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Welcome back everyone. 
I am Cass PNC. 

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I'm joined as usual by my 
partner in crime, Mr. Bennett 

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Tomlin. 
How are you today? 

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Oh, I'm doing well. 
How are you, Cass? 

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I'm doing good. 
We are discussing something near

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and dear to both of our hearts, 
I think, and I mean that 

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legitimately today as opposed to
sarcastically like most days. 

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We're going to be talking about 
some of the tools that we 

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utilize on a day-to-day basis 
more or less to look into 

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companies and individuals that 
are involved in a lot of the 

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investigations that we conduct. 
For example, let's just say 

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someone like Justin Sun or a 
company like Tether. 

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So we're going to go ahead and 
just take a look at some of 

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these tools, how we use them, 
show them to you guys so that 

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you have an opportunity if you 
ever feel like it. 

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If you're doing some sort of due
diligence or you're interested 

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in a company before, I don't 
know, before investing or before

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talking to someone about them, 
if you're interested in any of 

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this stuff, this should give you
some sort of leg up on at least 

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understanding something about 
them. 

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At this point, I think it'd be 
good for Bennett to kind of talk

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to us about just the beginnings 
of, of how he ends up 

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investigating or what many of 
our viewers might end up doing 

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if at the very first steps of 
looking into a company or 

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person. 
One of the first things I want 

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to talk about is that sometimes 
it can be a little tricky to 

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figure out what company you're 
actually dealing with here. 

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Let's start with this generic 
company that we've perhaps 

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talked about once or twice on 
this podcast before Bit Fenix. 

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Now, if you just go looking in 
corporate registries for the 

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string Bit Fenix, you're going 
to miss most of the relevant 

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corporate entities because very 
few of them are actually called 

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Bit Fenix. 
However, most companies will, on

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their website, give away what 
the actual name is. 

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Sometimes it'll be down here in 
the footer. 

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If you look at the copyright 
information, this tells you that

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it's tied to ifenix 
Incorporated. 

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Alternatively, you can look at 
the terms or conditions or the 

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privacy statement and we can see
here. 

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This site is owned and operated 
by Ifenix Incorporated and its 

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affiliates including BFX WW 
Incorporated, BFX NA 

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Incorporated, One is said Leo 
Limited and Ifenix Financial 

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technologies Limited. 
And once you kind of have this 

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set of entities, you are at a 
good place to start, especially 

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if like Bitfinex is really 
generous in this case here where

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they're even giving you like the
specific corporation numbers and

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where they're registered. 
Not all places are going to do 

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that, but at the very least 
having the actual name for the 

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company is a good place to start
because then you can take that 

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name to places like Open 
Corporates, which I think Cass 

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wanted to talk about open. 
Corporates is pretty great in 

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that you can definitely use it 
for free. 

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You don't need to sign up. 
I'm sure there's some benefits 

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to becoming a power user for 
something like this, but 

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generally you can just type in 
companies or for that matter 

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officers so. 
We'll go ahead and put. 

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Officers this time Bennett 
brought up just now Bitfinex and

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Bitfinex, we, we happen to know 
who their officers are. 

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I think there it might be listed
on their on their company 

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website. 
Still, if not, we, we happen, we

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happen to know who they are. 
So we're going to go ahead and 

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type in one of their company 
officers into open corporates, 

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Giancarlo Devicini. 
And we're going to search all 

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jurisdictions. 
We're not going to try to hinder

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what we are shown. 
And there you go. 

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Giancarlo Devicini. 
That's new, actually what I 

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mean. 
So I mean, this is a kind of a 

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perfect example. 
I haven't looked for Giancarlo 

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Devasini probably in a very, 
very long time. 

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He's listed twice in this 
database, one with a Canadian 

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company. 
Generally, Canadian companies 

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have these, this weird numbering
thing instead of actually going 

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by names. 
So this is not no longer active.

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But in the past two years, he 
has apparently created a company

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called the Cryptocurrency 
Association. 

