Speaker 1: All right, everyone, welcome back to another episode of the
Speaker 1: Market Disruptors podcast. Today, I'm joined by Alex Ailman. He's
Speaker 1: the CEO and co founder of Lolly and Lotly is
Speaker 1: a company that's really trying to push adoption, awareness and
Speaker 1: adoption in the bitcoin cryptocurrency space, and so someone that
Speaker 1: I'm really interested to talk to. So welcome Alex. Hey,
Speaker 1: thanks for having me. Yeah great, Um, I know we
Speaker 1: tried to line this up a couple of times. I'm
Speaker 1: glad we finally did. Uh. Like I said, I've been
Speaker 1: excited to talk to you. So for those that don't know,
Speaker 1: why don't you tell us a little bit about who
Speaker 1: you are, the products you worked in the past, how
Speaker 1: you got here, and and what you're doing. Yeah. So, yeah,
Speaker 1: my name is Alex um. I'm one of the co
Speaker 1: founders of Lolly and also the CEO of Lolly and Uh. Yeah.
Speaker 1: What we've created is a really simple way for people
Speaker 1: to earn bitcoin when they shop online as they normally would.
Speaker 1: So we have over nine hundred merchants on the platform.
Speaker 1: People are these are These are companies that you shop
Speaker 1: at every day. There's Walmart, there's price Line, Booking, dot Com, Safeway, grocery.
Speaker 1: UM places that people where you can go get your essentials.
Speaker 1: You get your groceries, you you take your travel, UM
Speaker 1: buy your toilet paper, whatever you're looking for, and we
Speaker 1: make it really easy for everybody to earn bitcoin when
Speaker 1: you when you do it so right now, it's a Chrome,
Speaker 1: Safari and Firefox extension and it's sort of like follows
Speaker 1: you around and you go to different sites and it
Speaker 1: pops up and it says, hey, do you want to
Speaker 1: earn ten percent back in bitcoin? You can also go
Speaker 1: to lolly dot com and see our nine hundred plus
Speaker 1: merchants on the platform, and UM earn more bitcoin when
Speaker 1: you do it. UM. So yeah, so we're we UM
Speaker 1: started this company after the whole team and I we
Speaker 1: built a previous company called Cosmic, and we sold into
Speaker 1: very similar space, UH into into merchants, and we would
Speaker 1: go to merchants and we would UM sell the solution
Speaker 1: to them that let them sell their products anywhere. With
Speaker 1: this mission of democratizing commerce. UM. We ended up learning
Speaker 1: about bitcoin a couple of years into building the company
Speaker 1: and found it just to be this like fascinating technology. UM.
Speaker 1: The whole team was really drawn into this idea of
Speaker 1: giving everyone in the world the ability to have the
Speaker 1: same asset and be able to trade that asset and
Speaker 1: send it anywhere in the world a cross border, thus
Speaker 1: democratizing commerce native to a currency. So we all got
Speaker 1: really excited about it. It never made sense for us
Speaker 1: as like a payments mechanism with our last company. We
Speaker 1: talked to merchants about it. They weren't really excited about
Speaker 1: it because it didn't really solve their real problems at
Speaker 1: that moment. So that's sort of where we started, like
Speaker 1: grew in this in this idea of how do you
Speaker 1: distribute bitcoin to more people. The next phase is, you know,
Speaker 1: we end up getting acquired by a company called pop
Speaker 1: Sugar to come into power one point two billion and
Speaker 1: retail revenue. A year after that, after we grew quite
Speaker 1: a bit post acquisition, a bigger company came along, Ebates,
Speaker 1: which is largerest cash back company in the US. They
Speaker 1: came along and bought us away from Pop Sugar in
Speaker 1: a divestiture. So we were there for about a year,
Speaker 1: got to learn the cashback model, and I was thinking
Speaker 1: while I was there, like, you know, pitch this to them,
Speaker 1: how incredible would it be to use the cash back
Speaker 1: model as a distribution mechanism for bitcoin to teach people
Speaker 1: about the bitcoin and spread it to more people. And
Speaker 1: the central thesis of that is that most people are
Speaker 1: not investors, and even more than that, most people are
Speaker 1: not miners. So how are you going to get mass
Speaker 1: bitcoin adoption without attracting a whole new wave of consumers.
Speaker 1: So we said, let's take this consumer that shops online
Speaker 1: that knows rewards, that once rewards, and let's share a
Speaker 1: bitcoin with them and introduce them to bitcoin in this
Speaker 1: new way. Um. And so yeah, we we launched about
Speaker 1: eleven months ago and it's just been incredible. We're bringing
Speaker 1: new people into bitcoin, we're bringing I think importantly women
Speaker 1: into bitcoin. Um there's thirty of our users are female.
Speaker 1: And and so just shows sort of like early signs
Speaker 1: of increased adoption by new people that previously did not
Speaker 1: have bitcoin where we're not um in the space. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's awesome. So I think everyone's aware of the system,
Speaker 1: I suppose, right, So we're earning like cash or rewards back,
Speaker 1: so whether that's airline miles or target reward points or whatever.
Speaker 1: And then there's the cash back. Right, So now credit
Speaker 1: cards companies probably started it, but you know, now they'll
Speaker 1: give you cash back instead. But rather than in earning
Speaker 1: a cash back or a rewards point, you're given bitcoin
Speaker 1: exactly right. So we're taking something that people are already
Speaker 1: familiar with. We're not having to convince them that rewards
Speaker 1: are good, free things are good, um. But we're also
Speaker 1: assigning value and having people pay attention to it, not
Speaker 1: just around price and not just around investing, but around
Speaker 1: passive earning. And when they can go see that their
Speaker 1: points are deflating, um, you know, and and there's this
Speaker 1: like um or they started inflating. There's this inflationary name
Speaker 1: terature to two points, whereas bitcoin is like there's only
Speaker 1: twenty one million of them. You're getting real bitcoin, and
Speaker 1: that is going up in value because there's scarcity um
Speaker 1: and because more people believe in bitcoin and they're learning
Speaker 1: about the principles of bitcoin. Then like, so far, like
Speaker 1: our users have seen bitcoin triple and and they haven't
Speaker 1: seen the rewards triple, and they haven't seen their points triple.
