Yeah, okay, so I guess there. 0:13:37.400 --> 0:13:40.199 But there are more and more naysayers in the crypto 0:13:40.200 --> 0:13:42.800 space now or or or like you know, they talk 0:13:42.880 --> 0:13:45.200 about crypto even though they're not they're not in on 0:13:45.200 --> 0:13:47.920 on the game. And Jamie Diamonds, the CEO of Chase, 0:13:48.000 --> 0:13:49.960 he recently he called crypto. I mean this, I mean, 0:13:49.960 --> 0:13:52.080 I'm sure this made ripples in that Reddit community, right. 0:13:52.120 --> 0:13:55.440 He called crypto a decentralized Ponzi scheme. And he's He's 0:13:55.440 --> 0:13:57.319 not the only one who's kind of a Debbie Downer 0:13:57.400 --> 0:14:00.160 in this regard, but it certainly feels like, you know, 0:14:00.200 --> 0:14:02.160 anyone like Matt Side at the beginning, who invested some 0:14:02.200 --> 0:14:04.440 of their money around Super Bowl time earlier this year, 0:14:04.840 --> 0:14:07.439 like they might feel the same way as he does, so, 0:14:07.679 --> 0:14:11.200 I don't know how how has the crypto community responded 0:14:11.600 --> 0:14:14.360 to big time players like it are they? Is he 0:14:14.480 --> 0:14:17.319 like the arch nemesis now of the crypto community. There 0:14:17.320 --> 0:14:19.720 are so many animals in crypto, like Jamie Diavon, like 0:14:19.800 --> 0:14:22.760 some you know, the it's like you know those murder 0:14:22.760 --> 0:14:24.400 boards where there's just a bunch of people and they're 0:14:24.400 --> 0:14:27.200 connected by red string like some dudes. Somewhere definitely has 0:14:27.200 --> 0:14:31.720 like Jamie Diamond's face as well as Somewhere board somewhere. Um, well, 0:14:31.760 --> 0:14:34.120 I'll say a couple of things. One is, it is 0:14:34.320 --> 0:14:36.680 very much the case that a lot of people bought 0:14:36.720 --> 0:14:40.400 into crypto because prices were hitting all time highs and 0:14:40.680 --> 0:14:43.520 there was this this you know, legit fomo, this fair 0:14:43.520 --> 0:14:45.520 of missing out, this idea of like wow, all of 0:14:45.520 --> 0:14:48.520 my friends are suddenly rich on paper, Um, I want 0:14:48.560 --> 0:14:51.560 to get in on this action. And so, and that 0:14:51.600 --> 0:14:53.760 was before the super Bowl. For me, the Super Bowl 0:14:53.800 --> 0:14:55.840 was kind of like the toppi Ist top of the 0:14:55.920 --> 0:14:59.760 marketing crency. Um, you know, if like million dollar ads 0:14:59.800 --> 0:15:02.320 with famous celebrities, exactly Matt Damon is telling you to 0:15:02.360 --> 0:15:06.320 buy something, it's like a strong counter indicator. Otherwise you're weak, 0:15:07.200 --> 0:15:12.080 are you not your exactly so, but that enthusiasm has 0:15:12.120 --> 0:15:14.400 been going on for several months, and you know, like 0:15:14.440 --> 0:15:17.520 that September to December period is when you couldn't if 0:15:17.520 --> 0:15:19.400 you were a celebrity and you weren't talking about your 0:15:19.400 --> 0:15:22.160 board ape and ft like, were you even a celebrity? 0:15:22.480 --> 0:15:25.400 And but the reality for a lot of other people 0:15:25.480 --> 0:15:28.400 who bought into crypto in two thousand thirteen, two thousand 0:15:28.440 --> 0:15:31.760 fourteen when it was trading like the low thousands of dollars, 0:15:32.240 --> 0:15:34.120 is that even though it's down, you know, more than 0:15:34.160 --> 0:15:37.760 fifty this year, those people are still fine. And so 0:15:38.120 --> 0:15:41.280 you have this kind of dichotomy emerging in the market 0:15:41.440 --> 0:15:46.120 of folks who piled in at the top and folks 0:15:46.160 --> 0:15:50.520 who have been in from the beginning. And it's sort 0:15:50.560 --> 0:15:53.280 of it's almost like two sides talking past each other 0:15:53.560 --> 0:15:55.240 because a lot of the folks who piled in at 0:15:55.240 --> 0:15:57.040 the top, and to be clear, some of the people 0:15:57.120 --> 0:16:00.200 piled on the top were