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Speaker 1: In a world that's seemingly going dark. It's bad everywhere

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Speaker 1: you look. Attempted assassinations, coups in the government, the food's

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Speaker 1: being poisoned, and there's no problem finding bad in this world.

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Speaker 1: There's a glimmering hope, there's a there's a light coming

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Speaker 1: from the most unlikely place in the world right now.

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Speaker 1: And so rather than focus in all the dark, let's

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Speaker 1: focus on the light, and let's think about a better future. Now.

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Speaker 1: Somebody who's been on the ground, boots on the ground,

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Speaker 1: helping to spark that revolution, if we'll call it, that.

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Speaker 2: Is Michael Peterson.

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Speaker 1: Michael Peterson started a movement down there using the most

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Speaker 1: unlikely tool, which is bitcoin, which is now on the

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Speaker 1: global stage.

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Speaker 2: So, Michael, thanks for sitting down with me.

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Speaker 3: Hey, it's great to be here with you again.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, it's been a while since we caught up.

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Speaker 1: The glimmering shining hope that we have of a little

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Speaker 1: unlikely country. It's pretty amazing. Hopefully people can't pay attention.

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Speaker 1: I mean, El Salvador went from the most dangerous country

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Speaker 1: in the world to the safest country in the world.

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Speaker 2: You've been down there a long time.

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Speaker 1: How long have you been down there and how dangerous

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Speaker 1: was it and how has it become a lot safer.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, so we've been down there for twenty years and

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Speaker 4: it was actually when we first when we first bought

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Speaker 4: our place down there, it was kind of on it

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Speaker 4: seemed like it was getting better. But then after the

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Speaker 4: housing crisis, that's that's when the gang problem really started

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Speaker 4: to proliferate.

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Speaker 3: And it was for about ten years.

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Speaker 4: It would go back and forth between El Salvador and

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Speaker 4: Honduras as being the highest murder rate in the world.

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Speaker 3: It was literally off the.

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Speaker 4: Charts, worse than a lot of countries that were, you know,

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Speaker 4: officially at war.

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Speaker 2: Not a title you want, no.

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Speaker 3: No, it was, yeah, it was.

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Speaker 4: I mean even in our community, Alzante, which is a

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Speaker 4: beautiful little beach community, I mean you would see bodies,

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Speaker 4: you know, in the street and it was wow. It

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Speaker 4: really felt like you were in a war zone. And

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Speaker 4: it's crazy how much that has changed now. People who

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Speaker 4: come can't even imagine that that's what it was like.

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Speaker 2: Now.

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Speaker 1: I spent a lot of time in Mexico. We're building

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Speaker 1: the house in Mexico right now. So we're down there

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Speaker 1: a lot and you hear of a lot about murders

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Speaker 1: and death in Mexico as well, but from my experience,

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Speaker 1: it's never really like in the towns. It's you know,

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Speaker 1: out of town, it's the cartels they're fighting, so you

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Speaker 1: the numbers are there, but you don't see it.

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Speaker 2: I'm curious.

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Speaker 1: I mean, you said you saw the body, so that's

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Speaker 1: that's obviously a whole different story, was it. But was

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Speaker 1: it really kind of just the gangs or did it

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Speaker 1: really spill over into just like regular people.

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Speaker 4: No, it really spilled over into the regular people because

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Speaker 4: the you know, unlike Mexico where it's it's mostly revolves

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Speaker 4: around drug trade. There in Alsalvadore, it was about extortion,

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Speaker 4: and so it was these the little mom and pop

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Speaker 4: vendors that were being extorted and so when they wouldn't pay,

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Speaker 4: they would just execute them. And so you would actually

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Speaker 4: see it, you know, in the street as you're you know,

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Speaker 4: coming down the street, you'd see the body there and

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Speaker 4: the police out there, and so it really was something

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Speaker 4: that you couldn't get away from. And it for foreigners,

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Speaker 4: I mean, we never really felt in danger. It was

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Speaker 4: one of those things that you were kind of off

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Speaker 4: limits as a foreigner because the repercussions would be much

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Speaker 4: longer if they were to kill a foreigner and so,

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Speaker 4: and foreigners were just seeing as kind of more troublesome.

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Speaker 4: They're more likely to fight back, they're more likely to

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Speaker 4: report if they're trying to be extorted. And so it

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Speaker 4: didn't affect them directly, but you know, you saw it

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Speaker 4: all around you and then you know you're friends with

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Speaker 4: the local people in the community, so you saw how

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Speaker 4: it affected them.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, how did it affect them? I mean it holds

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Speaker 1: them back to they able to plan long term.

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Speaker 2: I mean, what were the kind of.

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Speaker 4: The mean they so for one thing, most of them,

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Speaker 4: their their goal was to get out of the country.

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Speaker 4: That was the primary goal was to you know, usually

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Speaker 4: to come to the US illegally was the main thought.

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Speaker 4: The other thing you'd see you often see people start

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Speaker 4: up a business and then they would shut it down

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Speaker 4: right away because they would come to them and say, hey,

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Speaker 4: you have to pay this much. And a lot of

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Speaker 4: times they would make a rational decision, you know it

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Speaker 4: can they stay in business and pay this They looked

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Speaker 4: at it kind of as a tax, and so they

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Speaker 4: would make that decision. But a lot of times what

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Speaker 4: the gangs wanted to pay. It just wasn't sustainable, and

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Speaker 4: so you would see these businesses come and go and

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Speaker 4: shut down real quickly.

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Speaker 3: You also had these weird things.

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Speaker 4: Businesses would set up and you know, closed neighborhoods, there

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Speaker 4: were behind gates and they wouldn't put up any signage.

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Speaker 4: They wouldn't it was hard to even know. You had

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Speaker 4: to have like an inside track to even know where

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Speaker 4: the business was because they were always trying to stay

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Speaker 4: one step ahead of the gangs, which obviously makes it

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Speaker 4: very hard to run a profitable business if you can't

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Speaker 4: even put a.

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Speaker 3: Sock out front.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, So then everything just kind of continues to spiral downhill.

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Speaker 1: I mean there's less businesses being started, there's less money

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Speaker 1: to go around, there's less jobs. People don't have as

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Speaker 1: much money to spend with other businesses, and so it

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Speaker 1: was like this is spiral that it started.

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Speaker 4: Oh, it was a cycle of destruction because then you

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Speaker 4: have the parents leaving.

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Speaker 3: They'd go to the US.

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Speaker 4: So you have the kids growing up without their parents around,

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Speaker 4: which then become prey to the gangs because they don't

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Speaker 4: have any family there and so the gang provided family

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Speaker 4: for them.

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Speaker 3: So as that as the gangs grew. That made it.

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Speaker 4: Less and less profitable to run a business there, which

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Speaker 4: made more people flee. So it was kind of like

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Speaker 4: that's so most people just felt like there was no

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Speaker 4: future in El Salvador.

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Speaker 1: And I heard that they even preyed on the kids

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Speaker 1: because of like the age difference and like kids couldn't

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Speaker 1: really be prosecuted for crime. So then really those kids

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Speaker 1: became a big target.

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Speaker 4: Oh yeah, it was usually the twelve thirteen year olds

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Speaker 4: that were the triggerman. And for one thing, they couldn't

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Speaker 4: be prosecuted as doults. It's another thing, you know, for them,

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Speaker 4: it was kind of like a video game. They don't

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Speaker 4: understand the repercussions of what they're doing. Yeah, and so

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Speaker 4: they could get these kids to go in and you know,

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Speaker 4: just blast people away without really thinking about it. You know,

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Speaker 4: as people get old er, even hardened criminals, they start

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Speaker 4: to you know, think more about the repercussions of what

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Speaker 4: they're doing.

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Speaker 3: But as a kid, it just seemed the game to them.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Now, obviously, you know with Bitcoin beach, you know, that's

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Speaker 1: where the kind of the world a lot of the

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Speaker 1: worlds are paying attention. But where did the shift, Where

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Speaker 1: do you see now looking backwards, where do you think

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Speaker 1: that shift in momentum started to go from this downward

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Speaker 1: spiral the most dangerous country in the world, Like, what

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Speaker 1: was the spark?

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Speaker 2: Do you think?

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Speaker 3: I think it was was two things.

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Speaker 4: I mean, I think, and I think they happened in

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Speaker 4: a synergistic way. So I definitely give credit to the

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Speaker 4: President bu Kelly. He came in and really was willing

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Speaker 4: to shake things up. The previous politicians it had all

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Speaker 4: been about getting in power so you could drain as

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Speaker 4: much money from the state as possible, and he really

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Speaker 4: shifted that where he wanted to see real change come.

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Speaker 4: Even people within his own party that were corrupt, he

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Speaker 4: went after them, and he really made people feel like

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Speaker 4: for the first time that there was potentially going to

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Speaker 4: be a future in El Salvador. It happened to be

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Speaker 4: that we had started the bitcoin project at that same time,

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Speaker 4: and so they were seeing just the impact that bitcoin has.

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Speaker 3: You know, it's like a mind virus.

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Speaker 4: It shifts people's perspective, gives them a lower time preference,

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Speaker 4: makes them think longer term, and makes them hopeful about

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Speaker 4: the future. And so we were seeing this project that

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Speaker 4: started as this very small thing and al Xante grow

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Speaker 4: and start, you know, affecting the communities around us. We

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Speaker 4: started like a lifeguard program. There was the number of

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Speaker 4: kids attending high school like triple people were going to college.

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Speaker 4: It was all these different not just saving in bitcoin,

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Speaker 4: but all these secondary and tertiary impacts of bitcoin. And

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Speaker 4: so while the government was making these big changes on

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Speaker 4: the national level, these things happening in Alzonte, and then

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Speaker 4: they embraced saw what was happening there and said, hey,

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Speaker 4: let's combine these forces. And so I think it was

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Speaker 4: you know, all of these things coming together in kind

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Speaker 4: of a magical way.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: So, where there's no hope, the people perish kind of

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Speaker 1: a thing. Right, So when the president came in and

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Speaker 1: showed that there was going to be change happening, and

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Speaker 1: then people were hopeful for that. And then as well

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Speaker 1: as the bitcoin thing allowed people to think more long term,

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Speaker 1: and that created more hope.

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Speaker 3: And also brings in business and opportunity.