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It is a nonprofit and it is 
located in California. 

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Now, we can't obviously be 100% 
sure that this is him. 

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There could be another Giancarlo
Davasini creating cryptocurrency

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related companies, but we're 
going to go ahead and type in 

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this, although I want to pause 
there. 

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So what this provides us is it 
does give us an address. 

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This is likely Bennett, are you 
seeing this? 

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This company's address is 6547 N
Academy Blvd., USDT Bank LLC 

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which is news to me that there 
is something called USDT Bank 

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LLC in. 
Colorado, I have follow up 

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questions. 
I have follow up questions that 

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we wouldn't normally be 
recording. 

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What? 
I'm very like, hopefully you're 

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gonna cut all of this. 
Yes, I'm not putting. 

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Shocked to do I found this. 
Like. 

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The agent with the last name Son
on USD USDT Bank LLC Yun Fang 

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Son. 
Dude, so okay, Anyway, look, 

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we're kind of falling down a 
rabbit hole right now because I 

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haven't looked Ben and I have 
not looked for Giancarlo 

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Devicini on Open Corporates in a
very long time. 

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Obviously finding this odd 
company right now, this non for 

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profit is is throwing both of us
off. 

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Now the beauty of what this does
is that Open Corporates provides

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us a link to the California 
Secretary of State. 

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So now we can actually type in 
cryptocurrency association 

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search for it, it should pop up 
here it is. 

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And then so I would have to have
an account with to view this, 

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this document with the, the 
state of California actually 

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probably had that not logged in 
right now. 

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But basically you can find out 
what's going on with this. 

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It is that is available for us 
to figure out. 

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We now know more about Giancarlo
Devicini, at least when it comes

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to his nonprofits located in 
America. 

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Now is that everything that we 
can find out? 

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Of course not. 
There's plenty of other officers

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companies that we could type in 
related to Bitfinex Tether 

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executives there and see what's 
going on with them, what their, 

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what associations they have and 
try to go from there. 

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So this actually provides you 
with a huge amount of 

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information, like kind of a 
shocking amount of information 

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that you can utilize to actively
search for these individuals. 

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Now, I will say Giancarlo 
Davoscini is well known for 

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being involved with Tether and 
Bitfinex. 

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I am not aware of the 
cryptocurrency association or 

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his involvement with it. 
So what this is showing us is 

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his involvement in AUS non 
profit. 

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It isn't showing us his offshore
activities etcetera. 

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A few days ago, you saw it. 
We discovered this on camera 

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where we were just trying to 
show our audience some of these 

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tools and we in, in real time, 
discovered something we've never

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seen before. 
Now it involved tether and 

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tether executives, and you can 
only assume where my mind 

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immediately ran when I saw that.
And but this is the. 

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Beauty of what we're trying to 
teach you guys is that not only 

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do you can you use the tools, 
which is great, and it, it gives

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you all of all of this great 
data and information at your 

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fingertips. 
And that's lovely, but you need 

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to know how to navigate that 
once you've acquired that 

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information. 
And that's what we were able to 

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do with this story. 
So hopefully we'll we'll link to

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it in the YouTube and on the in 
the podcast information so that 

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if you want to follow along with
us while we talk about this 

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right now and how we did it, you
can there's a Protose article 

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about it. 
So we'll include that Protose 

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article in the information. 
But Bennett, after we saw after 

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I looked up Giancarlo Devasini 
and saw this company in in 

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California pop up, can you kind 
of talk about where, where it 

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went from from there, just at 
least the beginning of it? 

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Well, there was a bunch of 
strangeness around it like we 

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mentioned while we were 
recording several days ago, part

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of it like the address was USDT 
bank over somewhere in China 

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associated with a company in 
Colorado as well. 

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There was like name changes to 
like names of other 

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cryptocurrency companies as 
well. 

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And then we started looking at 
some of the other non tether 

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executive names that were 
associated with this entity. 

