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Thank you for joining us today. We're excited to bring you a brand new show from the On Ramp Media umbrella. Wake Up Call is a weekly show that will be streamed live on LinkedIn every Monday morning. To catch the premiere of each episode, follow On Ramps LinkedIn page and add Wake Up Call events to your calendar. After the live premiere on LinkedIn, we will distribute each episode across On Ramp Media's podcast channels and YouTube page. Wake Up Call aims to educate financial professionals on the merits of the Bitcoin investment thesis, how this asset represents both a threat to legacy financial service businesses and an opportunity to differentiate oneselves and retain and attract new clients. Hosted by Mark Connors, Onramp's Head of Global Macro Strategy, and Rich Kerr, Onramp's President of Managed Wealth, this show seeks to provide financial professionals the wake up call they need, prompt them to have an open mind with respect to Bitcoin, rethink their prior assumptions, become more educated on the topic, and learn from others who are already farther down this path. Mark and Rich bring a combined 60 plus years of experience across traditional markets and financial services and will share their unique perspectives and how their peers and colleagues can approach the realm of Bitcoin. Wake Up Call will feature guests from various backgrounds and industries will also share their own journeys to Bitcoin and how others can get up to speed. Now time for the show. Well, good morning, everybody and good morning, Mark and Fred. Welcome to the wake up call with On Ramp. And we're just delighted to be here today. I've been having a little bit of technical issues this morning. So hopefully it doesn't, you know, impede on the great conversation that we have since we've got such a great guest today who Mark and Fred are actually joining us live from Jackson's Hole where they're attending the Salt Wyoming Blockchain Council meetings. And so we're delighted to have you. Fred Pie is the founder and a director at 3 IQ, which I think you guys will all be very familiar in terms of their advancements in in the crypto space and what they did back in March. Was it March of 2020 when you guys rolled out your ETF, Fred? That's when the first close in fund came out, but OK, it was it started much before that. Oh, I'm sure it did. There's no doubt. And you've got some great stories to share. As a trad by refugee, I understand. And, and finding your way to Bitcoin and then of course other cryptocurrency assets and, and we're delighted to hear a little bit about your perspectives in the space. And, and boy, we could, we could take this a million different directions from regulatory to custodial to product development, to the challenges that investment advisors and family offices may face and in, in selecting the right setup and in terms of how to enter the asset class. But, but that being said, maybe we'll, we'll, we'll just kick off real quickly with Mark's perspective, because there's a lot going on this week. You know, you've got what's happening in Jackson's hole with salt and then you have, of course, the Federal Reserve coming on the heels of that in Jackson's hole. So you guys are kind of in the epicenter of of financial services, but the while that's all happening, we've got a Democrat National Convention happening in Chicago, which draws remarkable parallels to 1968. And you know, I'd be interested in hearing Mark's perspectives just to kind of kick us off and and then we'll dive into Fred. Awesome. Yeah, Thanks for that, Rich. Yeah, we always like to kind of give up. Before we go into the nitty gritty of of how to get advisors involved in in Bitcoin, should they be involved? Let's look at what's in front of us. We got an equity market that's off its highs. Bond market ran as we hit one of the biggest sell offs in Japan since 1987 earlier this month on that unwind of the end trade and all is well. All is well except when you go to Chicago and people are making that parallel to the 1968 Democratic convention, which I think is overblown, but it's totally good table talk and cocktail confirmation. You know, Fred and Rich and people can't help themselves saying, you know, we have a well, we have a presidential candidate in the Democratic Party that stepped in after the incumbent stepped down. You know, Biden did, Johnson did. In 68, you had an assassination, unfortunately successful, an assassination of a candidate. Back in 68 with Robert F Kennedy, you had an attempt on Trump and then you had the on the Republican side, you had a law and order Nixon and you know, that's what Trump is presenting himself. So the newspapers still struggling on the on the legacy side, trying for eye eyeballs and headlines are doing that. But the reason we're here, the reason Fred went over as as Rich said from Tri Fi, I don't want to put words in your mouth. The reason I think you did is you saw the opportunity in Bitcoin. This is not 1968, but the politicians, their policy did matter. It does not matter anymore three years after that 68 election when Nixon popped or broke