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Speaker 4: And they saw tourists, you know, people cared about El

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Speaker 4: Salvador all of a sudden, I mean really put El

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Speaker 4: Salvador on the world map when he made that decision

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Speaker 4: to make it legal tender people.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, but that was that was. I mean, that kind

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Speaker 1: of came about. I want to get to that, but

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Speaker 1: I'm just curious. So you were in the United States

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Speaker 1: and you spent like half your year in El Salvador

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Speaker 1: and half your year in the United States kind of thing.

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Speaker 4: We were there like nine months in El Salvador. In

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Speaker 4: three months we'd come back for the summers of the US.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so you were kind of one in, one out.

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Speaker 1: And I guess the question that I'm thinking about or

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Speaker 1: asking is it seems like it's sort of back to

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Speaker 1: the hope in the air of the directionality, if you will,

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Speaker 1: because I try to think about, like the United States

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Speaker 1: is going in a horrible direction and things look very bleak.

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Speaker 1: But at the same time, if I want to shift

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Speaker 1: my perspective, it's also still probably the greatest place in

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Speaker 1: the world to live, but the hope is kind.

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Speaker 2: Of gone because we see where it's going.

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Speaker 1: So even though it's still probably the best place in

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Speaker 1: the world to live, it's heavy because of where we're going.

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Speaker 1: Where's El Salvador is still one of the poorest countries

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Speaker 1: in the world. It is like the services are poor, right,

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Speaker 1: et cetera, The roads are bad, et cetera. But the

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Speaker 1: hope is different, the energy of the direction is different.

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Speaker 2: And so really even though the.

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Speaker 1: Current conditions couldn't be more opposite, the directions they're going

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Speaker 1: are different, and that creates a different energy.

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Speaker 3: Is that right, No, one hundred percent.

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Speaker 4: I think that's one thing people miss and or underestimate,

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Speaker 4: is just the impact of the animal spirits in a population.

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Speaker 3: Like if the population.

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Speaker 4: Thinks that tomorrow is going to be better, more likely

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Speaker 4: to save, they're more likely to invest in education, they're

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Speaker 4: more likely to defer current purchases just for gratification, more

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Speaker 4: for investment, and to think longer term, where if you

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Speaker 4: think things are going to be worse in the future,

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Speaker 4: you're just gonna live for the day. And so I

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Speaker 4: think that is really what makes the difference between economies

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Speaker 4: and countries that are on the upswing and those are

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Speaker 4: on the downswing. It's just that perspective and that that hope.

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Speaker 2: That's exactly right.

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Speaker 1: And so then you're around people who also have that,

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Speaker 1: and so to your point, living for today versus living

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Speaker 1: long term, and so then it's just the whole culture

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Speaker 1: gets dragged down.

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Speaker 2: So so you.

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Speaker 1: You were there, you've been there for a while, and

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Speaker 1: then one little sliver of hope in that.

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Speaker 2: Country that you said kind of start.

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Speaker 1: At the same time was then this project in Alesonte

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Speaker 1: which has now been dubb Bitcoin Beach.

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Speaker 2: Give us the origin of that, like what was the

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Speaker 2: spark for that.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, so we had you know that Alsante where a starter.

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Speaker 3: That's where that's where I live.

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Speaker 4: You know, my wife and I were working with missionaries

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Speaker 4: and in the country. We moved to El Salvador to

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Speaker 4: work with like a broad base of different missionaries there,

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Speaker 4: and we were based on the beach, mostly because I

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Speaker 4: like to surf and so I wanted to be on

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Speaker 4: the beach. And you know, even in Alzonte, though there

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Speaker 4: was this kind of quaint tourist town, the gangs ran everything,

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Speaker 4: and so we had an opportunity to start some youth

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Speaker 4: programs with some local leaders and really start to try

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Speaker 4: to change the mindset of the youth there. And originally

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Speaker 4: we were it wasn't involved with bitcoin. I was a bitcoinner,

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Speaker 4: but I wasn't really thinking that. So this was probably

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Speaker 4: twenty sixteen did that happen that we started the youth

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Speaker 4: programs there and then but you know, and I was

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Speaker 4: in the bitcoin but I didn't really you know, you

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Speaker 4: think of that as like a separate world. And there

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Speaker 4: were a lot of times where I was thinking, you know,

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Speaker 4: as we were trying to bring money down to you know,

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Speaker 4: buy vehicles for the project or things like that, and

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Speaker 4: it was a headache using the wire system. I was like, man,

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Speaker 4: if we just use bitcoin, but I never envisioned that

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Speaker 4: that would actually be. And so in twenty nineteen it

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Speaker 4: was introduced to somebody that was in early in the

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Speaker 4: bitcoin space that wanted to see bitcoin circular economies rise up,

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Speaker 4: and they heard about the work we were doing in

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Speaker 4: El Salvador and they said, hey, maybe maybe there's a

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Speaker 4: connection there. They were supporting some other ministries that we

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Speaker 4: were familiar with, and so I thought, hey, I doubt

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Speaker 4: it's gonna you know, it would work, but let's take

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Speaker 4: a chance and meet.

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Speaker 3: And so had this crazy meeting.

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Speaker 4: It wasn't even the donor, it was his representative because

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Speaker 4: he wanted to remain anonymous, but heard the story of Hey,

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Speaker 4: there's somebody there that really sees the bitcoin that they

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Speaker 4: have from early days as not just the value in

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Speaker 4: the monetary value, but the way using bitcoin as currency

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Speaker 4: as it was meant to be used, will actually impact society.

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Speaker 4: And so they kind of challenged us to think of

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Speaker 4: a way to start a system that could begin to

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Speaker 4: pull away from the fiat system.

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Speaker 2: Still there's still a lot of people that want to

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Speaker 2: do good in this world. That's amazing.

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Speaker 1: So they gave you a bitcoin, you broke it down

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Speaker 1: into the hundred million satoshi's that are available, and then

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Speaker 1: what I mean, you start giving it to people to say, hey,

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Speaker 1: I'm gonna give it to you, but you need to

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Speaker 1: spend it, or you talk to businesses about buying and

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Speaker 1: selling it, or how did that then get going?

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Speaker 4: Yeah, So initially we just used it in the projects

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Speaker 4: we already doing. So we were, you know, we'd been

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Speaker 4: paying the youth to clean the river and the beach,

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Speaker 4: just you know, mostly just try to keep them occupied.

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Speaker 4: It also gave us a chance to walk alongside them

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Speaker 4: and mentor them. And when I say this, I mean

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Speaker 4: more like the local team members there that were doing that.

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Speaker 4: I tried to remain behind the scenes as much as possible.

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Speaker 3: I just I'm very much a.

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Speaker 4: Proponent that things need to come from the local level

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Speaker 4: and from people that are in the community. And so

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Speaker 4: we started using bitcoin, you know, to compensate them. And

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Speaker 4: it was Originally, we just thought it would be like,

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Speaker 4: you know, paying them and it wouldn't make a difference

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Speaker 4: so if we were paying them in dollars or bitcoin,

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Speaker 4: but we saw when we just started paying them in bitcoin,

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Speaker 4: it really changed the way they started thinking about things

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Speaker 4: because they became curious about money, like what is money?

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Speaker 4: They thought about that for the first time, they started

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Speaker 4: considering the cost of spending something now versus holding it

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Speaker 4: for later, because they understood that this was most likely

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Speaker 4: appreciating value over time, and so they for the first

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Speaker 4: time understood deferred gratification.

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Speaker 3: And so we saw these things happened.

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Speaker 4: This was on a very very small level when this

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Speaker 4: was happening, and then we had a podcast. Peter McCormick

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Speaker 4: came in and spent some time with us, and then

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Speaker 4: when he did some things, it kind of started to

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Speaker 4: blow up. We started getting number of bitcoin tourists that

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Speaker 4: started coming in and we were able to expand the programs.

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Speaker 4: And then COVID hit and that really gave us the

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Speaker 4: opportunity to expand it to the whole community. Anybody who's

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Speaker 4: worked in in any type of development work understands that,

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Speaker 4: you know a lot of whelming people come in with

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Speaker 4: projects and wind up doing a lot more harm than good,

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Speaker 4: because you if you just throw a bunch of money

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Speaker 4: at people a lot of time, you disincentivize them to work.

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Speaker 4: You can distort the local economy and actually put local

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Speaker 4: businesses out of business if you start providing free services.

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Speaker 4: So it's it's always a balance, and so we wanted

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Speaker 4: to be very aware of that. But when COVID hit,

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Speaker 4: everything was locked down, people were not allowed to work,

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Speaker 4: people were going hungry, and the businesses were going on

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Speaker 4: business because nobody had any money. So it gave us

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Speaker 4: kind of the freedom to do like a community wide

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Speaker 4: disbursement of bitcoin, and we started sending bitcoin.

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Speaker 3: To the stimulus.

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Speaker 4: Very much like a stimulus it was, and probably ninety

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Speaker 4: percent of the families were receiving you know, I can't

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Speaker 4: remember how many SATs it was at the time that

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Speaker 4: we were sending out, but you know, it was enough

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Speaker 4: to buy maybe half their basic food items for the month,

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Speaker 4: and so but it wasn't distortive in any way because

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Speaker 4: they weren't allowed to work anyways, and so it really

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Speaker 4: kept these families fed and it also kept the businesses alive,

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Speaker 4: and it made it very easy for us to onboard

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Speaker 4: businesses because it was the only currency circulating in the community,

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Speaker 4: and so they were coming rather than us happened to

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Speaker 4: come to them and try to orange pill, and they

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Speaker 4: were coming to us like, hey, how do we how

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Speaker 4: do we.

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Speaker 3: Get involved in this?

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Speaker 4: And so it really helped supercharge it and set the

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Speaker 4: stage for you know, for what later you know, became this.

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Speaker 4: It became ubiquitous within the community that the majority of

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Speaker 4: the businesses are accepting bitcoin.

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Speaker 2: So was this happening.

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Speaker 1: So this you said, like when Hayley came in and

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Speaker 1: started changing things was kind of around the same time,

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Speaker 1: So around twenty nineteen ish is when you started kind

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Speaker 1: of the project there and then right so that was

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Speaker 1: kind of coming up to the seash.

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Speaker 4: So we started a little bit before he was elected,

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Speaker 4: because I remember he was on the scene.

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Speaker 3: It was during it was campaign season, and I remember.

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Speaker 4: Actually when I did a podcast with Peter, I remember

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Speaker 4: telling him, I like, there's this new president, and I

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Speaker 4: think that there's a possibility that he could be the

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Speaker 4: first president to adopt bitcoin as legal tender.