Speaker 1: They've seen their points stay the same or deflate um
Speaker 1: in value. So I think it's really important. It's almost
Speaker 1: like a forcing function of teaching somebody about the importance
Speaker 1: of bitcoin indirectly, then they value it more and then
Speaker 1: they become more invested in it, um, and they're choosing
Speaker 1: us over cash back programs, which is a really great signal. Yeah,
Speaker 1: something is uh, something definitely switches in your brain when
Speaker 1: you start to realize how a deflationary currency works. And
Speaker 1: so um, a lot of people do come for the
Speaker 1: money aspect to make money, but then, like you said,
Speaker 1: as you see it going up in value, you're like, Wow,
Speaker 1: what the heck is this? I need to learn more
Speaker 1: about it. And it's weird because it even change changes
Speaker 1: the way that you want to spend money, the way
Speaker 1: you look at spending money, Like I look at spending
Speaker 1: dollars and I don't really think about it, but like,
Speaker 1: oh no, I'll never spend my bitcoin. So um, that's interesting. Now. Um,
Speaker 1: if I guess your primary market right now though it's
Speaker 1: people that are already aware of bitcoin, is there like
Speaker 1: an option where people maybe at first want to earn
Speaker 1: cash back and then they have an option to choose bitcoin.
Speaker 1: Are you only do bitcoin? We only do bitcoin. That's
Speaker 1: our that's like what we're really focused. And there's plenty
Speaker 1: of cash back companies out there, and I don't think
Speaker 1: that there needs to be any more competition on that front.
Speaker 1: You technically can, like you can exchange it for cash
Speaker 1: like you can you you get Bitcoin is the default currency,
Speaker 1: and I think that's really important for our brand to
Speaker 1: be around bitcoin. UM. But you can get cash and
Speaker 1: you can do whatever your bitcoin is your bitcoin like,
Speaker 1: you can do it whatever you want with it UM
Speaker 1: And so some you know, very few people have like
Speaker 1: cashed out when you know, when their bitcoin triple double whatever,
Speaker 1: you know, whatever point that they got into UM. But
Speaker 1: for the most part, people were turning people into holders,
Speaker 1: you know, hoddlers and and and that's been like our
Speaker 1: bread and butter. And do you offer wallet or do
Speaker 1: you transfer to the wallet of the address of their choosing.
Speaker 1: So Lolly is effectively a wallet. It's a custodial wallet,
Speaker 1: and most people are keeping it within the wallet. There's
Speaker 1: certain like bitcoin maximalists that have earned you know, hundreds
Speaker 1: of dollars in bitcoin and are you know, feel safer
Speaker 1: you know, holding their own keys and so you can
Speaker 1: transfer it out and hold it your own It's really
Speaker 1: up to you. UM. We it's sort of our mission
Speaker 1: to teach people the importance of self sovereignty. And being
Speaker 1: their own bank and owning their keys. But there's a
Speaker 1: lot of people that want other people to manage that
Speaker 1: for them. And so you know, we can't come from
Speaker 1: a payment's background. We come from uh, you know, our
Speaker 1: last company was pc I Level one compliant. We were uh,
Speaker 1: you know, we we had a extreme dedication you know,
Speaker 1: partly because we had too in security, privacy and all
Speaker 1: of that good stuff. So I think that a lot
Speaker 1: of people you know, are trusting us with you know
Speaker 1: that we're we're taking the same principles and protocols and
Speaker 1: applying them to the bitcoin space that we did uh
Speaker 1: in the payments world. Um, but you know, some people
Speaker 1: don't you know, trust anybody, and they want their own bitcoin,
Speaker 1: even with like fifteen dollars bitcoin. So it's really up
Speaker 1: to the consumer. Their money should be you know, up
Speaker 1: to them. And that's the whole thing that we have
Speaker 1: to teach people, is like you should have control of
Speaker 1: your money and be able to do it with what
Speaker 1: you want, and you shouldn't um like if you you know,
Speaker 1: give a bank cash, like it's debatable if that's really
Speaker 1: your money. Um, the bank's doing all these things with it,
Speaker 1: they're lending, So we like to think about like the
Speaker 1: future banking system, giving these like attraction layers of earning
Speaker 1: like lending, um cash back, these sort of things, and
Speaker 1: giving it back to the consumer. Uh I think that,
Speaker 1: like one of the most difficult things about bitcoin, which
Speaker 1: you can probably relate to, is a lot of people
Speaker 1: just don't understand what money is and they don't understand
Speaker 1: how money works. Thus they're like, well, what what are
Speaker 1: the issues? Like my cash works at my you know,
Speaker 1: at my whole foods, like my credit card works, but
Speaker 1: they don't understand the back in systems of like how
Speaker 1: it all works and why and where it breaks down.
Speaker 1: So bitcoin is like better money. It's more efficient. It's
Speaker 1: like it functions without needing any any trust in any
Speaker 1: centralized parties and no data breaches. It's just like this beautiful,
Speaker 1: incredible piece of code that we all can use, um,
Speaker 1: you know, hypothetically for this like new money. Yeah, it's crazy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're absolutely right. People have no idea how the financial
Speaker 1: system works. And um, when I do a lot of uh,
Speaker 1: I do a lot of digging through history to kind
Speaker 1: of bring some of those lessons back. And it's interesting
Speaker 1: because when you look back all the way to like
Speaker 1: the founding of the United States. And you see some
Speaker 1: of the quotes from Thomas Jefferson, but Benjamin Franklin, but
Speaker 1: even Henry Ford in the early nineteen hundred said that, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, he said that if if the average, if
Speaker 1: if the Americans understood how the financial system worked, there
Speaker 1: would be a revolution overnight. And like this is like
Speaker 1: in the early nineteen hundreds, and they got it back then. Um,
Speaker 1: numerous quotes of you know, how much danger will be
Speaker 1: in if the central banks take over and all these things. Um,
Speaker 1: but now you know over you know, the last eighty years,
Speaker 1: hundred years of education has been completely changed and now
Speaker 1: nobody is aware of it. But hopefully that changes. I'm
Speaker 1: curious because now you've built your you're a builder. You've
Speaker 1: built a couple of companies and and a couple of acquisitions.
Speaker 1: So you've built it in like the payment space and
Speaker 1: the like the reward space, cash back space, and now
Speaker 1: bitcoin space. Um, how similar is it or how much
Speaker 1: different is it building in the bitcoin crypto space versus
Speaker 1: like a traditional like points back or cash back space.