that peg to gold and started a decade of inflation. It is now all about the Treasury and the Fed. It's about the supply of money now. It's coming. It's not stopping. Doesn't matter who gets in. So I think we'll take it over to Fred on on my assertion, Fred, that it's it's all about the money, as as someone once said, but we'd love to hear about how you switched in or wherever you want to take this this call. And you know why you're here? Because you punched through in Canada 4 years before the US did as far as getting a spot product. Well, Mark, both Rich and Mark, thank you very much for having me. We have our lassos there ready. We're going to rope all the guys from the Federal Reserve and the, and all, all the, all the money printers in the US and we're going to talk to them and make sure that they hear the Bitcoin story loud and clear over the next few days. But, you know, it's actually beautiful out here. And, and I want to say, you know, the state of Wyoming and what their, their advancements and what they've done in blockchain and everything else is just truly, you know, remarkable. But yeah, you're, you're right. I, I think Mark, funny enough, on Sunday night on CNN, we watched the 19th, the entire history of the 1968 and give an old Canadian like me a good, a good reminder and a wake up call of what it was, what it was like in the, in the tougher times, I think times are a lot easier. I think people, I just think we print money now, we get richer and you know, Lord forbid that comes to an end in our lifetime. But you know, you have to be, be very careful. And I think, you know, investment advisors, especially those tuning in today are, are, are those that are aware that, you know, we've got to, you know, make sure that we've, we've got all our bases covered when it comes to protecting the assets of the people we run money for. And I think that that's why we're all here. At Onramp, we believe that Bitcoin is the most important asset of the 21st century. The hard part is securing it right. There are shortcomings with keeping your coins on an exchange, but also with setting up your own self custody arrangement. Onramp solves for these concerns. Our multi institution custody solution maximizes security and minimizes counterparty risk, ensuring that your Bitcoin remains securely in your possession and provides built in inheritance planning to ensure your family is protected as well. Onramp provides Peace of Mind for your Bitcoin journey, whether for your whole stack or for part of it as a compliment to your existing self custody setup. For more information, check us out at onrampbitcoin.com. Excellent. Thanks for that. Fred, can you, when you talk about the advisors and about, you know, we're printing money, we got to have a fiduciary responsibility. Well, I'm using that word say as a duty and duty of care for the clients. Did that have anything to do with what why you chose to go in or did you just see the opportunity for a business with Bitcoin when you when you took three IQ? We'd love to go in and add a little bit. Yeah, no. So going back to 2012 and, and remember my background is Fidelity Investments and we were one of the very first quants in the world, like 19891990. We built the first growth America fund, which was an entirely a quant driven model. And that's when computers were, you know, were run by hamsters and cages. And it used to take three days to do back testing. We which we which we do in two seconds now. But you know, for most of the the 2000s, we were writing something called the multi asset momentum portfolio, which is really simple. Investment advisors have a very tough job because they look at 16 different asset classes, plus or minus. They look at these 16 different asset class. And we said, well, why don't we own just the best seven all the time? And, and, and then you define what those best seven are. So whether we're in short bonds, long bonds, corporate bonds, foreign bonds, merging markets or whether we're in stocks, Japanese, European or whether we're in NASDAQ, small cap, large cap, you know, investment advisors have so many decisions to make. And that includes gold, it includes commodities. But when it comes down to it, you know, in a rising tide, all, you know, all bolts rise. But our concern is with the the printing of liquidity. Back in 2012, I said the correlation between these asset classes is crazy. Now it's just, you know, we're lucky to have seen in one year, you know, diversification or movement away from correlation between bonds and stocks and everything else like this. But now we're, you know, we'll hopefully get that correlation back again. But the reality is this is a hedge fund manager. We've always been on the quest to look for that perfect non correlated asset class. And when I stumble on Bitcoin in 2012, I said, wow, it would be great to put this crazy thing called Bitcoin into our portfolio. And I started learning about it and understanding, saying this isn't a crazy thing. This is a serious change to the entire potential entire monetary system of the world over time. And, you know, we may not be 100% right, but we're pretty sure we're