very sophisticated. They were, in 0:16:00.320 --> 0:16:02.600 kind of parlance, I'm sure folks and you're shore familiar with, 0:16:02.800 --> 0:16:05.720 considered like qualified investors. Right. They had they had the 0:16:05.760 --> 0:16:10.200 liquid assets, they had the background, they had the experience um, 0:16:10.240 --> 0:16:15.880 and they made decisions that institutional investors, including major hedge funds, 0:16:15.880 --> 0:16:18.360 were also making, Like this token looks like a smart bet, 0:16:18.880 --> 0:16:22.120 you know, hindsight and all that stuff. So I would 0:16:22.160 --> 0:16:24.360 be very careful not to say that everybody who came 0:16:24.400 --> 0:16:26.520 in because of the Super Bowl was like didn't know 0:16:26.560 --> 0:16:28.840 what they were doing. People who very much knew what 0:16:28.840 --> 0:16:31.720 they were doing also made bad bets and bad calculations. 0:16:32.000 --> 0:16:34.600 That's very true, good distinction to make, Stacy. You know, 0:16:34.640 --> 0:16:36.600 we're kind of talking about crypto here, just kind of 0:16:36.640 --> 0:16:39.360 widely and broadly. We're gonna take a quick break, but 0:16:39.440 --> 0:16:41.040 after that break, we're going to dive into kind of 0:16:41.120 --> 0:16:44.440 some of the more specific and practical applications that we 0:16:44.480 --> 0:16:48.320 can see cryptocurrencies impacting our lives directly. We'll get to 0:16:48.360 --> 0:17:00.280 all of that right after this our we're background the break, 0:17:00.360 --> 0:17:05.159 still talking with Stacy Marie Ishmael about cryptocurrency. And you know, 0:17:05.600 --> 0:17:09.080 we covered a lot of history, old history, recent history 0:17:09.400 --> 0:17:13.360 just a second ago. But obviously since the Super Bowl time, 0:17:13.440 --> 0:17:16.400 right since the topi ist of the top Stacy, we're 0:17:16.440 --> 0:17:19.399 we're experiencing a lot of volatility um a lull in 0:17:19.400 --> 0:17:22.520 the crypto market, right and so I guess I'm curious 0:17:22.560 --> 0:17:23.919 to hear from you. Like, We've got a lot of 0:17:23.960 --> 0:17:27.560 history to draw from when it comes to stock market recoveries, 0:17:27.760 --> 0:17:29.560 but we just, you know, we just don't have as 0:17:29.640 --> 0:17:32.840 much history on the crypto front. So how have you 0:17:32.880 --> 0:17:37.359 seen investing strategies shifting in the face of less data 0:17:37.480 --> 0:17:41.520 less information? There's a phrase in crypto that is deployed 0:17:42.000 --> 0:17:44.840 in a way that's not always helpful. Um that's called 0:17:44.840 --> 0:17:48.520 do your own research. And it's this it's you know, 0:17:48.560 --> 0:17:49.960 you would have seen this at the heights of meme 0:17:50.040 --> 0:17:52.960 stocks as well, But it's just this idea of you 0:17:52.960 --> 0:17:55.479 should be able to find out and you should be 0:17:55.520 --> 0:17:58.240 able to you know, like use Google, use Reddit, use 0:17:58.320 --> 0:18:01.280 discord talks to your financial advisor, whatever, but you should 0:18:01.280 --> 0:18:04.119 be able to figure this out for yourself. The reality, though, 0:18:04.280 --> 0:18:06.040 and I say this from the vantage points of somebody 0:18:06.040 --> 0:18:08.520 who works at in a newsroom that has access to 0:18:08.640 --> 0:18:11.879 like the best, fastest, most real time financial data in 0:18:11.880 --> 0:18:14.680 the world, you can stare at crypto data all day 0:18:14.720 --> 0:18:18.480 long and not be sure what exactly you're looking at because, 0:18:18.960 --> 0:18:21.920 as you say, you have a relatively short amount of 0:18:22.040 --> 0:18:25.080 like sample, right, it's you know, Thirteen years is not 0:18:25.119 --> 0:18:27.520 a long time for a financial asset to be in existence. 