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Speaker 3: Like he has this sense of wanting to embrace new things.

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Speaker 4: Everybody thought it was crazy at the time, and I

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Speaker 4: was like no, I see this happening.

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Speaker 3: And so it was funny that it actually came to be.

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Speaker 3: We were definitely swinging for the fences there.

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Speaker 1: How was it that that became on his map like

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Speaker 1: all of a sudden, was someone from his team alerted

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Speaker 1: him he wanted to come take a look at it,

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Speaker 1: or like, you know, did it just get so big

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Speaker 1: and it made so much change in the country that

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Speaker 1: he couldn't ignore it, or how did that work?

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Speaker 3: I think a couple things.

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Speaker 4: There was a Forbes article that came out talking about

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Speaker 4: the projects, and it was probably one of the first

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Speaker 4: articles about l Salvador that was positive that wasn't talking

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Speaker 4: about the gangs and the violence, and it was talking

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Speaker 4: about this new innovative project that was happening in El

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Speaker 4: Salvador by a major publication. So I think that kind

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Speaker 4: of put it on their radar. And then we really

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Speaker 4: tried to engage the government from early stages because we

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Speaker 4: didn't want them to hear rumors like oh, bitcoin.

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Speaker 3: Money laundering, drug, you know, all the.

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Speaker 4: Negative connotations that came with bitcoin, especially in the earlier days,

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Speaker 4: and so we would be very open with them.

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Speaker 3: We were working with the.

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Speaker 4: Ministry of Tourism to promote tourism through bitcoin. We also

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Speaker 4: established the country's first lifeguard program. They didn't have any

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Speaker 4: lifeguard program in the country, and there would be probably

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Speaker 4: about three hundred people that would drown each year, you know,

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Speaker 4: some of them tourists, but.

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Speaker 3: Most of them locals.

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Speaker 4: And so we brought in a team to do the

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Speaker 4: full I think it was one hundred and twenty hour

403
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Speaker 4: course with the International Life Saving Foundation to get them

404
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Speaker 4: internationally certified, and then the whole all the beaches in

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Speaker 4: the surrounding region around Alzante. We paid these lifeguards. I

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Speaker 4: think there was ninety that went through the training. We

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Speaker 4: were paying them in bitcoin to patrol these beaches, literally

408
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Speaker 4: saving you know, dozens of lives just in that region,

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Speaker 4: and so I think they saw like the impact of that.

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Speaker 4: And then we were able to have a meeting with

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Speaker 4: the Minister of the Economy, Miles.

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Speaker 3: Do you know Myles suit her. Yeah, so Miles was

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Speaker 3: happening to.

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Speaker 4: Be in town, and so we got this meeting, and

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Speaker 4: you know, we thought it would be a brief meeting,

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Speaker 4: and she came in with all her for aids and

417
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Speaker 4: we sat down for three hours and just really tried

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Speaker 4: to show how adopting bitcoin could change the whole narrative

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Speaker 4: about El Salvador. Like it was really, from our point

420
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Speaker 4: of view, the only way that they could flip the

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Speaker 4: script about El Salvador from people thinking of it as

422
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Speaker 4: gangs and violence to thinking of it as this innovative

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Speaker 4: country that was leading the way way forward and so

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Speaker 4: and of course we knew that Boukelly was somebody who had,

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Speaker 4: you know, international ambitions. He wants to leave a legacy.

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Speaker 4: I think he wants to go down in the history books.

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Speaker 4: And so we were like, hey, this is the way

428
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Speaker 4: he can go down in the history books. Like there's

429
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Speaker 4: coming from a small country like El Salvador. It's very

430
00:18:41,359 --> 00:18:44,879
Speaker 4: hard to spark worldwide change. But if he is the

431
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Speaker 4: first one to adopt bitcoin as legal tender, like nobody

432
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Speaker 4: else will have that claim, he will be in the

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Speaker 4: history books. So we kept kind of pushing from that angle.

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Speaker 4: How much of that impacted it, I don't know. Maybe

435
00:18:57,080 --> 00:18:59,680
Speaker 4: there was other things, probably very impact so it's hard

436
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Speaker 4: to tell, but it was it was definitely on our radar.

437
00:19:02,320 --> 00:19:04,919
Speaker 4: We saw we never want to rely on government, but

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Speaker 4: it's much easier if the government is going in the

439
00:19:07,800 --> 00:19:10,399
Speaker 4: same direction as you than trying to fight you on things.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, you you know that's in this kind of space specifically,

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Speaker 1: but even just overall, you have that balance of like,

442
00:19:18,040 --> 00:19:21,760
Speaker 1: I don't really want to be in politics, but if

443
00:19:21,760 --> 00:19:23,639
Speaker 1: we're called to be good citizens, then that means we

444
00:19:23,680 --> 00:19:27,520
Speaker 1: are involved. Yeah, And so Jordan Peterson says that if

445
00:19:27,520 --> 00:19:29,240
Speaker 1: you abdicate your power, then a tyrant's going to take

446
00:19:29,240 --> 00:19:31,560
Speaker 1: it every time. So it's like most of us just

447
00:19:31,560 --> 00:19:33,679
Speaker 1: want to focus on our family and our business and whatever.

448
00:19:33,720 --> 00:19:37,320
Speaker 1: But if we don't take that responsibility, then we get

449
00:19:37,359 --> 00:19:40,480
Speaker 1: what we get kind of a thing. So if we're

450
00:19:40,480 --> 00:19:42,439
Speaker 1: gonna you know, if anyone's going to run it, hopefully

451
00:19:42,440 --> 00:19:45,800
Speaker 1: it's good representatives of that. Now, you started buying that

452
00:19:45,800 --> 00:19:48,680
Speaker 1: started in twenty nineteen, so that was sort of coming

453
00:19:48,720 --> 00:19:50,399
Speaker 1: out of the bear market. We kind of had this

454
00:19:50,440 --> 00:19:52,399
Speaker 1: run up with thein in twenty twenty, the price of bitcoin,

455
00:19:52,440 --> 00:19:56,600
Speaker 1: the US dollar value of bitcoin crashed really heavy. So

456
00:19:56,920 --> 00:19:58,920
Speaker 1: I'm curious what it was like from twenty nineteen into

457
00:19:58,960 --> 00:20:01,360
Speaker 1: twenty twenty. Because you said people start thinking about long

458
00:20:01,440 --> 00:20:04,000
Speaker 1: term preference, right, they probably saw the value evasion of

459
00:20:04,040 --> 00:20:07,000
Speaker 1: Big One going up, the purchasing power of bitcoin going up,

460
00:20:07,040 --> 00:20:08,960
Speaker 1: so they started thinking about saving but then it crashed

461
00:20:08,960 --> 00:20:12,679
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty and very dramatically, so I'm curious what

462
00:20:12,720 --> 00:20:14,720
Speaker 1: that was like. And then they started running back up again,

463
00:20:15,960 --> 00:20:17,960
Speaker 1: and then it crashed again. So how has the ups

464
00:20:17,960 --> 00:20:20,480
Speaker 1: and downs been when you're trying to use it to

465
00:20:20,560 --> 00:20:23,080
Speaker 1: like plan your daily food or weekly food kind of thing.

466
00:20:23,680 --> 00:20:27,000
Speaker 4: Yeah, so I think you know, these the people in

467
00:20:27,000 --> 00:20:29,320
Speaker 4: Al Salvador kind of come into it the same way

468
00:20:29,320 --> 00:20:31,280
Speaker 4: most of us have come into You have to go.

469
00:20:31,280 --> 00:20:35,240
Speaker 3: Through at least one cycle before you kind of realize.

470
00:20:34,840 --> 00:20:36,680
Speaker 2: You have to get punched in the face once exactly.

471
00:20:37,200 --> 00:20:40,880
Speaker 4: So you know, when when the first crashes were happening,

472
00:20:41,040 --> 00:20:43,600
Speaker 4: you know, especially were like we had that big drop

473
00:20:43,640 --> 00:20:47,200
Speaker 4: off when when COVID was starting. Yeah, people were freaking

474
00:20:47,200 --> 00:20:49,120
Speaker 4: out because we had a lot of stores that had

475
00:20:49,119 --> 00:20:51,440
Speaker 4: been accepting it, and you know, they're on you know, calling.

476
00:20:51,280 --> 00:20:53,760
Speaker 3: Us at two am, like when the world's happening.

477
00:20:53,840 --> 00:20:56,320
Speaker 4: So we had to just kind of handhold them, give

478
00:20:56,400 --> 00:20:58,960
Speaker 4: them the allita, Hey, this is what's happened in the past.

479
00:20:59,200 --> 00:21:01,680
Speaker 4: There were even in early days where we would personally

480
00:21:01,720 --> 00:21:03,679
Speaker 4: sometimes like reimburse them.

481
00:21:03,640 --> 00:21:04,800
Speaker 3: For their losses.

482
00:21:04,960 --> 00:21:07,879
Speaker 4: So, you know, because you just felt a sense of responsibility,

483
00:21:07,920 --> 00:21:09,879
Speaker 4: and it was you know, we're not talking about crazy

484
00:21:09,960 --> 00:21:12,560
Speaker 4: huge amounts for them, it was life changing amounts. You know,

485
00:21:12,600 --> 00:21:15,439
Speaker 4: for us, it wasn't you know, something that was going

486
00:21:15,480 --> 00:21:18,040
Speaker 4: to be that impactful. So we would walk with them

487
00:21:18,040 --> 00:21:21,520
Speaker 4: in that, but then also try to educate them and like, hey,

488
00:21:21,680 --> 00:21:23,959
Speaker 4: this is the history of it, this is how this

489
00:21:24,040 --> 00:21:27,160
Speaker 4: is normal for bitcoin. But over the long term, this

490
00:21:27,240 --> 00:21:30,280
Speaker 4: is the direction that it moves in. So if there's

491
00:21:30,280 --> 00:21:32,520
Speaker 4: something that you need to pay next week, then yeah,

492
00:21:32,560 --> 00:21:33,159
Speaker 4: maybe it's.

493
00:21:33,000 --> 00:21:35,080
Speaker 3: Better for you to hold that in dollars to be able.