not 100% wrong that something, some changes have to be made. And, and, and I think, you know, we've been on the question now, Mark and, and we work together on point is, you know, it's hashtag get off zero. It's, you know, this movement is just too powerful. The, you know, when I listen to people say, well, there's nothing that backs Bitcoin, I'm going hang on a second. It's the most powerful secured computer network in the world. This is 4 or 5% of the world's electricity to protect and power the new digital economy, the new digital currencies. And then I said, how can that be worth 0 it it really doesn't make any sense. And then when you put together the brilliance of Satoshi and the the declining growth pattern of supply pattern of, of Bitcoin, now you've got a a beautiful asset that you know can act as the store of wealth for the entire next generation. Fred people, you know, sometimes will say about a a friend, you know, like, Oh yeah, that guy is an acquired taste, meaning like, you know, tough to get to know. Like Bitcoin is an acquired understanding. It's it is complex. So when you talked about, you just talked about Bitcoin from from momentum, a momentum standpoint. And is there a way when you went and talked to people, this is just land the plane here for this? Who were the ones that were most likely to adopt? Could you figure that out? Like when you went into an advisor's office or one of the banks, which I know weren't exactly open to the ideas, but where was the adoption? Well, I'm glad you say that because obviously being in the brokerage industry for well over 40 years, I believe the top brokers in this country and top investment advisors in this country are amongst the smartest people in the world. And you know, they're constrained now by the guy who's not the sharpest guy in the world that's in charge of, of, of, of policy procedures, approvals, gatekeeping. Like how can you know XYZ wirehouse in the United States not allow the sharpest money managers in the world to buy Bitcoin, you know, in, in their client portfolios? And how come the biggest, most powerful financial firms in the world don't have platforms like on ramp that are, you know, make it make it easy to get access to these asset classes. You know, you've got some, you know, 4 year old CFA sitting there saying, Oh yeah, no, we don't, you know, there's no history. We don't understand it. Well, you know, those of us that have been in the business a long time, first of all, bitcoins now got, you know, well over more than 15 years of history and has been the best performing asset class in, in the history of the world ever. I, you know, you can't ignore things like this. And I think that that's where, you know, the wake up call comes. But you know, Mark, it's the, the, the key here really is the education process. And I think the generation, the younger generation, all the people that work for us, for example, that are way smarter than me, they speak a language I'm not sure I necessarily understand. I think Mark used to know, I used to say, OK, you take $100 US bill and separate the paper from the serial number. Where's the $100? Then the papers at the cereal, everyone goes to cereal. And I said, OK, that's the first step to understanding that you're now currencies will move around the world securely, instantaneously and virtually for free without being attached to a piece of paper. And when people understand that that movement to digital currencies, it's the single largest transition, technological transition of our lifetime, you throw AI in there and you're going to be trading digitally, trading forex. But forex is the guy that trades $4 trillion a year. There's not $4 trillion of AI traded a day. Sorry. Yeah, yeah, a day. Yeah. So it's a game changer. Right, Fred, when, when was the first time you used the paper versus Q if I call it or serial number? Yeah, no, that was that was really early on. But you know, it's interesting to talk about, you know, how we won and, and what a game changer we were 'cause you know, all the stories I have about paying my kid his allowance in Bitcoin, you know, back in 2013, fourteen and buying my famous dinner for 17 bitcoins. You know, well, it's more than I paid for my house, right? So, so I used to try to show everybody could spend Bitcoin everywhere. The dumbest thing I ever did in in my life. I'd I'd like to get my one Bitcoin running shoes back, give them back and take the Bitcoin back out. But the, the reality is, is, is when I wanted to invest in Bitcoin in a properly regulated managed portfolio, like put it into my multi asset momentum ETF, I needed, I needed a way to do that. And you know, some really good people, the people at Coin shares and Jan Vanak and Vanak and the people at Fidelity, you know, they were, we were all big believers early on and we were all fighting, we're all fighting the same game tomorrow night, tomorrow we're on a panel with again, Coin shares and Fidelity and, and Galaxy Digital and all The Pioneers in the, in this space. And, and we've done well, but I have a bit more of a history in, in 1983, investment advisors had no way to buy gold for their