Speaker 1: So yeah, it's a great question. Um. I mean, building
Speaker 1: a company is build a company and a second time.
Speaker 1: It's just like it's so different like the second time around. UM,
Speaker 1: and I love to like share my like musings with
Speaker 1: they just building companies in general. UM, and so we're
Speaker 1: like one thing a lot of people don't know is
Speaker 1: like we're building with the same team as our last company.
Speaker 1: So we we had an incredible team, we like everyone,
Speaker 1: and we got the band back together to start this.
Speaker 1: So having like the trust built into the this next company.
Speaker 1: We you know, we we built some pretty incredible technology
Speaker 1: with the last company. We love building together. We all
Speaker 1: trust each other, we work early well together, and so
Speaker 1: uh of us built our our last company together. UM.
Speaker 1: And you know I've taken a lot of like learnings
Speaker 1: from that. So our day to day is very similar
Speaker 1: to building any company. UM. You know, you're hiring people,
Speaker 1: you're you're you're doing that, everything very similar. The customers
Speaker 1: are a little bit different. I don't think that a
Speaker 1: lot of people, UM, because so our last company was
Speaker 1: mainly like an enterprise company that was like our our
Speaker 1: primary play. And building a consumer company, I think is
Speaker 1: very different. And building a consumer company in the bitcoin
Speaker 1: space is also very different. UM. I think that you
Speaker 1: have to be very very transparent. You have to be
Speaker 1: you have to tell people exactly what you're doing. You're
Speaker 1: you have to have you know, we have open source
Speaker 1: code and like we we we want people to um,
Speaker 1: you know, make sure keep us honest about like the
Speaker 1: things that we're doing, the business practice that we're doing,
Speaker 1: which be very transparent with our community. UM. That said,
Speaker 1: we get, we get, and we have this extremely engaged community,
Speaker 1: like if you follow us on Twitter, you know, like
Speaker 1: like people who use Lolly are obsessed with it and
Speaker 1: they love stacking stacks, they love earning bitcoin and and
Speaker 1: so when you're building in this like transparent, like I
Speaker 1: think people love the story when they love to feel
Speaker 1: like they're building with us. And we because we build
Speaker 1: so open and we like leverage our community to go
Speaker 1: get new merchants, which increases the adoption of bitcoin. Like
Speaker 1: every like we're all working together, like they're stacking stacks.
Speaker 1: We're you know, we're getting new merchants. UM. We do
Speaker 1: this game where we're like, oh, who do you want
Speaker 1: to see next? And like people are like, oh, I
Speaker 1: want safe Way, I want UM, I want like hotels
Speaker 1: dot com, I want Booking dot Com. And then we
Speaker 1: go show those two like Booking dot com and we
Speaker 1: go get them on board because our community demanded it,
Speaker 1: and they see this like this incredibly engaged community. So
Speaker 1: building in the bitcoin space, I think it's like really
Speaker 1: nice because with with with when we were at ebates,
Speaker 1: one of the things we learned is like the coupon
Speaker 1: clippers and sort of like this older generation that transitioned
Speaker 1: into ebates and was obsessed with cash back is like
Speaker 1: this rabid customer that like loves getting their cash back.
Speaker 1: And I mean who doesn't love getting like things for
Speaker 1: free and like getting cash and and so people who
Speaker 1: are like getting SATs back and people who are getting
Speaker 1: bitcoin back are like so excited to like get involved.
Speaker 1: And every time we land a new merchant, it's like
Speaker 1: one step you know forward for the bitcoin community. Because
Speaker 1: we've been very transparent about our roadmap. It starts with
Speaker 1: rewards and then over time as we as bitcoin transitions
Speaker 1: from a store of value to a medium of exchange,
Speaker 1: we're at that point of transition with that, like Vertex,
Speaker 1: And that's what gets so excited when we go drive
Speaker 1: fifty million dollars in sales for Walmart and I go
Speaker 1: to them and say, hey, you guys are spending five
Speaker 1: billion dollars in credit card fees. I don't even know
Speaker 1: how much you're spending in chargebacks. Why don't you use
Speaker 1: bit poin, Why don't you use some sort of digitally
Speaker 1: native currency with immutability to solve your issue around UM fraud,
Speaker 1: to solve your issue around like credit card fees. And
Speaker 1: if we're at that point of purchase and we have
Speaker 1: all these consumers that are like using wally as like
Speaker 1: their preferred rewards wallet, that gets really exciting. To save
Speaker 1: people even more money, to bring even more transparency to
Speaker 1: eat commerce, to purchasing, to commerce in general. Like, that's
Speaker 1: that's where it gets really exciting. So I personally like
Speaker 1: love building in the bitcoin space. I think it's really exciting.
Speaker 1: And I just don't think that there's like too many
Speaker 1: markets that have a consumer that is so passionate about
Speaker 1: the future and this like new world that we're all
Speaker 1: creating together. Well, it's a it's a it's a it's
Speaker 1: a good thing and a bad thing. I think the
Speaker 1: reason why the people, the consumers are so passionate is
Speaker 1: because we're in such an early stage, and so in
Speaker 1: the early stage, the early adopters are like the true believers,
Speaker 1: and so the true believers, early adopters are going to
Speaker 1: be super passionate about it and are going to want
Speaker 1: to share it, which is why it's amazing to work
Speaker 1: with them. The con to that is that it's a
Speaker 1: small segment of the population. Uh So, um, you know,
Speaker 1: as that segment of the population grows, maybe some of
Speaker 1: that enthusiasm enthusiasm died down a little bit. But that's
Speaker 1: an interesting insight that you have and I can see that.
Speaker 1: So people are used to getting rewards back. People like
Speaker 1: getting cash back better, but we have cash everywhere. This
Speaker 1: is this is bitcoin and so for the true believers,
Speaker 1: they really want that. I guess, uh, you know, So
Speaker 1: on the consumer side, I get that. I'm thinking more
Speaker 1: about like the new maybe like regulatory side that you
Speaker 1: have to deal with. So for example, you're a wallet provider,
Speaker 1: so now you have like a bitcoin custody to deal with.
Speaker 1: I would imagine that's more challenging than just sending points
Speaker 1: back or cash back or is that not much different? Um?