494
00:21:34,920 --> 00:21:37,959
Speaker 4: To make that payment, But if this is something long term,

495
00:21:38,240 --> 00:21:40,200
Speaker 4: it's going to be much more beneficial for you saving

496
00:21:40,240 --> 00:21:43,280
Speaker 4: in this. But the other aspect of it is rather

497
00:21:43,480 --> 00:21:46,080
Speaker 4: is the Bitcoin network kind of separating that from Bitcoin

498
00:21:46,200 --> 00:21:50,080
Speaker 4: the currency. The network for them provided them this freedom

499
00:21:50,160 --> 00:21:54,439
Speaker 4: to do electronic payments to you know, have basically a

500
00:21:54,480 --> 00:21:56,600
Speaker 4: bank account on their phone, all these things that they

501
00:21:56,640 --> 00:22:00,520
Speaker 4: hadn't had before. So there was even with the volat utility,

502
00:22:00,920 --> 00:22:04,080
Speaker 4: the benefits that it brought of actually being connected to

503
00:22:04,080 --> 00:22:08,000
Speaker 4: a worldwide network for a lot of people made it

504
00:22:08,040 --> 00:22:08,399
Speaker 4: worth it.

505
00:22:08,440 --> 00:22:10,680
Speaker 3: And you know, they were very innovative.

506
00:22:10,680 --> 00:22:13,840
Speaker 4: They learned to ride the waves we would see when

507
00:22:14,800 --> 00:22:18,840
Speaker 4: when Strike came in. A lot before that people were

508
00:22:18,920 --> 00:22:21,159
Speaker 4: using the Bitcoin Beach wallet. When Strike came in, they

509
00:22:21,160 --> 00:22:24,040
Speaker 4: would use the both wallets and they would they would

510
00:22:24,040 --> 00:22:24,680
Speaker 4: basically use.

511
00:22:24,600 --> 00:22:26,120
Speaker 3: Them as like a trading vehicle.

512
00:22:26,200 --> 00:22:28,120
Speaker 4: When they wanted to move the dollars, they would move

513
00:22:28,119 --> 00:22:30,600
Speaker 4: it into their Strike wallet. At that time, strike only

514
00:22:30,760 --> 00:22:32,600
Speaker 4: you could only hold it as dollars. You couldn't hold

515
00:22:32,600 --> 00:22:34,520
Speaker 4: it as bitcoin. Yeah, and then they would move it

516
00:22:34,560 --> 00:22:36,680
Speaker 4: back and forth, and so you know, they would figure

517
00:22:36,680 --> 00:22:41,040
Speaker 4: out the ways to kind of mitigate the risk. But

518
00:22:41,080 --> 00:22:43,520
Speaker 4: it's then we had the challenge on the other side.

519
00:22:43,520 --> 00:22:45,879
Speaker 4: When you have the upswing, people start to get that

520
00:22:45,920 --> 00:22:49,000
Speaker 4: speculative fever and they're telling us, oh, yeah, I'm gonna

521
00:22:49,040 --> 00:22:51,639
Speaker 4: sell my house and to buy bitcoin, or you know,

522
00:22:51,720 --> 00:22:53,840
Speaker 4: I'm gonna borrow money to buy a bit. And so

523
00:22:53,880 --> 00:22:56,080
Speaker 4: then we're on the other side like, hey, no, like

524
00:22:56,160 --> 00:22:59,080
Speaker 4: this is super volatile, you could get wiped out.

525
00:22:59,119 --> 00:23:01,120
Speaker 3: Like just it's long term.

526
00:23:01,280 --> 00:23:05,280
Speaker 4: Just steadily accumulate, use it in your daily life as currency.

527
00:23:05,359 --> 00:23:07,600
Speaker 4: Try to keep pulling back and removing yourself from the

528
00:23:07,640 --> 00:23:08,320
Speaker 4: fiat system.

529
00:23:08,359 --> 00:23:10,000
Speaker 3: But don't become a speculator.

530
00:23:10,119 --> 00:23:13,880
Speaker 1: Yeah, as I mentioned earlier, I'm building a house down

531
00:23:13,880 --> 00:23:18,040
Speaker 1: in Mexico, and I'm really seeing it firsthand because like

532
00:23:18,160 --> 00:23:20,520
Speaker 1: the building materials, some are coming from America, some are

533
00:23:20,520 --> 00:23:23,040
Speaker 1: coming from Europe, some are like so like we're getting invoices,

534
00:23:23,080 --> 00:23:25,560
Speaker 1: but the invoices are shifting all the time from time

535
00:23:25,600 --> 00:23:27,400
Speaker 1: I get the invoice of that time to pay because

536
00:23:27,440 --> 00:23:29,919
Speaker 1: the exchange rates are constantly moving around.

537
00:23:30,359 --> 00:23:31,280
Speaker 2: And it's making me.

538
00:23:31,280 --> 00:23:34,000
Speaker 1: Realize for the first time how much everyone is forced

539
00:23:34,000 --> 00:23:36,000
Speaker 1: to be a speculator, you know, being on a dollar standard.

540
00:23:36,000 --> 00:23:38,639
Speaker 1: I don't really realize this, but now, like I'm buying

541
00:23:38,640 --> 00:23:41,600
Speaker 1: stuff in euros and stuff in dollars and stuff in pesos,

542
00:23:41,600 --> 00:23:44,240
Speaker 1: and like trying to manage that has been very difficult

543
00:23:44,280 --> 00:23:46,000
Speaker 1: and more importantly for them. I see the people in

544
00:23:46,000 --> 00:23:48,080
Speaker 1: Mexic with the people that are giving the invoices and importing,

545
00:23:48,160 --> 00:23:50,720
Speaker 1: like it's like almost it's a nightmare for them and

546
00:23:51,240 --> 00:23:52,560
Speaker 1: forcing them to be a speculator.

547
00:23:52,800 --> 00:23:55,159
Speaker 4: Well, how hard has it been just trying to get

548
00:23:55,200 --> 00:23:57,320
Speaker 4: them paid too, to get money down there?

549
00:23:57,400 --> 00:23:59,960
Speaker 1: Yeah, luckily that hasn't been too bad. Most of them

550
00:24:00,080 --> 00:24:02,879
Speaker 1: have American bank accounts I can wire into, so my

551
00:24:02,920 --> 00:24:06,199
Speaker 1: general contractor as an American bank account, my main like

552
00:24:06,240 --> 00:24:07,879
Speaker 1: appliance guy, which was a lot of money. You know,

553
00:24:07,920 --> 00:24:10,080
Speaker 1: they have American bank so that's been a little bit easier,

554
00:24:10,760 --> 00:24:13,520
Speaker 1: but you're certainly moving money out of the country is difficult.

555
00:24:14,760 --> 00:24:18,960
Speaker 1: One thing that most people don't realize is that there's

556
00:24:19,080 --> 00:24:21,680
Speaker 1: you know, approximately a billion, billion and a half adults

557
00:24:21,720 --> 00:24:23,960
Speaker 1: in the world that don't have access to banking. A

558
00:24:23,960 --> 00:24:25,520
Speaker 1: lot of them don't have access to bankings they don't

559
00:24:25,520 --> 00:24:27,199
Speaker 1: have permission to join so they don't have the right

560
00:24:27,240 --> 00:24:30,959
Speaker 1: documentation or whatever it is, or a sanctioned country. When

561
00:24:31,000 --> 00:24:34,879
Speaker 1: I came down to Bitcoin Beach and tried to get

562
00:24:34,880 --> 00:24:37,040
Speaker 1: a little program off the ground that unfortunately didn't work,

563
00:24:37,080 --> 00:24:39,760
Speaker 1: But I realized for the first time that a lot

564
00:24:39,800 --> 00:24:41,480
Speaker 1: of people in ell Soalfimare didn't have access to banking

565
00:24:41,520 --> 00:24:43,960
Speaker 1: because they didn't have enough money. So they didn't have

566
00:24:44,040 --> 00:24:46,400
Speaker 1: enough money to pay the monthly fee. And then merchants

567
00:24:46,400 --> 00:24:48,760
Speaker 1: weren't able to get point of sell or merchant accounts

568
00:24:48,760 --> 00:24:53,000
Speaker 1: because they didn't have enough transactions. So like there, maybe

569
00:24:53,000 --> 00:24:54,760
Speaker 1: they were allowed to be in the system, but they

570
00:24:54,800 --> 00:24:56,439
Speaker 1: couldn't afford it.

571
00:24:56,160 --> 00:24:59,920
Speaker 4: But that goes back to the problems with KYC and AM.

572
00:25:00,359 --> 00:25:03,760
Speaker 4: They've put this high price on bringing people into the

573
00:25:03,800 --> 00:25:07,720
Speaker 4: banking system. So we've locked literally billions of people out

574
00:25:07,760 --> 00:25:10,159
Speaker 4: of the banking system because it just will never be

575
00:25:10,240 --> 00:25:12,840
Speaker 4: profitable to bank them. It's not that they don't have

576
00:25:12,920 --> 00:25:16,199
Speaker 4: the documentation, but it's expensive for the banks to do

577
00:25:16,280 --> 00:25:19,640
Speaker 4: all these compliance procedures. So it really makes these people unbankable.

578
00:25:19,800 --> 00:25:23,120
Speaker 1: Yeah, and then if they can't get into the financial system,

579
00:25:23,280 --> 00:25:24,840
Speaker 1: then they can't get into the world. You know, I

580
00:25:24,840 --> 00:25:26,840
Speaker 1: talk about, you know, the invention of the smartphone. It's

581
00:25:26,880 --> 00:25:29,600
Speaker 1: like now we could learn anything, meet anybody, do anything,

582
00:25:29,600 --> 00:25:31,639
Speaker 1: and like you have kids now that have an Instagram

583
00:25:31,680 --> 00:25:34,800
Speaker 1: account could make a hundred thousand dollars, but only if

584
00:25:34,840 --> 00:25:38,160
Speaker 1: they can get into the banking system. And so Bitcoin

585
00:25:38,200 --> 00:25:39,840
Speaker 1: was able to kind of give that to them. What

586
00:25:39,920 --> 00:25:43,919
Speaker 1: about the remittance thing? So I think about thirty percent

587
00:25:43,960 --> 00:25:48,040
Speaker 1: of El Salvador's GDP comes for remittances, and so if

588
00:25:48,080 --> 00:25:50,600
Speaker 1: I wanted to send money down there, that's very inconvenient

589
00:25:50,600 --> 00:25:52,680
Speaker 1: for me. Western union't have to get cash, go stand

590
00:25:52,720 --> 00:25:54,639
Speaker 1: in line, the whole thing. But then how do they

591
00:25:54,640 --> 00:25:57,000
Speaker 1: get it down in El Salvador or how were they?