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And like what we found was that 
there was a civil Rico lawsuit 

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against one of them from Google 
alleging they were like pig 

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butchering scammer who was 
running a bunch of fake things. 

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There was like. 
And just a pause in case I I 

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think people have probably 
watched our Zeke Fox episode, 

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longtime listeners. 
Probably have, but just to 

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recap, pig butchering is this 
scam basically where it involves

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human trafficking more or less 
where people are put into big 

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apartment blocks in Myanmar or 
Cambodia or Laos, basically 

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Southeast Asia. 
I'm sure there's other places 

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too, maybe the Middle East and 
and other areas where you can 

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kind of get away with this stuff
if you keep your cool and your 

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wits about you. 
And so pig butchering is when 

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you take all these human 
trafficked people, force them to

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work on this scam and steal 
money from people, whether it's 

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through fake cryptocurrency apps
and being the helpful support 

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desk or it is a love a love 
romance scam. 

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But yeah, I just wanted to fill 
everybody in on what pig 

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butchering is. 
Sorry. 

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So yeah, Sun Yun Yun Fong is 
being sued by Google civil Rico 

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case about pig butchering. 
Go on. 

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And then one of the other names 
on that same list also was like 

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someone who had been charged 
with a crime. 

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And so then when we started to 
see these things, it seemed 

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increasingly less likely that 
these were actually the tether 

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executives participating. 
And if it was the tether 

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executives participating, it was
really important we figure out 

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what was the context of what was
going on here. 

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And when you started to look 
into this a little bit, Cass, 

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you came across some of the 
corporate loopholes that made it

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possible for this whole thing to
come together. 

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Yeah. 
And I understand a lot of states

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operate on a good faith filing 
policy. 

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I, I assume just to keep 
paperwork to a minimum, but 

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there are certain there's got to
be ways to do this better than 

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the way it's the way it's 
currently implemented. 

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But yes, basically using the 
tools that we already were 

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showing everyone, I found these 
names on open corporates, 

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realized this was a 
California-based company, went 

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to the California Secretary of 
State website, went search for 

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corporate filings from this 
company, found these corporate 

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filings, and then found the 
people actually involved. 

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And once you find out those 
other individuals and you start 

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looking them up and finding out 
that they're involved in these 

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pretty serious scams, it leads 
you to start wondering about the

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mechanics of the policy in 
place. 

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So basically these guys were 
able to do this because when 

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they put all the names of these 
tether executives on, the 

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corporate filing for this is not
an LLC, this is some kind of 

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other domestic corporation. 
When they put all these names 

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on, they just lied and said, 
yeah, all these tether 

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executives are working with us, 
we promise. 

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And they cross their fingers 
behind their backs. 

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Now, is this illegal? 
It is. 

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It certainly is. 
The California Secretary of 

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State's office told us that it 
if you're if I'm a if I were to 

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do something like this, try to 
do something like this, I would 

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get charged with perjury. 
And that can carry certain I 

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like you can do jail time, 
prison time for that. 

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It is it can be a real serious 
charge. 

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But one of these gentlemen is a 
Chinese national and he lives in

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China and he ain't getting 
extradited for this. 

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And so the question becomes what
it, what is in place to try to 

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stop this from happening? 
And they were semi 

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sophisticated, for what it's 
worth, because in California you

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can't name a company bank, for 
instance. 

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So what did they do? 
They, they created that company 

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in Colorado because Colorado 
doesn't have a law explicitly 

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stating that you can't name a 
company bank. 

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Like they, they were 
sophisticated enough to know 

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those corporate rules and set up
these companies in different 

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places within the US. 
And I don't know what the 

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repercussions will be, but I, I 
do think, yeah, let's let's dig 

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a little deeper because I think 
it's important for everyone to 

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recognize how we were able to as
quickly as as I think I was very

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00:12:38,760 --> 00:12:41,800
much like, oh, I'm going to run 
with this is going to be crazy. 