Speaker 1: I mean it is, But it's like, you know, we
Speaker 1: work with some like you know, incredible third parties that
Speaker 1: like like are you know, they have um, like the
Speaker 1: regulatory licenses that we need, so we can off board
Speaker 1: a lot of the UM the that side of the
Speaker 1: house to other parties that specialize in custodial solutions, and
Speaker 1: we can really focus on the part of the business
Speaker 1: that we are uniquely great at. And it's it's it's
Speaker 1: just as uh it's I mean, it's hard to build anything,
Speaker 1: but like I mean, building our last company was really
Speaker 1: hard and has our last company had so many challenges
Speaker 1: that we had to deal with that we don't have
Speaker 1: to deal with this company. So there's like given, you know,
Speaker 1: sort of a give and take in pros and cons
Speaker 1: to building any business. And I think, you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people, including myself, are maybe
Speaker 1: concerned or at least aware of of its seat. It
Speaker 1: seems to be very difficult to do crypto based businesses,
Speaker 1: bitcoin based businesses in the United States. UM. We saw
Speaker 1: I think just this week even Goldman Zack's company Circle
Speaker 1: announced they're moving most of Poloniacs offshore because they just
Speaker 1: can't deal with US regulations. UM. So we see this
Speaker 1: happening over and over and over UM US people being
Speaker 1: blocked from participating in different UM different exchanges and things
Speaker 1: like that as well. So I was just curious if
Speaker 1: you experienced any roadblocks. But as far as you're concerned,
Speaker 1: you're saying, it's kind of about the same for what
Speaker 1: you're doing. Yeah, it's pretty much. Uh, it's a lot
Speaker 1: of the same and there. I mean, like I guess
Speaker 1: it's you know, you only know what you don't know.
Speaker 1: And like when we started this business, there's so many
Speaker 1: things that we learned and we had to learn and
Speaker 1: we've gotten good at so and like also, you know,
Speaker 1: we've been in the bitcoin space for five years, so
Speaker 1: it's not like these are new things to us. We
Speaker 1: we know the regulations, we know how to like we've
Speaker 1: built in the space for a long time. Uh. And
Speaker 1: I actually think that payments, the payments space, which is
Speaker 1: what we're doing, previously had way more regulations and was
Speaker 1: way more I mean, like our claim to fame in
Speaker 1: the payments world, which you know doesn't get a lot
Speaker 1: of uh press or credit or whatever, is Like we
Speaker 1: survived the Target breach, um you know five six years ago. Uh,
Speaker 1: Target had like the biggest breach of all time, and
Speaker 1: we had just landed them, and we had to survive
Speaker 1: all of these penetration tests as like this four person
Speaker 1: company and and so that was like a really like
Speaker 1: scared moment. But you you know, we've built an incredibly
Speaker 1: secure platform. What does that mean? You had to survive
Speaker 1: the penetration tests, so without disposing too much information from targets.
Speaker 1: And basically like when Target got bridge, when anyone gets breached,
Speaker 1: they have to go test all of their vendors to
Speaker 1: make sure that everyone is compliant. And and then they
Speaker 1: do advance like security screenings on all the different technologies
Speaker 1: and like third parties come in UM to reevaluate which
Speaker 1: which parties they can keep, which parties they have to
Speaker 1: get rid of UM because they had revamped security to
Speaker 1: never have a breach again into like you know, really
Speaker 1: like lockdown, and as the smallest vendor by far that
Speaker 1: they had, we were able to survive that breach. And
Speaker 1: so we only did that because we built the best
Speaker 1: technology and the most secure technology in the space. And
Speaker 1: we did that from day one. And there's a lot
Speaker 1: of things that I think my team like our principles
Speaker 1: are around where we like, we will not compromise on privacy,
Speaker 1: we will not compromise on security, and doesn't matter if
Speaker 1: it takes longer to build and ship because of that
Speaker 1: we just we're we're not willing to give that up.
Speaker 1: So we took we took those principles with Cosmic. We
Speaker 1: were rewarded with like by them. And I mean think
Speaker 1: about like your incentives as a new startup, Like if
Speaker 1: you get hacked, if you get breached like that, you
Speaker 1: lose credibility, you lose trust, and so you're incentivized to
Speaker 1: look out for those sort of things and into like
Speaker 1: do what you do what you have to do to
Speaker 1: like be the most secure company and to not get breached.
Speaker 1: Let's not get hacked. It seems like most people really
Speaker 1: today don't don't even really think about their privacy. I
Speaker 1: think some of these hacks are starting to bring some
Speaker 1: of that to the forefront. I think it's still a
Speaker 1: long way off. Um, would you agree with that? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I mean if I could like snap my fingers and
Speaker 1: do just about anything, I I one of the one
Speaker 1: of my first initiatives would be to like have everyone
Speaker 1: understand why like the importance of privacy and the importance
Speaker 1: of like their identity. Um. I think that credit card
Speaker 1: companies and credit companies in general have there's been so
Speaker 1: many breaches and people just don't understand, like all the
Speaker 1: information that's out there, and it's really it's it's a
Speaker 1: scary world to live in this dystopian world when all
Speaker 1: your information is digitized and that information is is protected
Speaker 1: quote unquote protected by third party these like centralized institutions,
Speaker 1: and there's no trust and like you if you're trusting
Speaker 1: this like institution to like protect you, and there's no
Speaker 1: sort of like um, like there's no way to protect yourself.
Speaker 1: It's like a very scary world. So, uh, companies that
Speaker 1: have done the best I think has been like Apple,
Speaker 1: Like I trust Apple with my data because even when
Speaker 1: they're subpoenaed by the you know, the Supreme Court, they
Speaker 1: you know, their stance was like we don't even have
Speaker 1: access to our own customers data like and and they
Speaker 1: even if they wanted to, they couldn't like pull the data. Thus,
Speaker 1: if they got hacked, you can't find data that doesn't
Speaker 1: exist on it on an individual. Whereas other companies like
Speaker 1: Facebook have made and Google have made businesses off of
Speaker 1: controlling people's data. It's interesting to see how that will
Speaker 1: evolve and how companies will like look over time, how
Speaker 1: how much they're incentivized to protect data and then arguably
Speaker 1: like not store certain data or tokenize certain data. Um,
Speaker 1: because the biggest companies in the world are the biggest
Speaker 1: honeypots in the world are data like companies that have
Speaker 1: lots of data. Yeah, and I think I think the
Speaker 1: bar has been raised. So I mean, if you're if
Speaker 1: you're Google and you're tracking my Internet usage and what
Speaker 1: I'm looking at online, I mean that's that's a lot
Speaker 1: that Obviously what I'm looking at good, you know, incriminate
Speaker 1: me or could tell a lot about me or whatever.