592
00:25:57,160 --> 00:25:57,400
Speaker 3: Yeah?

593
00:25:57,400 --> 00:25:59,199
Speaker 4: So they you know, they have offices there that they

594
00:25:59,200 --> 00:26:01,400
Speaker 4: would go to receive usually they have to go in

595
00:26:01,400 --> 00:26:04,119
Speaker 4: person to pick it up. You know, there's fees involved,

596
00:26:04,240 --> 00:26:06,359
Speaker 4: it's right, but a lot of them don't. Yeah, they

597
00:26:06,400 --> 00:26:08,920
Speaker 4: don't have their own vehicles, and so they're riding the bus.

598
00:26:09,040 --> 00:26:14,399
Speaker 4: That's it's definitely very inconvenient in a lot of different ways.

599
00:26:16,800 --> 00:26:19,640
Speaker 4: But you know, that's why there's so much promise with

600
00:26:19,640 --> 00:26:20,320
Speaker 4: with bitcoin.

601
00:26:20,480 --> 00:26:21,920
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, but.

602
00:26:21,880 --> 00:26:24,960
Speaker 4: It's It's one thing you find with people is people

603
00:26:24,960 --> 00:26:28,800
Speaker 4: are creatures of habit and so just because something's better

604
00:26:28,920 --> 00:26:31,480
Speaker 4: doesn't mean people are going to immediately move to it.

605
00:26:31,480 --> 00:26:35,240
Speaker 4: It takes there's usually a process of them discovering that,

606
00:26:35,520 --> 00:26:39,199
Speaker 4: especially something very personal like money, People like, no, I

607
00:26:39,240 --> 00:26:40,880
Speaker 4: know how to do this, and even though it costs

608
00:26:40,920 --> 00:26:42,439
Speaker 4: me this, so they have.

609
00:26:42,359 --> 00:26:45,080
Speaker 3: To kind of be you know, aided along the way.

610
00:26:45,119 --> 00:26:48,240
Speaker 4: And we're seeing that gradually happen as people kind of

611
00:26:48,240 --> 00:26:51,680
Speaker 4: gradually shift to that. The other great thing that we've seen,

612
00:26:51,760 --> 00:26:55,520
Speaker 4: and this is something that people underestimate and that people

613
00:26:55,520 --> 00:26:58,680
Speaker 4: that aren't even using bitcoin are benefiting from El Salvador's

614
00:26:58,720 --> 00:27:02,120
Speaker 4: adoption of bitcoin, is Western Union and money Gram. All

615
00:27:02,160 --> 00:27:05,479
Speaker 4: these companies see the threat and so they've all pushed

616
00:27:05,480 --> 00:27:09,000
Speaker 4: their fees way down. I'd say about they've kint them

617
00:27:09,040 --> 00:27:13,119
Speaker 4: probably competitionty percent, and they've made the experience better because

618
00:27:13,160 --> 00:27:15,600
Speaker 4: now they realize they're having to compete with somebody being

619
00:27:15,600 --> 00:27:17,920
Speaker 4: able to send you know, from their phone to somebody

620
00:27:17,920 --> 00:27:21,280
Speaker 4: else's phone and not having an intermediary. So it's really

621
00:27:21,400 --> 00:27:24,440
Speaker 4: forced them to step up their game. And so now

622
00:27:24,520 --> 00:27:28,679
Speaker 4: you have literally you know, million plus Salvadorans and that

623
00:27:28,720 --> 00:27:32,159
Speaker 4: are benefiting from bitcoin, that aren't even using bitcoin, but

624
00:27:32,280 --> 00:27:34,560
Speaker 4: they're benefiting from the competition that the bitcoin.

625
00:27:34,320 --> 00:27:35,360
Speaker 2: Well economy is benefiting.

626
00:27:35,600 --> 00:27:37,720
Speaker 1: I mean, now there's more money in the economy overall, right,

627
00:27:37,800 --> 00:27:40,399
Speaker 1: so that's a big deal. Now we talked about not

628
00:27:40,480 --> 00:27:41,959
Speaker 1: everyone has act to banking. A lot of people who

629
00:27:41,960 --> 00:27:44,480
Speaker 1: can't afford it because the expensive a kyc et cetera.

630
00:27:45,160 --> 00:27:46,760
Speaker 1: And so one thing I think about, you know, in

631
00:27:46,800 --> 00:27:49,440
Speaker 1: regards to a bitcoin adoption, you know, from a US

632
00:27:49,480 --> 00:27:52,280
Speaker 1: centric lens, move some of your savings in there. We say,

633
00:27:52,359 --> 00:27:53,880
Speaker 1: you know, don't invest what you can't afford to lose.

634
00:27:53,920 --> 00:27:54,960
Speaker 1: If you can't, you know, lock it up for a

635
00:27:54,960 --> 00:27:57,000
Speaker 1: couple of years, et cetera. But people down there don't

636
00:27:57,000 --> 00:27:59,400
Speaker 1: even have money to pay for a checking account. So

637
00:27:59,560 --> 00:28:02,199
Speaker 1: I think out in these developing countries and I know

638
00:28:02,280 --> 00:28:04,720
Speaker 1: you know, have ties down in Peru and other countries

639
00:28:04,760 --> 00:28:06,280
Speaker 1: like that, so where people are living on like five

640
00:28:06,280 --> 00:28:09,760
Speaker 1: bucks a day, like they're not really saving. So I

641
00:28:09,800 --> 00:28:12,840
Speaker 1: think sometimes like how does bitcoin help people that aren't saving?

642
00:28:13,480 --> 00:28:15,320
Speaker 1: And so you mentioned, you know, some people are trying

643
00:28:15,320 --> 00:28:17,159
Speaker 1: to be speculators, but if there's people that are so

644
00:28:17,160 --> 00:28:19,600
Speaker 1: poor they don't really have long term savings, they can't

645
00:28:20,080 --> 00:28:22,600
Speaker 1: think about the long term vie of bitcoin, I mean,

646
00:28:22,720 --> 00:28:25,040
Speaker 1: is it really even helping them? I mean directly as

647
00:28:25,040 --> 00:28:27,200
Speaker 1: opposed to indirectly or yeah.

648
00:28:27,040 --> 00:28:28,280
Speaker 3: You would be surprised.

649
00:28:28,320 --> 00:28:30,600
Speaker 4: And I went into this thinking that same thing, like

650
00:28:30,640 --> 00:28:33,680
Speaker 4: these people make so little, there's no way that they'd

651
00:28:33,720 --> 00:28:35,840
Speaker 4: be able to save. But the same time, you look

652
00:28:35,880 --> 00:28:40,680
Speaker 4: around and there's you know, McDonald's everywhere and Coca Cola everywhere,

653
00:28:40,680 --> 00:28:43,920
Speaker 4: and all these consumer goods that these people are buying.

654
00:28:44,080 --> 00:28:47,280
Speaker 4: And so even though they're not making that much money,

655
00:28:47,320 --> 00:28:50,760
Speaker 4: they are making choices every day where they could choose

656
00:28:50,840 --> 00:28:53,160
Speaker 4: to save. But it's it For a lot of them,

657
00:28:53,200 --> 00:28:55,800
Speaker 4: it seemed pointless, and so buying that coke was like

658
00:28:55,880 --> 00:28:58,280
Speaker 4: the you know, reward for a very hard day. But

659
00:28:58,400 --> 00:29:01,760
Speaker 4: when they switched over to a bitcoin standard, they really

660
00:29:01,800 --> 00:29:05,480
Speaker 4: start realizing the cost of buying that Coca cola because

661
00:29:05,520 --> 00:29:07,800
Speaker 4: those SATs that they're going to spend on that are

662
00:29:07,800 --> 00:29:08,040
Speaker 4: going to.

663
00:29:08,040 --> 00:29:09,480
Speaker 3: Be worth a lot more in the future.

664
00:29:09,640 --> 00:29:11,920
Speaker 4: And so we saw people that I would have told

665
00:29:12,000 --> 00:29:14,400
Speaker 4: you there's no way we can expect them to save

666
00:29:14,440 --> 00:29:18,160
Speaker 4: because their salaries too low, started saving and accumulated money

667
00:29:18,200 --> 00:29:20,480
Speaker 4: and you would, you know, see on their phone. You're like,

668
00:29:20,520 --> 00:29:23,800
Speaker 4: what you got like a month's salary in SATs, like

669
00:29:24,320 --> 00:29:27,280
Speaker 4: on your phone and before you usually had your money

670
00:29:27,320 --> 00:29:29,520
Speaker 4: spent before you even received it. And they're like, yoh, yeah,

671
00:29:29,560 --> 00:29:31,960
Speaker 4: I'm saving up for to replace my roof, for to

672
00:29:32,120 --> 00:29:33,160
Speaker 4: get my teeth fixed.

673
00:29:33,160 --> 00:29:35,200
Speaker 3: And so we've seen that.

674
00:29:36,040 --> 00:29:40,200
Speaker 4: Really, the the thought that a lot of us have

675
00:29:40,240 --> 00:29:43,280
Speaker 4: that these people aren't capable of saving is untrue.

676
00:29:43,520 --> 00:29:46,920
Speaker 3: Like they are capable. The incentives just have to be aligned.

677
00:29:47,560 --> 00:29:48,040
Speaker 2: That's good.

678
00:29:48,360 --> 00:29:51,200
Speaker 1: Now Here we are about four years or so into

679
00:29:51,200 --> 00:29:56,000
Speaker 1: this experiment. There's a lot you know, mainstream media has

680
00:29:56,160 --> 00:29:59,520
Speaker 1: to your point, the first time was talking positive about it.

681
00:29:59,480 --> 00:30:01,440
Speaker 1: We've seen a lot pieces come out talk about negative

682
00:30:01,440 --> 00:30:03,360
Speaker 1: about it. So we've heard both both back and forth.

683
00:30:04,320 --> 00:30:07,560
Speaker 1: Some reports come back and say that bitcoin isn't really

684
00:30:07,560 --> 00:30:09,720
Speaker 1: being used there, there's really nowhere to spend it. It's

685
00:30:09,720 --> 00:30:12,640
Speaker 1: not as as as proliferated as people would think it

686
00:30:12,640 --> 00:30:15,440
Speaker 1: would be. So we hear both sides of the story

687
00:30:15,880 --> 00:30:17,960
Speaker 1: where we come in four years, like where is it

688
00:30:18,000 --> 00:30:18,560
Speaker 1: at right now?