clients. You know, you could buy a gold stock, but there was no way to actually buy physical gold for, for their clients. So we were at a company called Guardian Trust and we said, well, why don't we list gold, silver and platinum certificates, which are backed by gold, and list those certificates on the Montreal Stock Exchange and allow investment advisors to now say, OK, I've got stocks, I've got bonds, and now I've got a gold certificate that represents gold. These were in the inflation at the end of the inflation, heavy inflation days of the 70s. And so we go to the regulators. The regulators say gold certificate on an exchange. They said, well, that's got non traditional custodians. It's volatile, it's speculative and it's used for criminal purposes. Why would we ever, you know, put gold, gold on the on an exchange or regulate it? Well, it took three years and we finally got gold, silver and platinum certificates listed on the Montreal Stock Exchange. And then kind of Fast forward 30 years later, 40 years later and we try to list Bitcoin on the Toronto Stock Exchange. They say, hang on a second, it's got non traditional custodians, volatile, speculative, it's used for criminal purposes. Why would we ever list this? And we actually originally did all the hard work. We were about to get listed in 2015 or 16 was our first application. They threw a lot of curveballs at us and then we were about to be approved and unfortunately this, this, this really, you know, good man John Mountain was about to approve our Bitcoin fund. I think probably 2018 or 2017. He, he got pancreatic cancer and he passed away within like a 30 day period. And the new group came in, they said, oh, we don't understand this Bitcoin thing. And they put a big halt on it. And then that's when we had to take them to a public hearing, which is litigating here in Canada. It's not going. To work that story, first of all, it's, you know, testament to the guy who you spoke to passed away about his dedication. But it also speaks to the fact that, you know, that old saw that, you know, there are no new ideas. There's just an unequal distribution of them. And the gentleman that you just spoke about did the work. He had it, he saw it, and yet no one else did. And now you had to go back and then reacquaint people, you know, through an open hearing to get it done. And again, the reason why you're here is because I've worked with you for 2 1/2 years. I saw that it was still being pushed after four years in Canada. And we're effectively, and I'd love to have Rich's take on this because he is from the advisor to the world. We're at March of 2020 in the US, Fred, or even earlier as far as Bitcoin's concerned. Yeah, I think Rich, I'd, I'd, I'd love to hear your, your take as well. But you know, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll step in and say that. The key component, the key point here Mark, that I think is important is it's the investment advisor who understands technology that should be empowered to make the decision to make the investment. The regulator that you know, John Mountain said. If this is properly constituted and legal, meaning you can audit it, you can account it, you can trace it, you can store it, you can insure it, you can, you know, if you, if it is legitimate asset class, then it's not our job to be the, it's our job to be the gatekeeper. That's properly regulated, but it's not our job to make a decision whether it's a good investment or not. That's the job of the investment advisor and those who have a solid client base and probably have stopped taking clients because they do a great job for the people that they run. Now they are open to these sorts of things and that's where the when, when those doors open. It's one thing to have an ETF approved in the United States. It's another thing to have a proper platform either at one of the dealers of the brokerage firms that can actually hold the asset and make it secure and liquid and everything else along those lines. Yep. But Rich, you were, you were saying. Yeah. You know, it's interesting and I I'd love to pick your brain because, you know, one, you've been through this, you know, this adoption curve so much earlier than than what investment advisors, financial and professionals inside the United States, you know, have had the opportunity to. And I think with the ETF proliferation, I'm a big fan of that because I think it gets people exposure and allows them to start really understanding the asset and, and education is, is a wonderful, wonderful way for, for, you know, advisors to go just as it is for our end clients. And, and one of the things that I've been finding most frequently is one, there is a gap in terms of education with the financial professionals. And, and I think that that's a systemic issue in many respects, meaning that, that you, we, we, we've all become accustomed to the way that we take education inside of financial systems, right? Companies like Fidelity, like Schwab, like Merrill Lynch, wherever it might be, you know, you have the analyst community that lives inside of those firms and, or them are the strategists and, and