Speaker 1: But when you're looking at what I'm spending my money on,
Speaker 1: that's even deeper. That's like even a more uh kind
Speaker 1: of a more invasion of privacy because now it's not
Speaker 1: just what I'm thinking about, is what I'm actually doing
Speaker 1: And so, um, the bar has been raised. And hope
Speaker 1: that that brings awareness. But I think just the average
Speaker 1: person wouldn't even think about, like what information is Lolly
Speaker 1: keeping on me? Is all I keeping information on my purchases?
Speaker 1: Like where where is that information going? What happens if
Speaker 1: that gets out? How are you going to use that
Speaker 1: against me? Etcetera. Yeah, So I think that's something that
Speaker 1: we like hold like the utmost important, So we don't
Speaker 1: know what you're buying. We don't want to know what
Speaker 1: you're buying. We we just need to know the amount
Speaker 1: you spend at each merchant and like, and that's how
Speaker 1: we we fulfill like the bit point back. So we
Speaker 1: we actually we take a stance and we want to
Speaker 1: colle collect the least amount of information and we do
Speaker 1: our own audits of like could we collect less information?
Speaker 1: Could we like to fulfill the same purpose, which is
Speaker 1: ultimately getting bitcoin back on your purchases. So, um, that's
Speaker 1: the approach we take. I think it's we've been rewarded
Speaker 1: for it so far. Um, I think that it's it's
Speaker 1: scary too, Like I think users should always ask what's
Speaker 1: being collected? How is it being uh, you know secured?
Speaker 1: Are people selling data like we have? We have no
Speaker 1: business and in selling data? We like, we are not
Speaker 1: incentivized to sell data. We don't want to sell data.
Speaker 1: We make money when you make purchases online and like
Speaker 1: that's the way that we make money and that is
Speaker 1: a great business. We it's a proven business model with ebates, Like,
Speaker 1: we don't need to reinvent the wheel, aren't there? We
Speaker 1: like we want to be a company that like makes
Speaker 1: money when you earn bitcoin. That's it. And we don't
Speaker 1: need a lot of data to to do that. We
Speaker 1: just need people to use ally and shop online as
Speaker 1: they normally would. What these like micro amounts that people
Speaker 1: are getting back, um is their k y C requirements
Speaker 1: on that No k y C on the onboarding it's
Speaker 1: only a minimal k y C on the off ramp. Um.
Speaker 1: And all we need is first name, last name, and
Speaker 1: email email to do on the off ramp to to
Speaker 1: transfer to US dollars or to transfer to your own
Speaker 1: bitcoin address because the amounts are so low. Yeah, exactly. Okay,
Speaker 1: So there's not like a big issue with like in
Speaker 1: our business, people are buying the people are buying like
Speaker 1: millions of dollars a bitcoin that they can potentially use
Speaker 1: for like you know, let's just say in a worst
Speaker 1: case scenario terrorism or or some sort of like black
Speaker 1: market activity, like people have to go buy like they're
Speaker 1: buying like toilet paper from Walmart or like flights and
Speaker 1: for like hotels dot com, and they're getting good point back.
Speaker 1: There's like not a lot of like fraud that you
Speaker 1: can commit. There's not there's not a lot of incentives
Speaker 1: for like paying a lot of money for something and
Speaker 1: getting you know, let's just say like like our average
Speaker 1: is like seven percent back, So the k y C
Speaker 1: is actually extremely minimal, and we actually don't have to
Speaker 1: do it on the on ramp because we're basically just
Speaker 1: creating somebody a wallet and and then they can start earning.
Speaker 1: So our our whole goal in building Lolly was to
Speaker 1: create the easiest on ramp into bitcoin, and all you
Speaker 1: need to do is like like sign up with your
Speaker 1: email and you can start earning, like you just it's
Speaker 1: it's like takes thirty seconds. Yeah. Yeah, so seven percent
Speaker 1: is the average. That's a good that's a good number.
Speaker 1: I was gonna ask you about that. Yeah, and I
Speaker 1: think our highest back right now is like so, but
Speaker 1: you can learn a lot of what's the harmony the harmony. Yeah,
Speaker 1: some of the digital products have like really high bitcoin back. Wow,
Speaker 1: that's awesome. And then you can sort that and figure
Speaker 1: out which ones get the highest percentage back and then
Speaker 1: try to frequent those if that if that fits in
Speaker 1: your buying schedule. M exactly. So, um, you talked about
Speaker 1: finding merchants before you talked about how um, you know,
Speaker 1: you look at the community, the community, you know, it's
Speaker 1: really voting someone up or asking about them, and you
Speaker 1: kind of go to them and use that. I'm curious,
Speaker 1: you know, when you're going to merchants or finding merchants,
Speaker 1: how is that process work out? Like are you going
Speaker 1: to these merchants and saying, hey, we're doing this thing
Speaker 1: where we pay bitcoin back and they're like, what the
Speaker 1: heck is that? Or is it like you just say
Speaker 1: we're doing a rewards point and you don't really get
Speaker 1: into the whole bitcoin thing. Yeah, that's a that's a
Speaker 1: great question. I think it's changed over the since we
Speaker 1: launched m A about a year and a half ago.
Speaker 1: When I first started talking with merchants, uh, the conversation
Speaker 1: was mainly about points. It was like, we're doing a
Speaker 1: reward system. Doesn't like they don't really care what you're
Speaker 1: giving them in points. It could be like you know,
Speaker 1: magical Unicorn points or whatever, like they don't really there.
Speaker 1: It's like there's so many point systems out there that
Speaker 1: as long as you're like rewarding somebody in something with
Speaker 1: something that someone wants, they don't really care. So we
Speaker 1: took that approach because it was like if I were
Speaker 1: to go convince all these people on bitcoin to start,
Speaker 1: that's a really difficult sales process. UM. If I were
Speaker 1: to convince people on rewards, it's just another rewards platform.