689
00:30:19,120 --> 00:30:22,160
Speaker 3: So it's much further along than I ever would have dreamed.

690
00:30:22,240 --> 00:30:24,760
Speaker 4: You can, you know, it's it's it's just and it

691
00:30:24,800 --> 00:30:27,120
Speaker 4: really depends on where your what your expectations are of

692
00:30:28,000 --> 00:30:31,720
Speaker 4: My expectation is these things are decade long transformation.

693
00:30:31,920 --> 00:30:33,400
Speaker 3: That's it's not going to happen overnight.

694
00:30:33,440 --> 00:30:36,240
Speaker 4: But there's many people living in El Salvador that the

695
00:30:36,400 --> 00:30:38,880
Speaker 4: only live on bitcoin. You can you know, the major

696
00:30:38,920 --> 00:30:42,680
Speaker 4: supermarkets take bitcoin. The you know, we've bought vehicles from

697
00:30:42,800 --> 00:30:45,800
Speaker 4: dealership with bitcoin and not just in bitcoin ba No,

698
00:30:45,880 --> 00:30:48,200
Speaker 4: not just in bitcoin Beach. It's now. If you want

699
00:30:48,200 --> 00:30:50,280
Speaker 4: to be able to go to any store you want

700
00:30:50,320 --> 00:30:51,920
Speaker 4: and expect to use bitcoin, that's not going.

701
00:30:51,880 --> 00:30:52,680
Speaker 3: To be realistic.

702
00:30:52,760 --> 00:30:56,120
Speaker 4: But if you there's a network of stores, like I said,

703
00:30:56,120 --> 00:30:59,880
Speaker 4: the main supermarkets, their version of Costco accepts bitcoin and

704
00:31:00,120 --> 00:31:01,360
Speaker 4: their Lightning payments.

705
00:31:01,040 --> 00:31:02,360
Speaker 3: Now, so it's super easy.

706
00:31:02,640 --> 00:31:04,680
Speaker 4: So you know, like when we were buying vehicles, we

707
00:31:04,800 --> 00:31:07,440
Speaker 4: chose to buy from a dealership that accepted bitcoin that

708
00:31:07,800 --> 00:31:09,760
Speaker 4: we weren't. You know, we maybe would have bought a

709
00:31:09,760 --> 00:31:14,000
Speaker 4: different vehicle if they had. Other dealerships were accepting bitcoin,

710
00:31:14,040 --> 00:31:16,520
Speaker 4: but we bought Mahindra pickup trucks because that was the dealership.

711
00:31:16,520 --> 00:31:18,880
Speaker 3: We wanted to support the dealership that was accepting.

712
00:31:18,960 --> 00:31:21,760
Speaker 4: So you do have to make some trade offs if

713
00:31:21,760 --> 00:31:24,959
Speaker 4: you want to live on a bitcoin standard. So so

714
00:31:25,400 --> 00:31:28,120
Speaker 4: for people that think that like you can use it everywhere, yeah,

715
00:31:28,120 --> 00:31:31,560
Speaker 4: definitely not. But the rate at which it's growing is

716
00:31:31,800 --> 00:31:34,640
Speaker 4: much faster and the adoptions much faster than when credit

717
00:31:34,680 --> 00:31:37,440
Speaker 4: cards were introduced to Elsavador or even into the US.

718
00:31:37,520 --> 00:31:39,880
Speaker 4: You look at credit cards when they were introduced, how

719
00:31:39,920 --> 00:31:43,320
Speaker 4: long it took before they were really taken everywhere. I mean,

720
00:31:43,320 --> 00:31:46,240
Speaker 4: it took decades before it became common for you to

721
00:31:46,240 --> 00:31:48,680
Speaker 4: be able to use a credit card, you know, even

722
00:31:48,720 --> 00:31:50,680
Speaker 4: like a fast food restaurant or something like that. So

723
00:31:51,200 --> 00:31:54,680
Speaker 4: I think it just you got have to have realistic expectations.

724
00:31:54,760 --> 00:31:57,920
Speaker 4: But I think five years from now, people will be like, oh, yeah,

725
00:31:57,960 --> 00:31:59,959
Speaker 4: of course it was obvious all the time. Once they

726
00:32:00,080 --> 00:32:02,640
Speaker 4: adopted it would be, you know, be able to use everywhere.

727
00:32:02,720 --> 00:32:02,920
Speaker 2: Yeah.

728
00:32:03,160 --> 00:32:05,640
Speaker 1: I think as the bill Gates quote that people overestimate

729
00:32:05,640 --> 00:32:07,440
Speaker 1: what they can do in a year and underestimate what

730
00:32:07,520 --> 00:32:09,400
Speaker 1: can come down in a decade. Right, And so I

731
00:32:09,440 --> 00:32:11,080
Speaker 1: say that all the time with bitcoin, you you just

732
00:32:11,120 --> 00:32:13,200
Speaker 1: expect way too much too soon. And especially to the

733
00:32:13,240 --> 00:32:15,280
Speaker 1: point you made earlier about money, money is a whole

734
00:32:15,280 --> 00:32:16,680
Speaker 1: different thing. It's one thing to switch over to a

735
00:32:16,680 --> 00:32:18,760
Speaker 1: new social media account. It's a whole different thing to

736
00:32:18,760 --> 00:32:21,960
Speaker 1: switch over your money. So from that perspective, I see

737
00:32:21,960 --> 00:32:22,520
Speaker 1: that now.

738
00:32:22,800 --> 00:32:24,720
Speaker 4: The other thing I Joan Henter real quick was the

739
00:32:24,800 --> 00:32:28,440
Speaker 4: role El Salvador has played in and pushing the tools

740
00:32:28,480 --> 00:32:32,280
Speaker 4: and the resources forward, because when El Salvador made this adoption,

741
00:32:32,440 --> 00:32:35,000
Speaker 4: there wasn't that many great wallets out there, or point

742
00:32:35,000 --> 00:32:38,920
Speaker 4: of sale or even the way to spend bitcoin really

743
00:32:38,920 --> 00:32:41,880
Speaker 4: didn't work that well. And so when El Salvador moved

744
00:32:41,920 --> 00:32:44,320
Speaker 4: in that direction, all these companies came in and they

745
00:32:44,360 --> 00:32:47,560
Speaker 4: continue to develop better products, and it makes it much

746
00:32:47,600 --> 00:32:49,920
Speaker 4: more easy to use bitcoin, where now if I spend

747
00:32:49,920 --> 00:32:51,960
Speaker 4: bitcoin a lot of these places, it happens faster than

748
00:32:52,000 --> 00:32:55,120
Speaker 4: if I try to use my credit card, where initially,

749
00:32:55,320 --> 00:32:57,280
Speaker 4: you know, they were still doing things on chain, so

750
00:32:57,280 --> 00:33:00,920
Speaker 4: you'd be sitting there in the supermarket, wait confirmation and hoping.

751
00:33:00,720 --> 00:33:01,840
Speaker 3: It made it in the next place.

752
00:33:01,920 --> 00:33:05,720
Speaker 4: Yeah, so we're seeing that, you know, Salvador be kind

753
00:33:05,720 --> 00:33:08,640
Speaker 4: of a laboratory I think for the world to get

754
00:33:08,960 --> 00:33:11,600
Speaker 4: bitcoin to the usability that it's going to need to

755
00:33:12,120 --> 00:33:15,320
Speaker 4: jump and become the ubiguous currency that you.

756
00:33:15,360 --> 00:33:16,120
Speaker 3: Used around the world.

757
00:33:16,600 --> 00:33:19,560
Speaker 1: Now again, so here we are four years later, and

758
00:33:20,000 --> 00:33:21,760
Speaker 1: there was two sparks, right, So we had buke Ley

759
00:33:21,840 --> 00:33:24,040
Speaker 1: and then we had Bitcoin, and maybe they helped each other, right,

760
00:33:24,120 --> 00:33:28,440
Speaker 1: the synergy between that. It's gone from the most dangerous

761
00:33:28,440 --> 00:33:30,080
Speaker 1: country in the world, I guess now to the safest

762
00:33:30,120 --> 00:33:31,080
Speaker 1: country in the world, which.

763
00:33:30,960 --> 00:33:33,680
Speaker 3: Is safest in the in the America's in.

764
00:33:33,640 --> 00:33:36,600
Speaker 1: The Americas, okay, so not like Luxembourg, but in the

765
00:33:36,600 --> 00:33:42,200
Speaker 1: America's okay. So that's a big shift. Boukayley has done

766
00:33:42,240 --> 00:33:44,280
Speaker 1: a lot. I've seen him announcing, like really trying to

767
00:33:44,280 --> 00:33:47,600
Speaker 1: recruit people, like giving passports out to philosophers and thought leaders,

768
00:33:47,680 --> 00:33:51,200
Speaker 1: things like that. I've heard a lot of investment capitals

769
00:33:51,200 --> 00:33:51,640
Speaker 1: flowing in.

770
00:33:51,720 --> 00:33:52,760
Speaker 2: Businesses are flowing in.

771
00:33:54,320 --> 00:33:57,400
Speaker 1: I think around Alzonte, around Bitcoin Beach, the real estate

772
00:33:57,440 --> 00:34:01,600
Speaker 1: has gone crazy through the roof. How much have you

773
00:34:01,680 --> 00:34:03,760
Speaker 1: really seen that? I mean, is that really noticeable. Is

774
00:34:03,800 --> 00:34:06,000
Speaker 1: that a big deal or is it just still that

775
00:34:06,080 --> 00:34:06,720
Speaker 1: hope in the air.

776
00:34:07,200 --> 00:34:08,719
Speaker 3: No, it's definitely a big deal.

777
00:34:08,719 --> 00:34:12,319
Speaker 4: I mean the you know, ten years ago, the unemployment

778
00:34:12,400 --> 00:34:13,160
Speaker 4: was off the charts.

779
00:34:13,160 --> 00:34:15,080
Speaker 3: It was very hard for people to find work.

780
00:34:15,120 --> 00:34:17,400
Speaker 4: Now, the biggest complaint I hear from people is like,

781
00:34:17,560 --> 00:34:19,120
Speaker 4: you can't find any construction workers.

782
00:34:19,160 --> 00:34:21,640
Speaker 3: We can't find any restaurant workers. Like people are.