228
00:12:41,800 --> 00:12:46,000
I'm going to run with this story
within, I want to say 12 to 24 

229
00:12:46,000 --> 00:12:48,120
hours. 
I had done enough digging to be 

230
00:12:48,120 --> 00:12:50,480
like, oh, this is definitely not
tether. 

231
00:12:50,640 --> 00:12:52,080
But yeah, let's talk about more 
of that. 

232
00:12:52,080 --> 00:12:54,160
Like what other things did we 
have to do? 

233
00:12:54,160 --> 00:12:57,680
Because this seemed so 
extraordinarily strange for this

234
00:12:57,680 --> 00:13:02,400
person being accused of being a 
pig butcher to be on this random

235
00:13:02,400 --> 00:13:05,080
association with these tether 
executives. 

236
00:13:05,480 --> 00:13:08,760
There was a bunch of due 
diligence steps that we had to 

237
00:13:08,760 --> 00:13:12,040
go through and then that protos 
had to go to, to report this 

238
00:13:12,040 --> 00:13:13,880
out. 
Reaching out to the Secretary of

239
00:13:13,880 --> 00:13:17,760
State's office to like confirm 
what the policies are and like 

240
00:13:18,000 --> 00:13:20,720
how someone could possibly take 
advantage of that. 

241
00:13:21,080 --> 00:13:24,520
Talking to someone at the 
attorney general's office about 

242
00:13:24,520 --> 00:13:27,840
like how they manage the 
potential criminal aspect of 

243
00:13:27,840 --> 00:13:32,200
some of these activities and 
trying to even reach out to 

244
00:13:32,200 --> 00:13:35,720
Tether themselves was able to 
state on the record that they 

245
00:13:35,720 --> 00:13:40,000
had no association with any of 
these firms, which seems to be 

246
00:13:40,000 --> 00:13:42,240
the truth. 
This isn't the kind of thing 

247
00:13:42,240 --> 00:13:45,720
that Tether involves themselves 
in at this point in the arc. 

248
00:13:46,400 --> 00:13:49,440
And so like you have the, and 
this is a good reminder we had 

249
00:13:49,440 --> 00:13:52,840
the initial moment of, oh, this 
is a really strange Tether 

250
00:13:52,840 --> 00:13:54,400
thing. 
What is Tether up to now? 

251
00:13:54,640 --> 00:13:59,840
And the answer is nothing. 
Tether was not, as far as reason

252
00:13:59,840 --> 00:14:02,880
can tell, involved in any way, 
shape or form with this. 

253
00:14:03,080 --> 00:14:07,480
This was another set of scammers
trying to use Tether as a cloak 

254
00:14:07,520 --> 00:14:09,240
of legitimacy. 
That's right. 

255
00:14:09,240 --> 00:14:10,680
And I don't you, you made this 
point. 

256
00:14:10,680 --> 00:14:12,880
It's not. 
And I and I and you cleared, you

257
00:14:12,880 --> 00:14:15,760
cleared it up too. 
So I don't want to in a sense, 

258
00:14:15,880 --> 00:14:17,840
Tether is one of the victims in 
this. 

259
00:14:17,840 --> 00:14:19,800
They are not. 
They're not a real victim. 

260
00:14:19,840 --> 00:14:22,720
Nothing was stolen from them and
ultimately there is 0 

261
00:14:22,720 --> 00:14:25,280
reputational damage to the 
company. 

262
00:14:25,280 --> 00:14:29,640
Tether realistically, like even 
if, even if the companies or the

263
00:14:29,640 --> 00:14:33,000
individuals that did get scammed
think of Tether when they think 

264
00:14:33,000 --> 00:14:36,800
of who scammed them because of 
the involvement that these guys 

265
00:14:37,080 --> 00:14:40,200
pretended Tether had. 
Ultimately there is very little 

266
00:14:40,280 --> 00:14:43,440
damage done here. 
But I do think it's important to

267
00:14:43,440 --> 00:14:47,320
note that the Secretary of 
States office and along with the

268
00:14:47,320 --> 00:14:49,880
attorney General, like they 
aren't checking this data. 