Speaker 1: So we were able to get over five hundred merchants
Speaker 1: on board. UM directly on board because we're like, look,
Speaker 1: there's a big market with bitcoin, doesn't You don't need
Speaker 1: to know what bitcoin is other than it is a
Speaker 1: point system. And that's how we positioned it, were like,
Speaker 1: bitcoin is just points that's c centralized. It's determined by
Speaker 1: the world, but like like by buyers, by sellers, by
Speaker 1: investors of what bitcoin is worth at any time, where
Speaker 1: as points are determined by the institution that is giving
Speaker 1: rewarding the points. And and so they that was like
Speaker 1: a great way to get the first wave. The next
Speaker 1: wave that that came, that's like the next four and
Speaker 1: fifty that we've gotten over the last year that have
Speaker 1: been sort of the slower movers UM. They came on
Speaker 1: board because they saw that bitcoin was able as a
Speaker 1: as a marketing tool, was able to attract so many
Speaker 1: new users to their new shoppers to their their platforms.
Speaker 1: So they saw the success with Walmart with overstock, with
Speaker 1: price line, and that's how we got all this like
Speaker 1: this new wave of of merchants that came on the platform,
Speaker 1: and I think to this day we have more merchant
Speaker 1: adoption than any other bitcoin company in the world because
Speaker 1: we took a very different approach and we gave them
Speaker 1: an incentive to work with a bitcoin company. And now
Speaker 1: I've got like I mean, my friends at Walmart, my
Speaker 1: friends at Sam's Club like there, they like love bitcoin
Speaker 1: because they now have have had almost as forcing function
Speaker 1: to learn about bitcoin because it makes sense for their business,
Speaker 1: because we're driving sales with their business. Then they start
Speaker 1: to ask the real questions, but good questions about what
Speaker 1: is bitcoin? Why do people want it? It's generating real
Speaker 1: sales for me and my business? Do we need to
Speaker 1: think about more applications. That's when we played this like
Speaker 1: long game wherein five years I come back to Walmart
Speaker 1: and I say, hey, we've generated fifty million dollars in
Speaker 1: sales for you all. What do you think about doing
Speaker 1: pay with rally pay with bitcoin and have that that
Speaker 1: go down the purchase funnel and give people the ability
Speaker 1: to actually spend their bitcoin, use the Lightning network, reduce
Speaker 1: reduced fees and reduced Walmarts um you know, credit card
Speaker 1: fees and um the fees that you know for for chargebacks.
Speaker 1: So then you're saying when you first started the first
Speaker 1: five merchants, it was kind of like, hey, we're giving
Speaker 1: magical Unico points. But now you're leading with bitcoin and
Speaker 1: they're pretty receptive to that. So you've seen like maybe
Speaker 1: you've seen a little shift. Yeah, we now we have
Speaker 1: a real data around like around what um what drive
Speaker 1: sales and why people are interested, and we have so
Speaker 1: many users that have dropped Amazon and started shopping at
Speaker 1: Walmart because they want bitcoined back. And then the wing
Speaker 1: that like most merchants are have like great return policies,
Speaker 1: they have great shifting policies, and like they don't need
Speaker 1: overnight with everything. They would rather have bitcoin back and
Speaker 1: wait an extra day or have bitcoin back and have
Speaker 1: the same selection. And so they're like, how how can
Speaker 1: I earn more bitcoin at every moment? And we're giving
Speaker 1: them a way to earn more bitcoint in more places.
Speaker 1: You're kind of burning the candle from both ends, so
Speaker 1: to speak, because you you're pushing consumer adoption, but really
Speaker 1: and maybe in the longer term gain you're also pushing
Speaker 1: the merchant adoption, which as those two converge together. Now
Speaker 1: we have mass adoption exactly. You need both in order
Speaker 1: to have the macro effects of driving mass adoption. You
Speaker 1: can't just have consumer adoption. You have to have merchant
Speaker 1: adoption and consumer adoption at the same time. And so
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people thought that it would
Speaker 1: come with payments because they're like, oh, will pay and
Speaker 1: and bitcoin is a in a lot of cases, especially
Speaker 1: with second layer solutions, a more efficient way to pay
Speaker 1: um and and you know, reduces fraud all those things.
Speaker 1: But I think a lot of people that built these
Speaker 1: like early bitcoin payment companies, they thought about payments is
Speaker 1: the wrong the wrong way. They thought they could just
Speaker 1: come in and sell it like an enterprise tool. But
Speaker 1: people don't want to spend a currency that's going up
Speaker 1: in value, and you know, historically, how do you get
Speaker 1: someone to pay with bitcoin and use it? For one?
Speaker 1: It's got a stable out, So we're I think we're
Speaker 1: far away from that. I think it's like, I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, don't give financial advice, but I think we're
Speaker 1: far away from like bitcoin stabling out. I think how
Speaker 1: long you're gonna say, how long I think we're I
Speaker 1: think we're like five years out from any sort of stabilization.
Speaker 1: I'm like, pretty long bitcoin UM. I think it's pretty incredible,
Speaker 1: and I think like the world is just starting to
Speaker 1: adopt it and and institutional investors are deploying massive amounts
Speaker 1: of capital UM and and are going to deploy massive
Speaker 1: amounts of capital. And it's a great uset that everybody
Speaker 1: in the world can hypothetically own UM and then over
Speaker 1: time it will become a better medium of exchange. The
Speaker 1: more second layer tools that that come out and the
Speaker 1: more um uh you know companies like Lolly that that
Speaker 1: grow and continue to to build great businesses around the
Speaker 1: bitcoin space. Yeah. So um, this was unplanned because we've
Speaker 1: been trying to do this interview for weeks now, but
Speaker 1: just yesterday I dropped a video on YouTube talking about
Speaker 1: this exact topic and I said almost the exact same
Speaker 1: things you did, which is like, uh, the the the
Speaker 1: evolution of money and and really I believe we're still
Speaker 1: in a in a in a collectible stage and was
Speaker 1: being driven by speculation, and eventually we'll get to the
Speaker 1: store of value stage. And once we go to the
Speaker 1: store value stage, we'll see the volatility narrowed down and
Speaker 1: then eventually we'll move to the medium of exchange and
Speaker 1: then eventually unit of acout, etcetera. And I put about
Speaker 1: the same timetable. I said, maybe in the next two
Speaker 1: three years we see this more stable uh store value,
Speaker 1: but the media of exchange could be seven eight years out,
Speaker 1: is kind of is what I put. So I put that,
Speaker 1: I guess because the kind of the kind of a
Speaker 1: scene eyed eye on that. Yeah, And it's tough to predict.