783
00:34:21,480 --> 00:34:24,560
Speaker 4: Moving their way up the food chain the jobs that

784
00:34:24,920 --> 00:34:27,239
Speaker 4: pay more, which those are great problems to have. And

785
00:34:27,280 --> 00:34:30,920
Speaker 4: so you see construction booming everywhere. I mean, it's it

786
00:34:30,960 --> 00:34:33,879
Speaker 4: seems like every other lot is a construction site now,

787
00:34:34,560 --> 00:34:35,880
Speaker 4: and you're.

788
00:34:35,760 --> 00:34:37,120
Speaker 2: Just concentrated in that area.

789
00:34:37,120 --> 00:34:40,560
Speaker 4: Though, No, not just you know Alezante, of course there's

790
00:34:40,600 --> 00:34:43,239
Speaker 4: a ton of stuff happening there, and the prices have

791
00:34:43,320 --> 00:34:46,360
Speaker 4: gone gone off the charts, but even the rest of

792
00:34:46,520 --> 00:34:48,480
Speaker 4: you know, that pushes people out as it becomes too

793
00:34:48,480 --> 00:34:50,799
Speaker 4: expensive there, people move, you know, up the coast or

794
00:34:50,800 --> 00:34:54,040
Speaker 4: down the coast. The capital city is booming now. You

795
00:34:54,080 --> 00:34:57,440
Speaker 4: see all these countries or these companies kind of pouring in.

796
00:34:57,520 --> 00:35:00,919
Speaker 4: They're looking for they're driving the price of talent up

797
00:35:01,000 --> 00:35:04,000
Speaker 4: because there's there's limited talent in the country, and so

798
00:35:04,120 --> 00:35:06,799
Speaker 4: the education system now is needing to catch up and

799
00:35:06,880 --> 00:35:09,600
Speaker 4: to produce the type of workers that all these companies

800
00:35:09,640 --> 00:35:10,719
Speaker 4: are looking for, and so.

801
00:35:11,160 --> 00:35:13,239
Speaker 3: It's it can be a little.

802
00:35:15,080 --> 00:35:17,279
Speaker 4: It can be a little haphazard at times, like you know,

803
00:35:17,320 --> 00:35:19,200
Speaker 4: companies come in and they're like, oh, we can't find.

804
00:35:19,040 --> 00:35:19,759
Speaker 3: The workers we need.

805
00:35:19,800 --> 00:35:23,319
Speaker 4: And then but these things tend to solve themselves. Then

806
00:35:23,360 --> 00:35:25,520
Speaker 4: the schools step in and start producing the workers that

807
00:35:25,560 --> 00:35:27,880
Speaker 4: they need. And so it's it's a messy process, but

808
00:35:28,000 --> 00:35:31,160
Speaker 4: you see the country just just continuing to build up.

809
00:35:31,600 --> 00:35:32,720
Speaker 2: It's such a small country.

810
00:35:32,880 --> 00:35:35,080
Speaker 1: It's a tiny country, so it's kind of like a

811
00:35:35,160 --> 00:35:38,840
Speaker 1: very thinly traded stock. A thinly traded stock moves really fast,

812
00:35:38,840 --> 00:35:40,880
Speaker 1: even like bitcoin when it was small, and so so

813
00:35:40,920 --> 00:35:43,440
Speaker 1: Il Salvador was a very small country, and so you

814
00:35:43,480 --> 00:35:46,000
Speaker 1: can really swing the balance of employment or things like

815
00:35:46,000 --> 00:35:49,759
Speaker 1: that pretty quickly. Now, Mike, one thing, one thing that

816
00:35:49,840 --> 00:35:54,360
Speaker 1: I think can talk about quite often is that I

817
00:35:54,360 --> 00:35:57,200
Speaker 1: feel like this worldview and unfortunately I see it in

818
00:35:57,239 --> 00:35:59,520
Speaker 1: the bitcoin community and I see it across the world overall.

819
00:35:59,520 --> 00:36:03,560
Speaker 1: In the United States, I should say that there's not

820
00:36:03,640 --> 00:36:06,520
Speaker 1: really this spirit of like helping other people. And when

821
00:36:06,560 --> 00:36:08,600
Speaker 1: I say that, not like holding a door open for people,

822
00:36:08,640 --> 00:36:12,200
Speaker 1: but like donating money or time to go help other people,

823
00:36:12,600 --> 00:36:15,920
Speaker 1: and I feel that that sets people's worldview. So, for example,

824
00:36:16,040 --> 00:36:17,879
Speaker 1: I was on a plane with somebody not that long ago,

825
00:36:18,320 --> 00:36:20,600
Speaker 1: and you know, we're having this debate. We're sitting next

826
00:36:20,600 --> 00:36:23,400
Speaker 1: to each other, and and he's telling me that, you know,

827
00:36:23,480 --> 00:36:25,640
Speaker 1: he thinks that the government should continue to tax people

828
00:36:25,680 --> 00:36:28,600
Speaker 1: so they continue to fund all these programs. And I'm saying,

829
00:36:28,920 --> 00:36:31,000
Speaker 1: we don't need the government to take care of those people.

830
00:36:31,040 --> 00:36:33,400
Speaker 1: We take people take care of these people. And he

831
00:36:33,440 --> 00:36:35,439
Speaker 1: didn't see that. And then I just asked them this question,

832
00:36:35,480 --> 00:36:38,000
Speaker 1: and there's kind of personal question. I said, you don't

833
00:36:38,000 --> 00:36:40,080
Speaker 1: have to answer this question, but I'm just curious how

834
00:36:40,160 --> 00:36:42,440
Speaker 1: much of your money. We're in first class, so he's

835
00:36:42,480 --> 00:36:44,440
Speaker 1: a good he's doing good business. How much of your

836
00:36:44,480 --> 00:36:48,680
Speaker 1: money do you donate to good causes or people? Said,

837
00:36:48,680 --> 00:36:50,320
Speaker 1: you don't have to tell me that, but he's like none.

838
00:36:51,880 --> 00:36:54,000
Speaker 1: I was like, do you think that could change your worldview?

839
00:36:54,280 --> 00:36:54,719
Speaker 2: Right? Like?

840
00:36:55,440 --> 00:36:57,920
Speaker 1: And so like, we're out there helping you. You were

841
00:36:57,920 --> 00:37:01,160
Speaker 1: down there helping even before bitcoin. I'm curious your opinion

842
00:37:01,200 --> 00:37:05,320
Speaker 1: on that and people's worldview and being reflective of their actions.

843
00:37:06,280 --> 00:37:08,759
Speaker 4: No, I think, and you see this not to make

844
00:37:08,760 --> 00:37:10,960
Speaker 4: it too political, but you do see it a lot

845
00:37:11,000 --> 00:37:14,040
Speaker 4: of times it is politically aligned.

846
00:37:14,120 --> 00:37:15,040
Speaker 3: Like people that.

847
00:37:15,000 --> 00:37:17,120
Speaker 4: Are more on the left, they view that as the

848
00:37:17,719 --> 00:37:20,560
Speaker 4: government should be taking care of people, and there's been

849
00:37:20,600 --> 00:37:22,840
Speaker 4: lots of studies they tend to give much less to

850
00:37:23,000 --> 00:37:25,800
Speaker 4: charity and to be less generous and to do less

851
00:37:25,840 --> 00:37:29,000
Speaker 4: stuff on their own, where people that are tend to

852
00:37:29,040 --> 00:37:31,160
Speaker 4: be more on the right or more libertarian view it

853
00:37:31,200 --> 00:37:34,200
Speaker 4: as like, hey, this is my responsibility, not the governments,

854
00:37:34,239 --> 00:37:36,000
Speaker 4: and I'm going to do it much more efficiently, and

855
00:37:36,040 --> 00:37:37,960
Speaker 4: so I'm going to give of my own time and

856
00:37:38,000 --> 00:37:39,120
Speaker 4: my own money.

857
00:37:39,160 --> 00:37:41,520
Speaker 3: And so I think that for a.

858
00:37:41,440 --> 00:37:44,040
Speaker 4: Lot of people, it's they feel like they can kind

859
00:37:44,040 --> 00:37:46,600
Speaker 4: of check that box just by voting for somebody that

860
00:37:46,640 --> 00:37:48,640
Speaker 4: says they want to give money to the poor, Like

861
00:37:49,000 --> 00:37:51,560
Speaker 4: they can get it off their their conscience, like, Okay,

862
00:37:51,560 --> 00:37:54,600
Speaker 4: I've done my deed by voting for the person that's

863
00:37:54,600 --> 00:37:56,000
Speaker 4: going to increase taxes.

864
00:37:56,080 --> 00:37:58,439
Speaker 3: Of course, they hope it's not on them. Then they're

865
00:37:58,480 --> 00:38:00,440
Speaker 3: going to those billionaires and give them. They're going to

866
00:38:00,480 --> 00:38:01,839
Speaker 3: find ways to get around it.

867
00:38:02,280 --> 00:38:05,000
Speaker 4: And so even even the billionaires that you hear that

868
00:38:05,160 --> 00:38:08,120
Speaker 4: like oh, no, we should raise taxes. They're still employing

869
00:38:08,160 --> 00:38:10,759
Speaker 4: an army of people to make sure they're not subjected

870
00:38:10,840 --> 00:38:15,520
Speaker 4: to those increases in taxes, and so I think that, yeah,

871
00:38:15,560 --> 00:38:17,600
Speaker 4: I think that that's something that's really important and I

872
00:38:17,600 --> 00:38:20,319
Speaker 4: think that's something we need to speak openly about that, like, hey,

873
00:38:20,360 --> 00:38:23,799
Speaker 4: if you really care for somebody, you should be the

874
00:38:23,840 --> 00:38:27,400
Speaker 4: one that's out there doing it, making those sacrifices. And

875
00:38:27,640 --> 00:38:30,080
Speaker 4: I mean even even when it comes to immigration thing,

876
00:38:30,120 --> 00:38:33,080
Speaker 4: you see people that are that are talking about like, hey,

877
00:38:33,120 --> 00:38:35,120
Speaker 4: we need to help the immigrants we need It's like, well,

878
00:38:35,160 --> 00:38:37,160
Speaker 4: how many people do you have in your home? What

879
00:38:37,239 --> 00:38:41,400
Speaker 4: have you done personally? How are you becoming involved? The

880
00:38:41,400 --> 00:38:42,200
Speaker 4: government should do that?

881
00:38:42,320 --> 00:38:46,520
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, but what about you know, a nonprofit that

882
00:38:46,560 --> 00:38:49,920
Speaker 1: I was working with, our slogan was happy people help others.