0:18:28.119 --> 0:18:32.520 You have many different types of pricing because one of 0:18:32.560 --> 0:18:35.200 the things about being decentralized is like you don't necessarily 0:18:35.240 --> 0:18:38.920 have one single clearing price that everybody agrees on is 0:18:38.920 --> 0:18:41.280 is the price. It can be quite hard to get 0:18:41.480 --> 0:18:44.880 certain other kinds of data, like volumes, you know, things 0:18:44.880 --> 0:18:47.080 that if you are like a traditional look at a 0:18:47.080 --> 0:18:49.719 person coming at this from a traditional financial perspective, You're like, 0:18:49.760 --> 0:18:53.320 how do you assess the fundamentals of bitcoin? Question mark? 0:18:53.880 --> 0:18:56.520 And the folks on the more skeptical side of the 0:18:56.520 --> 0:18:58.960 spectrum will say, well, bitcoin has no fundamentals, And the 0:18:59.000 --> 0:19:02.439 folks on the more maximalist side of the spectrum, she'll say, 0:19:02.440 --> 0:19:04.800 the fundamentals don't matter. What matters is like the future 0:19:04.840 --> 0:19:08.040 and the optimism and the limited supply, and so trying 0:19:08.080 --> 0:19:10.639 to value this thing like a traditional financial asset is 0:19:10.680 --> 0:19:14.960 extremely difficult. So what folks have done instead is things like, okay, 0:19:15.000 --> 0:19:18.719 what is crypto correlated to? And for a decent stretch 0:19:18.840 --> 0:19:21.680 over the past several months, it was very correlated with 0:19:22.040 --> 0:19:25.080 like big cap tech stocks, So you know, whatever Apple 0:19:25.359 --> 0:19:28.960 or Meta or Amazon were up to or even Netflix, 0:19:29.040 --> 0:19:30.720 like that was what you were going to see in bitcoin. 0:19:30.800 --> 0:19:33.760 You know, if you were to chart Bitcoin versus the 0:19:33.800 --> 0:19:36.360 fangs for a while, it looked like a single chart. 0:19:36.760 --> 0:19:38.560 Some people would look at this from the perspective of 0:19:38.640 --> 0:19:41.200 something that you said earlier. Okay, like nobody has stimmy 0:19:41.240 --> 0:19:44.160 checks anymore. There's less liquidity in the economy. That means 0:19:44.200 --> 0:19:45.960 that fewer people are going to have the appetite for 0:19:46.040 --> 0:19:48.639 riskier assets. We're going to expect that we're gonna adjust 0:19:48.640 --> 0:19:51.479 our price targets downward. But again, those are things that 0:19:51.520 --> 0:19:55.600 are almost orthogonal to crypto itself that folks are trying 0:19:55.640 --> 0:19:58.800 to model on top of, because again they're just there 0:19:58.800 --> 0:20:03.800 are very few crypto native inputs that are scalable and 0:20:03.880 --> 0:20:07.679 available for the average person to analyze. Right, Yeah, as 0:20:07.680 --> 0:20:09.360 we're trying to find these corollaries, I mean, a lot 0:20:09.359 --> 0:20:11.840 of folks said that Bitcoin that it would be this 0:20:11.880 --> 0:20:15.480 inflation hedge, almost like a like a digital form of gold, right, 0:20:15.520 --> 0:20:17.600 and so folks turn to sort of like those safe 0:20:17.640 --> 0:20:20.480 harbor assets like gold when you're seeing, you know, the 0:20:20.480 --> 0:20:24.280 market tank. But obviously as inflation has been soaring, Bitcoin 0:20:24.359 --> 0:20:27.200 has been crashing along with the market, and yeah, So, 0:20:27.359 --> 0:20:28.960 I mean, I guess why is it that you think 0:20:28.960 --> 0:20:31.320 bitcoin hasn't lived up to its billing. Is it just 0:20:31.359 --> 0:20:34.879 an improper comparison to something like gold or to something 0:20:35.200 --> 0:20:37.360 like some of the top stocks. Well, I think it's 0:20:37.359 --> 0:20:41.960 the difference between like theory and the reality of markets, right, 0:20:42.000 --> 0:20:44.159 which is, you can have a really good theory and 0:20:44.160 --> 0:20:47.920 then markets will be like ha ha you thought. And 0:20:48.240 --> 0:20:50.040 one of the but one of the things that is 0:20:50.080 --> 0:20:54.040 true about crypto is this is a This is an asset. 0:20:54.280 --> 0:20:56.600 Whether you're thinking about you know, the big ones like 0:20:56.880 --> 0:20:59.560