269
00:14:50,360 --> 00:14:54,000
And the only way for Tether to 
get their names stricken from 

270
00:14:54,000 --> 00:14:56,720
those corporate records is for 
them to have someone reach out 

271
00:14:56,880 --> 00:14:59,400
and file complaints, which is 
insane. 

272
00:14:59,480 --> 00:15:03,120
I, I don't know, like, how else 
to think about that other than 

273
00:15:03,240 --> 00:15:07,120
it shouldn't be the we shouldn't
put the burden on the victim of 

274
00:15:07,120 --> 00:15:09,080
what what amounts to identity 
theft. 

275
00:15:09,240 --> 00:15:12,480
We shouldn't put the burden on 
them to prove that it is 

276
00:15:12,480 --> 00:15:15,000
identity theft. 
It should have been clear that 

277
00:15:15,000 --> 00:15:17,800
this was identity theft. 
So I do, I yeah, I do think 

278
00:15:17,800 --> 00:15:20,320
it's, it's important. 
Also, we're known as being 

279
00:15:20,320 --> 00:15:25,600
tether critics and and skeptics.
So reaching out to them and 

280
00:15:25,600 --> 00:15:30,120
essentially working with them to
stomp out someone who was 

281
00:15:30,280 --> 00:15:33,800
actively trying to pretend to be
them was a different place for 

282
00:15:33,800 --> 00:15:36,800
us to be. 
But it also tells me that we do 

283
00:15:36,800 --> 00:15:42,320
what we do because we care about
fraud more than some well, the 

284
00:15:42,320 --> 00:15:44,880
enemy of my enemy is my friend 
or something like that. 

285
00:15:44,880 --> 00:15:47,600
Like, you know, you don't want 
to think about that or think 

286
00:15:47,600 --> 00:15:51,120
like that as a a journalist or 
if you are just trying to look 

287
00:15:51,120 --> 00:15:53,440
for information, you also want 
to try to be objective. 

288
00:15:53,680 --> 00:15:57,240
Obviously, again, we come in 
with a bit of a, a tilt when I 

289
00:15:57,240 --> 00:15:59,920
find that when I find that 
information, I'm thinking, oh, 

290
00:16:00,160 --> 00:16:04,200
tether's up to no good again. 
But to give, to give yourself 

291
00:16:04,200 --> 00:16:08,960
the space and the time necessary
to back off from any initial 

292
00:16:09,120 --> 00:16:13,520
bias, I think is a good exercise
for anyone to to have because we

293
00:16:13,520 --> 00:16:16,440
all have that bias when it comes
to anything. 

294
00:16:17,040 --> 00:16:21,320
So, yeah, I think like a lot of 
good lessons were not 

295
00:16:21,320 --> 00:16:24,040
necessarily we these are things 
we practice regularly, but 

296
00:16:24,040 --> 00:16:28,120
practice in good lessons took 
place and we somehow were able 

297
00:16:28,120 --> 00:16:30,760
to record it in real time, which
I think is great because now we 

298
00:16:30,760 --> 00:16:32,480
can share this moment with the 
audience. 

299
00:16:32,480 --> 00:16:35,840
Again, a lot of due diligence 
though went into this five days.

300
00:16:36,160 --> 00:16:39,200
We didn't find it and 
immediately post online like, 

301
00:16:39,200 --> 00:16:42,680
look, looks like tether 
executives are in involved in 

302
00:16:42,680 --> 00:16:45,560
this shady company in, in 
California. 

303
00:16:45,560 --> 00:16:48,120
Like, no, that's not the right 
way to go about this. 

304
00:16:48,120 --> 00:16:50,760
And if you want to do your 
research properly, you got to 

305
00:16:50,920 --> 00:16:54,440
you got to actually get into the
weeds and get into the muck. 