Speaker 1: Like we've never seen anything like bitcoin before. And it's
Speaker 1: just like, I mean, I I won't pretend like I'm
Speaker 1: not I'm not like, you know, I don't have a
Speaker 1: finance background. I don't know, um, you know, I studied economics.
Speaker 1: But we've never seen anything like bitcoin. So anyone who
Speaker 1: like pretends to have like a definitive answer of it,
Speaker 1: it's it's like it will stable out when when like
Speaker 1: it stables out in the in the world, you're so like,
Speaker 1: think about the amount of things that have to happen
Speaker 1: in order for its stable out, Like governments are going
Speaker 1: to adopt it as a reserve currency or reserves a
Speaker 1: store of reserve. We know, I don't. I mean, maybe
Speaker 1: some countries have done it in like small scale but
Speaker 1: we have not even seen like institutions like start to
Speaker 1: invest their money in the bitcoin in the masses, and
Speaker 1: institutions are gonna come first, and then it's gonna be
Speaker 1: countries and then the countries like whoever is the last
Speaker 1: country is to like adopt it as partial reserve. It's
Speaker 1: like that's where it gets more exciting if we like
Speaker 1: look at really like a macroeconomic trend. The thing I
Speaker 1: get really excited about is countries that are like, okay,
Speaker 1: like I'm tired of using the US dollar as a
Speaker 1: store of reserve, which is a lot of people realize that,
Speaker 1: but like most countries reserved, it's not gold. They don't
Speaker 1: have access to gold. They have access to US dollars,
Speaker 1: and that's the most like liquid best store of value
Speaker 1: is the U S dollars. Like we this, the biggest
Speaker 1: stable coin in the world is the US dollar and
Speaker 1: it's not backed by anything but the FED so and
Speaker 1: like you know g d P so if if like
Speaker 1: we have that is our is the world store of value.
Speaker 1: If when countries start to get smart and they're like,
Speaker 1: wait a second, I can't own gold because there's only
Speaker 1: a limited quantity and all the countries have accounted for it,
Speaker 1: but I can earn bitcoin or I can't own bitcoin.
Speaker 1: And they start to say, I'm gonna take five percent
Speaker 1: of my reserve and I'm gonna put in a bitcoin
Speaker 1: and that's going to be a store of value for
Speaker 1: me and my country. And then other countries start to
Speaker 1: see other countries doing it and they're like, well, I
Speaker 1: don't want to get you know, far behind, I need
Speaker 1: to put it in. We haven't even hit that yet.
Speaker 1: Like when that happens, like we like the bitcoin at
Speaker 1: tank is gonna look really really fucking shape when to
Speaker 1: put the money in, because I only people realize like
Speaker 1: how much money is out there in these in these
Speaker 1: like reserves. And you know the countries that wait, you
Speaker 1: know like China, the US that are sort of they
Speaker 1: have their own reserve, they have the most stable currency.
Speaker 1: If they wait and they don't adopt it, and they
Speaker 1: get left behind and they say, well, I'm only gonna
Speaker 1: put one percent in, or I'm gonna put like point
Speaker 1: point one percent in, They're gonna get left behind because
Speaker 1: the whole world is gonna start to go to a
Speaker 1: new reserve system, being bitcoin, and unless something comes along
Speaker 1: that is a better Bitcoin, which I have not seen
Speaker 1: yet like then, I I just I don't see bitcoin
Speaker 1: getting replaced, um in that in that regard. So we're
Speaker 1: in the early days and I want to align myself
Speaker 1: with bitcoin, and I think we need to you know,
Speaker 1: give our consumers bitcoin, and we need to teach them,
Speaker 1: and we need you know, more people like you that
Speaker 1: are like, you know, doing like really high quality like
Speaker 1: teachings on money, educational services on money, and teaching people
Speaker 1: the importance of bitcoin, the importance of products like Lolly
Speaker 1: to educate people about how to earn bitcoin, how to
Speaker 1: own bitcoin, and and why that's so important for the world. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's great. I love that that whole thing that you
Speaker 1: just said there, and I agree with all of that.
Speaker 1: I think, um, it's it's uh, it's kind of refreshing
Speaker 1: to hear your perspective because as you said, right, you're
Speaker 1: not really trying to push the payment narrative because it's
Speaker 1: too early, it's too soon to push the human narrative.
Speaker 1: And so really what you're doing with Lolly is really
Speaker 1: pushing a store of value narrative and helping people earn um,
Speaker 1: to save, not to spend um. So that's that's a
Speaker 1: big piece and I appreciate that perspective. I think that's good, um,
Speaker 1: because we're just not there and it's not it's not
Speaker 1: the time to be spending your bitcoin, but it's definitely
Speaker 1: the time to be stacking the stats, right, So that's
Speaker 1: the game. Yeah, Yeah, that's the game. So yeah, I
Speaker 1: like that. I like that whole the whole thing that
Speaker 1: you said. I I was gonna talk more about the
Speaker 1: payments at merchants, but I think I'm just gonna stop
Speaker 1: there because it's such a great place to end it.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I think everyone just needs to be patient. Um,
Speaker 1: we're seeing the biggest shift that the world has ever seen.
Speaker 1: And it's not just like the information. We're talking about money, right,
Speaker 1: the most important thing that we have. Um, And and
Speaker 1: we have this game of musical chairs, this game theory,
Speaker 1: as you say, UM, it is gonna be interesting. We
Speaker 1: have seen I think I tweeted about Um. I think
Speaker 1: it was Hungary did like a massive like confiscation of
Speaker 1: bitcoin in some dark market and they have more bitcoin
Speaker 1: reserves now than gold reserves. Interesting, and they didn't acquire it,
Speaker 1: they seized it. But what's gonna happen with it? Is
Speaker 1: is going to be the answer but it's just interesting
Speaker 1: they have more bitcoin now than they have they have gold.