they, they gather a point of view and then they push that point of view down through products and through our solutions and to our messaging as as financial advisors that sit inside of these companies or work in association with them. And so in many respects, the, the organization of how education kind of comes forward for financial professionals is a bit of a barrier to overcome, at least in my perspective, because we end up taking these sound bites and these talking points and we say, Oh, well, geez, we dismiss certain things because maybe the company doesn't have a point of view at this point in time. Or they may not have a product set that is designed to, to implement solutions, or they may not have systems that can properly care for a certain type of asset. And therefore they, they, they minimize or or marginalized the, the disruptive capabilities of a new asset class like a Bitcoin and then that gets. So rich. True. Yeah. Is that like a game of telephone you're saying, which may help us figure out where the best place to go to? Is, well, I just think it's an interesting barrier and that prevents people from continuing to, to learn, to grow, to be open to new ideas and to be ultimately, you know, solve on how do we bring something like this forward to our clients? And, and you know, Fred, you, you, you kind of have gone through that those stages, you know, because you can look at it right, there's a regulatory hurdle that you've got to go through and you did, you went and fought that fight. And then there were the custodial considerations. How do you care for, for a unique digital asset properly, you know, and you went through that and then you said, OK, well, there's product design and, and what, what is going to appeal and how does it integrate into financial professional systems? And, and, and then there, then there's the education and all of these components, right? So they all kind of line up and and then you have the hurdles that live inside the advisor space, right, which is what is our viewpoint on it? How do we change our investment policy statements? How do we revise our investment thesis or or build an investment thesis? And then ultimately then what is the best way to integrate into the asset class? So it's an interesting top down and then another top down, you know, set of barriers. And I think we're in a place as an industry where we actually are really well positioned. It's now just kind of changing the message and helping people educate around what these assets are and what role they play. And you said it brilliantly, right? It's it's it, you know, it plays into the correlation, you know, story in many respects, but or non correlating assets. But there's other there's other reasons that can can be shared that will help different advisory firms kind of adopt of maybe a Bitcoin strategy or a cryptocurrency strategy for their clients and do it the right way. I think where people have a hard time is, as I've saying in God love all the Cfas that we work with, you know, you know, they understand different matrices. They understand matrices like, you know, revenue growth rates, valuations. They understand all these kinds of, you know, great financial terms, but they really don't know a lot about, you know, sharding and hash ration and and computing power and everything else like this. And a lot of people say, well, I don't understand Bitcoin said, well, I don't necessarily, you know, you know, understand how ChatGPT works, but it works really well and it's really fun to use. But you know, for me to invest in in AI doesn't mean I actually have to be able to program AI and understand how it works. So so Bitcoins a bit of a different animal, but when you just look at supply and demand, you've had 15 years of skyrocketing demand and you have a supply curve that's that's flattened going or, or, you know, flattening out. And I said that's economics one O 1. You know, you know, demand oversupply. The only releases price said going from pennies to $63,000 is is is is is not, is not a mistake. It's, it's actually, you know, the next 10X is going to be bigger and more powerful. So I but you don't have to understand how it works. I agree. Can we now, can we take a little sidebar and or a deviation go into a FUD busting riff right now? What's your favorite? Because I have some when people say, oh, what about, you know, criminal use or energy and all this. And well, my favorite one is about it's a Ponzi or, you know, it's a bubble. And then I'm like, all right, as you said, Fred earlier, it's been around 15 years based on technology that's been around for 45 years slash 5000. But 15 years of 1213 years of price history. The Tulip craze was three years. The, the tech bubble in 2000 was arguably maybe four years at Max 4 1/2 years Max. When you look at a Ponzi scheme like our, our the trad fi rabbi who was, you know, running in NASDAQ, Bernie Madoff that ran because there was no transparency. So here you have a transparent 15 year long and, and people are still calling it a, you know, a short lived. There's no precedent for anything that's been this transparent that has been a failed or