306
00:16:54,560 --> 00:16:58,360
And sometimes it's boring. 
Sometimes it's frustrating when 

307
00:16:58,360 --> 00:17:01,240
people don't call you back or 
don't e-mail you back or refuse 

308
00:17:01,240 --> 00:17:03,680
to speak with you. 
But these are steps that you 

309
00:17:03,680 --> 00:17:05,079
have to take. 
Otherwise, you're going to make 

310
00:17:05,079 --> 00:17:06,440
mistakes and you're going to 
look foolish. 

311
00:17:06,800 --> 00:17:08,560
Yeah, I think that's a good 
point. 

312
00:17:08,560 --> 00:17:11,880
And it emphasizes points we've 
made before in places like 

313
00:17:12,000 --> 00:17:16,720
episode 100 in places like that.
And like just before we end this

314
00:17:16,720 --> 00:17:20,839
little cut in, I was it was 
really interesting to see the 

315
00:17:20,839 --> 00:17:24,480
kind of inner workings of this 
part of this likely scam. 

316
00:17:24,800 --> 00:17:28,760
And like this is speculation, 
but my speculation is that the 

317
00:17:28,760 --> 00:17:32,160
reason they're doing this is so 
that when they're targeting like

318
00:17:32,320 --> 00:17:36,680
larger whales for this scam, 
they had like legitimate 

319
00:17:36,680 --> 00:17:40,280
corporate documents that had 
like no names in the industry on

320
00:17:40,280 --> 00:17:42,760
it that they could use to try to
defraud people. 

321
00:17:43,000 --> 00:17:46,320
And it was really interesting to
me to think about like that Ave.

322
00:17:46,320 --> 00:17:49,680
as a way to like do this type of
fraud on this type of scale. 

323
00:17:49,880 --> 00:17:54,200
So that even if someone who was 
like the actual victim of this 

324
00:17:54,200 --> 00:17:57,680
type of scam tried to do due 
diligence, they could be 

325
00:17:57,680 --> 00:18:00,840
presented with legitimate 
corporate records that list 

326
00:18:00,840 --> 00:18:03,520
people's names. 
And even if they went further 

327
00:18:03,640 --> 00:18:07,080
and went to like the California 
Secretary of State website and 

328
00:18:07,280 --> 00:18:09,600
and like search that company 
name and pulled it up, they 

329
00:18:09,600 --> 00:18:12,080
would see that same set of 
names. 

330
00:18:12,240 --> 00:18:15,280
Like there was a lot of 
deliberate steps here to take 

331
00:18:15,480 --> 00:18:19,200
taken to like, make due 
diligence on that part hard. 

332
00:18:19,240 --> 00:18:21,040
Yeah, yeah. 
I mean, I think it's a, that's 

333
00:18:21,080 --> 00:18:23,320
an excellent point. 
And I think this is another 

334
00:18:23,320 --> 00:18:26,160
thing that I didn't, I didn't 
really think about this. 

335
00:18:26,160 --> 00:18:29,880
But you know, part of what gave 
us pause, what was a couple, I 

336
00:18:29,880 --> 00:18:32,320
was like, well, there's no way 
Heather's due diligence 

337
00:18:32,320 --> 00:18:36,800
department is worse than me 
about like suspecting these two.

338
00:18:37,040 --> 00:18:39,520
Well, maybe for maybe, maybe 
when they didn't have a 

339
00:18:39,520 --> 00:18:41,880
compliance or a due diligence 
team at all. 