Speaker 1: We did see last year the central banks UM acquired
Speaker 1: more gold last year than any time in history since
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy one, which was the year that we got
Speaker 1: off the gold standard, and they all started buying buying
Speaker 1: it back that year. So we are seeing a massive
Speaker 1: amount of gold being purchased and and I agree with you,
Speaker 1: and it's just a matter of time. And still we
Speaker 1: start to see the sovereigns start to stack it. But
Speaker 1: it's time. It's patients and uh just curious. Uh, people
Speaker 1: lose time perspective and so UM being a builder such
Speaker 1: as yourself, UM, to build a company, I mean you're
Speaker 1: looking at years right like you look at this long
Speaker 1: term perspective, Like what's your perspective on building a company? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean I think that I was very fortunate, I
Speaker 1: think to have an incredible team that with my last
Speaker 1: company and we UM we very much built with this
Speaker 1: like twenty year time frame, and we got acquired early
Speaker 1: and you know we have we it made sense to
Speaker 1: get acquired with the last company very early. UM. Now
Speaker 1: we have like lower time preference because we already have
Speaker 1: an acquisition under our belt. We we have great investors
Speaker 1: for this company, like we have like you know, people
Speaker 1: don't like we don't have to sell, we have full
Speaker 1: control of the company. We don't have to do anything
Speaker 1: we don't want to do. And we're growing really fast.
Speaker 1: And so I take just like a way longer term
Speaker 1: approach or like I could see myself running this company
Speaker 1: for the next fifty years, Like I don't see anything
Speaker 1: changing um with how we're building this company, and I
Speaker 1: like to think like that long term and because of
Speaker 1: a lower time preference, it gives me the ability to
Speaker 1: look at Bitcoin like in a different way. It gives
Speaker 1: me the ability to look at Lolly in a different way.
Speaker 1: UM Like I I ultimately I think we need to
Speaker 1: be building like the visa on top of bitcoin rails
Speaker 1: um Like that's the sort of scale that I think
Speaker 1: we can look at, Like what is the international um visa?
Speaker 1: Like what's the rewards network? How do you change each
Speaker 1: money as a whole? And you take a lot of
Speaker 1: like good things that the world has built previously and
Speaker 1: you build them on top of bitcoin in a new way.
Speaker 1: And like since the Internet, we have not seen something
Speaker 1: as drastic on the technology front as Bitcoin, and so
Speaker 1: we have a whole new rails to build on top
Speaker 1: of that is this like trust less ecosystem that is
Speaker 1: gonna just like shape this whole new wave of innovation. Uh.
Speaker 1: And I just feel like so lucky to be able
Speaker 1: to like be a very early company in that space. Um.
Speaker 1: And we don't need to sell, like you know, it's
Speaker 1: it's something like I think some companies, you know, you
Speaker 1: feel sort of like the forcing function of having to sell,
Speaker 1: But like right now, um, you know, I I mean,
Speaker 1: I just told you our road map for the next
Speaker 1: ten years. Like we got a lot of work to do,
Speaker 1: and it's like there's so much that can happen and
Speaker 1: so many things that we can do right and wrong
Speaker 1: along that path. But we have a very clear path.
Speaker 1: I've been saying the same path for the last you know,
Speaker 1: eleven months since we launched on Like you know, every
Speaker 1: time I do a podcast, I'm like, I'm very it sparent,
Speaker 1: like people know where we're going and like if you
Speaker 1: want to try to compete with us, go right ahead.
Speaker 1: But like we're I mean, I feel like we have
Speaker 1: such a clear path, um, and we know the route
Speaker 1: to go, and like, you know, maybe we'll be wrong,
Speaker 1: but um, so far we've been right. Yeah. I love it.
Speaker 1: I love it. Um. I just love to hear from
Speaker 1: someone like yourself, a builder who's done it, and to
Speaker 1: hear that time preference, you know. I, uh, my investments
Speaker 1: take a long time. I build business take a long time. Um.
Speaker 1: I've done a lot of real estate developments. Of those
Speaker 1: projects takes six eight years. Um. You know, warm Buffets
Speaker 1: own Coca Cola since like the nineteen sixties, and uh
Speaker 1: so you know, real investors, real builders have these long
Speaker 1: time preferences. But I I see so many people getting
Speaker 1: into bitcoin today that are just so impatient and if
Speaker 1: it doesn't move up in six months or a year,
Speaker 1: it's not going anywhere. Um And I so I just
Speaker 1: always love to just like, hey, guys, like get some
Speaker 1: perspective on this, like your alex is building over you know,
Speaker 1: fifty year horizon, and so if we're gonna replace this
Speaker 1: monetary system, I mean, it's to take time. But but
Speaker 1: what a ride is going to be exactly And we've
Speaker 1: we've had some really supportive investors that um. Like one
Speaker 1: of the things that I always make sure is that
Speaker 1: the investors are are our believers in bitcoin and that
Speaker 1: they do believe in like the long term play. They're
Speaker 1: not trying to just get rich quick and and have
Speaker 1: like a quick return on capital UM Like a lot
Speaker 1: of these investors like they want us to I p O.
Speaker 1: They want us to like get to this like in
Speaker 1: mark that we can UM Like they're not looking for
Speaker 1: like a quick turnaround on this, and they understand like
Speaker 1: the time preference around bitcoin. So we're very much aligned
Speaker 1: with our investors. We have full control of the company
Speaker 1: UM and we've been really I mean, it's just like
Speaker 1: it's a great company. So it's also like a taking
Speaker 1: approve in business model like Visa, like ebays, these cash
Speaker 1: back models where we don't have to reinvent the wheel.
Speaker 1: These models work, And like I think there's a lot
Speaker 1: of companies that get into the bitcoin space and they
Speaker 1: don't have a real business model, and then they have
Speaker 1: to scramble because they're like, oh, we need to make
Speaker 1: money off fees. But what if you can't make money
Speaker 1: off fees anymore, because we can use decentralized exchanges and
Speaker 1: we can like you know, trade more easily with like
Speaker 1: next to no fees. Um, how are these companies gonna
Speaker 1: make money? Like we make money. Like we we have
Speaker 1: these partnerships with the merchants. The merchants pay us, and
Speaker 1: it just is like a very straightforward business model that
Speaker 1: we can build on a long time frame because we're
Speaker 1: making money. Yeah, I love it. All right, good, Well,
Speaker 1: we're running out of time. I have some more questions,
Speaker 1: but we'll have to save him for another time because
Speaker 1: I know we're kind of running a long and I
Speaker 1: and I'll keep it short. But I appreciate you taking
Speaker 1: the time to speak to us, and I recommend everyone
Speaker 1: to check out Lolly and help push the cooin adoption