fraudulent enterprise. So that's my favorite one. I don't know if you guys have one on energy use or or about technology. Yeah, Mark, there's never been a, a false transaction put on the on the Bitcoin blockchain. It is the ultimate, you know, it's the ultimate Excel spreadsheet. I mean, it's, you know, it, it, it, it cannot fail and it cannot fail. Will not, yeah, cannot fail and, and and will not fail. And again, you know, you know, 4 or 5% of the world's energy protects it and powers that and tells you why it can't happen when you start to dig down on the future use cases of what blockchain, Bitcoin and the Bitcoin blockchain and all the derivatives that have derived from Bitcoin are absolutely massive. And again, remember, moving money around the world instantaneously securely for free is the one thing I'm paying for a boat in in Greece next week. Trying to make that payment in euros is an absolute pain in the ass from from the US or from Canada or from Bermuda, where we live now. Yeah. So there's there's, you know it, it's a game changer. I think big companies like FedEx that use, you know, Bitcoin and, and blockchain for, you know, secure instantaneous payments. The, the world is changing and it's, it's, it's going on with that without the rest of the world knowing. But the demand in the use cases are massive. It's, it's, it's huge. It's great that the, the sun kind of came off Bitcoin and went all over to AI so quickly because Bitcoin was 18,000 when AI took off and no Bitcoin 65,000 AI had its correction. So it, it, it's nice to see things that continue to build and develop in the background that, that, that people are missing. So I, I, I think again, mark our story as hashtag get off zero. You don't have to be able to understand and program your own node to understand how powerful this is. And, and some of the advisors, and This is why I mean, major reason I love working with, with, with Rich is because of the ability to create a solution, not a product, but a solution to, I call it renting Bitcoin because as you said, there's a big case for doing it. You don't understand how the Internet works, but you use it and you are, you're trusting it, allocating a little bit of Bitcoin and a rebalancing. You can rent it. And you know, if you want to, I'd love to hear a little bit about what you're doing when you're also renting some of the exposure on some of the other crypto assets around a core Bitcoin in Ethereum. I don't want to put words in your mouth, but if memory serves, you know you, you would take what you learned 1215 years ago about the momentum of Bitcoin and then you've expanded a bit. I don't know if you want to share a little bit with the audience about what your current, what you see the current opportunity is and how that might relate to core Bitcoin holding. Yeah, I think, and here's really the reality of this, especially for the audience we're talking to today. Understand the power of Bitcoin and blockchain and get your initial exposure to it. If we can educate you on the power and the strength of, of Bitcoin. If you swallow the kool-aid, then you see a whole new world that opens up. And then you look at saying, OK, what's bigger, faster, you know, quicker, cheaper in, in, in what you know, you, you take a look at there's what 260, 1000 plus developers on the Etherium blockchain. That's easily the biggest software company in the world. Oh, and by the way, people, when you ask what's the biggest payment network in the world, everybody goes, oh, Visa, MasterCard, you know, they do. They're $8 trillion of transactions a year. You know, Etherium produced over $18 trillion of transactions, I believe last year, which is more than twice the size of Visa, Amex or PayPal or any of the others. So these payment networks are massive and they are powerful and you're missing it. It's kind of like investing in Visa when Visa, you know, had the old blue and gold card, you know, when when plastic was being invented. Hey, Mark, that's. How I know? That's such an interesting point that you bring up right? Just how in the world are people missing it? Like, to me, it feels so obvious. But then again, I've been studying it for, you know, a better part of the past five years. And, you know, and, and I was asking myself five years ago, how in the world did I miss this? Why was I so dismissive to it? You know, it people would come to me and ask me my point of view and, you know, should I get invested in Bitcoin, whether that be clients or employees of mine and said firm and I said, oh gosh, you know, run as far as you can, you know, ill informed, you know, ran counter to how I would ever, you know, issue investment advice. But here I was just dismissing so quickly and, and, and to the point where I, you know, I recognized my behavioral, you know, issue there and, and needed to self correct and actually do some work and, and, and study and develop a, a point of view and a level of awareness to be able to answer these questions versus just being so dismissive. But you, you, you talk about, you know, these broader things that are happening in the world today, and yet people have their, and people have