883
00:38:50,360 --> 00:38:53,040
Speaker 1: And so I think any parent recognizes that some really

884
00:38:53,080 --> 00:38:55,080
Speaker 1: the greatest joy you can have is by giving other

885
00:38:55,080 --> 00:38:55,680
Speaker 1: people joy.

886
00:38:56,160 --> 00:38:56,520
Speaker 2: And so.

887
00:38:58,120 --> 00:39:00,279
Speaker 1: Maybe there's sort of the chicken or the egg most

888
00:39:00,320 --> 00:39:02,560
Speaker 1: in a sense where like maybe if they went helped

889
00:39:02,560 --> 00:39:05,200
Speaker 1: to the people, then they would get the joy and realize, wow,

890
00:39:05,239 --> 00:39:08,880
Speaker 1: that was actually better. And when you rely on the state,

891
00:39:08,920 --> 00:39:11,839
Speaker 1: you short circuit that whole thing. Right, because like, if

892
00:39:11,880 --> 00:39:14,440
Speaker 1: I help you, I feel really good about that, but

893
00:39:14,520 --> 00:39:16,960
Speaker 1: you also feel really good, like, wow, this guy helped me.

894
00:39:17,000 --> 00:39:18,920
Speaker 1: That's amazing. So now both of us get the benefit

895
00:39:18,960 --> 00:39:21,480
Speaker 1: of that. But if the government steals my money from me,

896
00:39:21,640 --> 00:39:23,520
Speaker 1: I'm angry and they give it to you, and now

897
00:39:23,520 --> 00:39:24,280
Speaker 1: you feel entitled.

898
00:39:24,360 --> 00:39:24,560
Speaker 2: Yep.

899
00:39:24,800 --> 00:39:27,320
Speaker 1: And so then you take this experience that both people

900
00:39:27,320 --> 00:39:30,440
Speaker 1: could benefit from and now both people are angry about

901
00:39:31,080 --> 00:39:31,840
Speaker 1: one percent.

902
00:39:32,080 --> 00:39:34,520
Speaker 4: I mean, you pit the nail on the head. I mean,

903
00:39:34,560 --> 00:39:38,520
Speaker 4: that is exactly the problem that we face now. And

904
00:39:37,800 --> 00:39:42,640
Speaker 4: you take that connection, that human connection away, where when

905
00:39:42,680 --> 00:39:44,839
Speaker 4: people are receiving money from the government, like I said,

906
00:39:44,880 --> 00:39:47,040
Speaker 4: they become entitled and they become embittered, like wait, I

907
00:39:47,040 --> 00:39:49,839
Speaker 4: shouldn't be getting more, this isn't fair. But when they

908
00:39:49,840 --> 00:39:53,760
Speaker 4: see that connection that somebody's actually sacrificing their hard work

909
00:39:53,880 --> 00:39:57,239
Speaker 4: to help them, it becomes more real and they see

910
00:39:57,280 --> 00:40:00,400
Speaker 4: that they have to have a personal responsibility to respond

911
00:40:00,440 --> 00:40:02,400
Speaker 4: to that and to try to improve themselves.

912
00:40:02,400 --> 00:40:05,160
Speaker 3: And so that's what I really think that we need

913
00:40:05,160 --> 00:40:05,920
Speaker 3: to get back to.

914
00:40:06,400 --> 00:40:10,560
Speaker 4: And that's why I'm so hopeful about the people in

915
00:40:10,560 --> 00:40:14,879
Speaker 4: the bitcoin space. As their resources increase, that they can

916
00:40:15,000 --> 00:40:17,040
Speaker 4: have a broader impact than go out. And I think

917
00:40:17,080 --> 00:40:19,480
Speaker 4: we need to challenge people because the one issue I

918
00:40:19,560 --> 00:40:21,360
Speaker 4: see and I see with a lot of bitcoiners, and

919
00:40:21,400 --> 00:40:24,200
Speaker 4: they have this plan that down the road in twenty years,

920
00:40:24,239 --> 00:40:27,360
Speaker 4: when their bitcoin's worth, you know, twenty million dollars a

921
00:40:27,400 --> 00:40:30,040
Speaker 4: coin or something, then they're going to do something. It's like, no,

922
00:40:30,120 --> 00:40:32,480
Speaker 4: you're missing all this time in between. Think of all

923
00:40:32,480 --> 00:40:34,880
Speaker 4: the lives that you can impact. You can't go back

924
00:40:34,960 --> 00:40:37,319
Speaker 4: in time and change those people's lives. And so I

925
00:40:37,360 --> 00:40:39,480
Speaker 4: think regardless of the price of bitcoin, we should be

926
00:40:39,600 --> 00:40:41,480
Speaker 4: using our personal resources right now.

927
00:40:41,680 --> 00:40:45,600
Speaker 1: Yeah, whatever you have, your time, your effort, your energy, focus,

928
00:40:45,840 --> 00:40:47,759
Speaker 1: you know, whatever it is. I mean, we all have

929
00:40:47,800 --> 00:40:49,759
Speaker 1: something to give, even if it's not money. We've all

930
00:40:49,800 --> 00:40:54,400
Speaker 1: been given gifts, and so we'll just announce it here.

931
00:40:54,840 --> 00:40:55,000
Speaker 2: You know.

932
00:40:55,040 --> 00:40:57,520
Speaker 1: I tried to come down and help the community a

933
00:40:57,560 --> 00:41:00,359
Speaker 1: couple of years ago and it fell through unfortunately, but

934
00:41:00,560 --> 00:41:02,120
Speaker 1: I am planning a trip to go down there and

935
00:41:02,160 --> 00:41:06,040
Speaker 1: do some serving opportunities just directly into the community. We'll

936
00:41:06,080 --> 00:41:08,680
Speaker 1: bring a small amount of people with us if you're

937
00:41:08,719 --> 00:41:10,840
Speaker 1: interested in getting down to the community, learning about that,

938
00:41:10,920 --> 00:41:12,640
Speaker 1: learning about what's going on to big going, but more importantly,

939
00:41:12,680 --> 00:41:15,400
Speaker 1: giving back to the community. We'll put a link down

940
00:41:15,440 --> 00:41:17,040
Speaker 1: in the description down below if you want to fill

941
00:41:17,040 --> 00:41:18,960
Speaker 1: out that form. It's going to be a small group.

942
00:41:19,440 --> 00:41:21,000
Speaker 1: We'll be doing trips down there at else Aha, or

943
00:41:21,000 --> 00:41:22,680
Speaker 1: if you want to come hang out with us, let

944
00:41:22,680 --> 00:41:27,080
Speaker 1: me know in there. But you know, again I mentioned earlier,

945
00:41:27,120 --> 00:41:28,719
Speaker 1: I know you worked, you know, in some stuff in

946
00:41:28,760 --> 00:41:31,359
Speaker 1: Peru and you and I think there's Argentina and you're

947
00:41:31,400 --> 00:41:33,360
Speaker 1: starting to see this pop up all over the place.

948
00:41:33,800 --> 00:41:35,800
Speaker 1: So maybe just kind of wrap this up, but maybe

949
00:41:35,840 --> 00:41:39,719
Speaker 1: just what would your advice be to people who are

950
00:41:39,760 --> 00:41:42,240
Speaker 1: inspired by this and would like to go affect change.

951
00:41:43,160 --> 00:41:45,600
Speaker 4: So you really got to show up and put some

952
00:41:45,600 --> 00:41:48,560
Speaker 4: some boots on the ground and understand. You know a

953
00:41:48,560 --> 00:41:51,719
Speaker 4: lot of people think they, you know, understand the situation,

954
00:41:51,880 --> 00:41:54,359
Speaker 4: but you've got to really be there and see it

955
00:41:54,440 --> 00:41:57,680
Speaker 4: and really feel it, and then then you'll understand how

956
00:41:57,719 --> 00:42:01,719
Speaker 4: you can best use your resources, whether though or financial resources,

957
00:42:01,800 --> 00:42:02,560
Speaker 4: or skills you.

958
00:42:02,560 --> 00:42:05,200
Speaker 3: Have, or relationships. A lot of time just being able

959
00:42:05,200 --> 00:42:06,000
Speaker 3: to connect people.

960
00:42:06,440 --> 00:42:08,680
Speaker 4: And so that's why I always tell people like, come

961
00:42:08,680 --> 00:42:11,600
Speaker 4: down to El Salvador, see what's happening there, Judge for yourself,

962
00:42:11,640 --> 00:42:13,640
Speaker 4: and see what part you can play.

963
00:42:13,800 --> 00:42:17,560
Speaker 1: Yeah, and where can they follow along Bitcoin Beach on Twitter.

964
00:42:18,600 --> 00:42:20,400
Speaker 1: Where can they see what's going on and kind of

965
00:42:20,480 --> 00:42:21,040
Speaker 1: check that out.

966
00:42:21,160 --> 00:42:24,040
Speaker 4: Yeah, follow us on bitcoin Beach on Twitter. We also

967
00:42:24,120 --> 00:42:28,520
Speaker 4: have a podcast YouTube Live from Bitcoin Beach we do,

968
00:42:29,239 --> 00:42:32,440
Speaker 4: you know, we work in interviewing different bitcoiners that are

969
00:42:32,480 --> 00:42:35,120
Speaker 4: coming through El Salvador, but also once a week we

970
00:42:35,560 --> 00:42:39,680
Speaker 4: do a Twitter spaces that we post there that kind

971
00:42:39,680 --> 00:42:42,680
Speaker 4: of focuses and highlights one of these circular bitcoin economies

972
00:42:42,719 --> 00:42:46,440
Speaker 4: that we're working with around the world. So this, you know,

973
00:42:46,600 --> 00:42:50,000
Speaker 4: whether it's Bitcoin Akasi in South Africa or last week

974
00:42:50,040 --> 00:42:52,200
Speaker 4: we were talking with the folks and Uganda that are

975
00:42:52,200 --> 00:42:55,280
Speaker 4: working with an orphanage there and start starting a circular

976
00:42:55,280 --> 00:42:58,080
Speaker 4: bitcoin economy there. We try to highlight these different things,

977
00:42:58,080 --> 00:43:01,640
Speaker 4: so that's another way people can become connected with projects

978
00:43:01,680 --> 00:43:03,040
Speaker 4: they can become involved.

979
00:43:02,680 --> 00:43:04,960
Speaker 2: With great all right, well that was signed off.

980
00:43:05,000 --> 00:43:06,319
Speaker 3: Thanks so much, Mike, Thanks Mark,