340
00:18:41,920 --> 00:18:44,480
You know, maybe back then you 
and I were outpacing them for 

341
00:18:44,480 --> 00:18:47,360
sure. 
But nowadays, I don't think that

342
00:18:47,360 --> 00:18:49,480
we could compete with whatever 
compliance team they have in 

343
00:18:49,480 --> 00:18:51,640
place. 
And they are working with the 

344
00:18:51,640 --> 00:18:54,720
Secret Service and the FBI and 
all the three letter agencies 

345
00:18:54,720 --> 00:18:56,520
and stuff. 
So I don't think we could 

346
00:18:56,520 --> 00:19:01,040
compete with them any longer. 
And I also was like the I, I 

347
00:19:01,040 --> 00:19:04,720
don't doubt we know that bit. 
Fenix and Tether have worked 

348
00:19:04,720 --> 00:19:09,000
with unsavory characters before,
but these characters weren't 

349
00:19:09,000 --> 00:19:11,080
those kind of unsavory 
characters. 

350
00:19:11,080 --> 00:19:15,240
They were just the bottom rung 
of scam artist. 

351
00:19:15,360 --> 00:19:19,440
And it like there was no 
incentive for Tether to work 

352
00:19:19,440 --> 00:19:22,440
with these people. 
And I think our familiarity with

353
00:19:22,440 --> 00:19:24,960
this subject matter. 
Is a huge reason that we. 

354
00:19:24,960 --> 00:19:29,200
Were able to pause and be like, 
whoa, this is sloppy and a mess.

355
00:19:29,200 --> 00:19:31,320
Even for tether. 
This doesn't make sense. 

356
00:19:31,560 --> 00:19:35,240
So I I do think there's like a 
lot of layers to it and a lot of

357
00:19:35,240 --> 00:19:38,960
levels and I hopefully this 
doesn't poison the rest of the 

358
00:19:38,960 --> 00:19:40,480
episode. 
I think these tools are 

359
00:19:40,480 --> 00:19:42,640
important. 
Learning to use these tools are 

360
00:19:42,760 --> 00:19:47,040
are it's important, but there's 
also just spending the time and 

361
00:19:47,040 --> 00:19:51,160
practicing and learning about 
the subject matters and how to 

362
00:19:51,160 --> 00:19:53,080
use the tools and how to take 
the time. 

363
00:19:53,600 --> 00:19:54,920
And you can't learn that 
overnight. 

364
00:19:54,920 --> 00:19:57,120
You can't learn that in a week. 
You can't learn that in a month 

365
00:19:57,440 --> 00:20:01,120
like this takes a significant 
amount of practice and time and 

366
00:20:01,120 --> 00:20:04,320
you're going to make mistakes. 
You know, journalists are humans

367
00:20:04,400 --> 00:20:08,840
and I I think it takes a really 
long time to get good at it. 

368
00:20:09,000 --> 00:20:12,000
So don't expect to start 
utilizing these tools and 

369
00:20:12,240 --> 00:20:14,200
instantly be a private 
investigator or something. 

370
00:20:14,920 --> 00:20:17,320
But again. 
A really good foundational 

371
00:20:18,120 --> 00:20:21,040
structure for finding these 
people. 

372
00:20:21,040 --> 00:20:24,440
I can now keep going on the 
corporate stint here because 

373
00:20:24,920 --> 00:20:27,360
open Corporates is going to show
us state to state. 

374
00:20:27,360 --> 00:20:29,840
It's going to show us, it's 
going to show us some specific 

375
00:20:29,840 --> 00:20:32,720
countries sometimes. 
But what it won't do is show you

376
00:20:32,920 --> 00:20:35,440
other places. 
So this is again, like I, I just

377
00:20:35,440 --> 00:20:38,360
want to go ahead and go here. 
Let me share this now. 

378
00:20:38,560 --> 00:20:42,640
So now I'm looking at what is 
called Companies House. 

379
00:20:42,640 --> 00:20:47,360
This is the UK version 
essentially of, of open 

380
00:20:47,360 --> 00:20:49,360
Corporates. 
And So what we can do here 

381
00:20:49,360 --> 00:20:51,600
again, I don't know. 
I might as well, just for 

382
00:20:51,600 --> 00:20:54,760
continuity purposes, type in 
Giancarlo Devasini. 