their head in the sand around it, right? I, I, I pay attention to pattern recognition and I'm watching what's happening with nation States and, and, you know, certainly El Salvador is a, is a great example, but you know, that's the template for the rest of the world to take a look at. You know, what can you do if you go to a Bitcoin standard and then you take a look at what Sailor is doing with MicroStrategy and, and how profound that is. And, and you know, you're watching more and more corporations adopt A, you know, treasury reserve asset, you know, or strategies inside of their company. And so that's, that's a, that's another trend that people need to be paying attention to. And then you talk about the payment side of the equation, which is just astronomical. And yet people are sleeping on it. And so, you know, it's, it's it, I guess this is, you know, one of those situations where we all just need to ultimately, you know, recognize what is happening around us and, and ask some questions and get into a more curious stance of what's happening in the world and why is it happening and, and what kind of disruption might be happening. So that ultimately our clients and, and the the viewers of this show aren't disrupted, but they actually embrace and and recognize the opportunity set that's in front of them versus allowing it to run them over and not retain their position of trusted advisor. Yeah, and, and Rich, you were kind enough to introduce everybody. But for the audience who hasn't joined our previous calls, you know, you come from the traditional world, you know, over 30 years at Charles Schwab, if if I'm not mistaken. Is that right? Yeah. And you and you joined us in order to, you know, be on the merry band of of orange pillars. What I see is the fattest trade. And and we all agree like the fattest trade. This, this reminds me of a distress. This is the fattest trade I've ever seen. As far as the persistence, it's a matter of time and the opportunity set. It's like osmosis on steroids, the low concentration of value that's out there in the marketplace from bonds that have negative real yields effectively. And this little kernel, as Fred said, it's powered by real energy that's going to be just able to continue to provide rails for payments and information flow. It's it's absolutely, as you can tell, I'm I'm, I lack words to explain it. It was the easiest decision to come over once I found it out. And Rich, you gave up, you know, a pretty stable business that you worked on for 30 years. Fred went from Fidelity in order to start his own place and then you've switched your business. So to everyone on the call here, like, you know, these are we're thoughtful people. We could be wrong, but we're thoughtful people and we have a body of work behind us that we want to share with you in order to help your business. So that's my my three cents. While we have a fire drill in the background, I'll go on mute right now. Yeah, I'm just going to say I know we'll we'll come to an end here. I did see Michael Saylor in in Miami recently and I want to say one thing. Michael doesn't say go out and buy micro strategy. He doesn't say go out and buy Fred's ETF or Fred's closed down fund. He doesn't go out and say open up a wallet and on ramp and buy some Bitcoin. He just says buy Bitcoin. Whatever the advisor, whatever the investor feels is the best platform for him. You know, we're all enjoying the fruits of an amazing new technological development and it's not too late. I I have my Bitcoin 10,000 T-shirt. I bring with me all the way. It's a you know, it's a Bitcoin 10,000. It's not too late. Well, it's not even started yet. So anyways, I want to thank you rich for having me and mark good to see you again. We'll see you tonight. You bet. Yeah, thank you. Thank you so much Fred for joining. I mean, just the stories that you could tell. I could sit and listen to you for hours and and, and, and, and just enjoy the knowledge that you share, but also your genuine, you know, nature in, in how you make it so accessible. And, and so thank you for for, for spending some time with us this morning and, and sharing with our audience a little bit about your story and your points of view around Bitcoin. And we we are deeply appreciative of it. So thank you so much and to everybody have a great week out in Jackson's hole. If you are there, you know, say hello to Fred and Mark and otherwise we wish you all well. Let's see you next week. Thanks gents. Thanks for listening to this week's episode of the show. If you found the information valuable, please share the episode with a friend or leave a rating on your favorite podcast app. All the links we discussed in today's show will be in the show notes inside your podcast app. Before we finish, a quick reminder that On Rat Media is for informational and entertainment purposes only, and nothing should be construed as investment or legal advice. Regardless of where you are on your Bitcoin journey, we'd love to hear from you. Visit onrampbitcoin.com contact to schedule a consultation with one of our private client advisors.
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