383
00:20:55,200 --> 00:20:58,000
And as far as we know, he's not 
an officer for any companies in 

384
00:20:58,000 --> 00:20:59,680
the UK, so nothing should come 
up. 

385
00:21:00,720 --> 00:21:01,560
Right. 
Nothing. 

386
00:21:01,680 --> 00:21:05,000
But we do know, and let's bring 
up a, a perfect example for 

387
00:21:05,000 --> 00:21:06,880
this. 
There's somebody who goes by the

388
00:21:06,880 --> 00:21:09,680
name of Christopher Harbourne. 
This gentleman, sometimes he has

389
00:21:09,680 --> 00:21:13,600
other names. 
This gentleman has been involved

390
00:21:13,600 --> 00:21:18,400
with Tether and Bitfinex and 
also helped fund Brexit. 

391
00:21:18,400 --> 00:21:22,200
So this was the number one 
financier of Brexit, Christopher

392
00:21:22,200 --> 00:21:25,600
Harbourne, also known as 
Shakrete Sakuncrete, that is his

393
00:21:25,600 --> 00:21:27,880
Thai name. 
He is a Thai citizen as well. 

394
00:21:28,040 --> 00:21:31,160
He currently has what what 
they're telling us is that he 

395
00:21:31,160 --> 00:21:33,840
has two appointments. 
And so we're going to go ahead 

396
00:21:33,840 --> 00:21:35,600
and Scroll down. 
We're going to Scroll down and 

397
00:21:35,600 --> 00:21:38,600
you can see that this is the 
gentleman who we named, right? 

398
00:21:38,760 --> 00:21:41,320
And how do we know? 
Well, as I just told you, his 

399
00:21:41,320 --> 00:21:43,480
other name is Shotcrete 
Sakuncrete. 

400
00:21:43,600 --> 00:21:46,440
Well, that is his Thai name. 
His country of residence is 

401
00:21:46,440 --> 00:21:49,120
listed as Thailand here as well 
as here. 

402
00:21:49,360 --> 00:21:51,120
And it tells us when he was 
appointed to these. 

403
00:21:51,120 --> 00:21:54,880
It was in 20/18/2016. 
It's giving us information about

404
00:21:54,880 --> 00:21:58,000
his companies in the UK. 
There's AML Global Payments, 

405
00:21:58,000 --> 00:22:01,160
which I believe is his aviation 
fuel company. 

406
00:22:01,640 --> 00:22:04,440
And then there is Cambridge 
Advanced Research Alliance, 

407
00:22:04,440 --> 00:22:06,560
which I don't think anyone has 
done any reporting on. 

408
00:22:06,560 --> 00:22:08,720
Let's go ahead and click it. 
So if we click Cambridge 

409
00:22:08,720 --> 00:22:12,720
Advanced Research Alliance, we 
soon find out that this is a 

410
00:22:13,120 --> 00:22:16,040
private limited company by 
guarantee without share capital,

411
00:22:16,040 --> 00:22:20,360
use of limited exemption. 
We find out that it's up to 

412
00:22:20,360 --> 00:22:23,720
date, everything is OK with it 
currently and we can go ahead 

413
00:22:23,720 --> 00:22:25,880
and click people if we want to 
find out who's involved. 

414
00:22:25,880 --> 00:22:28,960
We already know that Christopher
Harbourne is involved, but now 

415
00:22:28,960 --> 00:22:32,080
we find out that Catherine Mary 
Harbourne, Christopher 

416
00:22:32,080 --> 00:22:34,840
Harbourne's sister, is also a 
director. 

417
00:22:35,000 --> 00:22:38,560
She has resigned apparently. 
So she resigned in 2021. 

418
00:22:38,960 --> 00:22:43,120
So now it is just Christopher 
Harbourne and sorry Joanna 

419
00:22:43,320 --> 00:22:48,080
Armenanen, who was appointed in 
2018 as a director, Finnish 

420
00:22:48,080 --> 00:22:51,760
apparently living in the UK. 
So now we have some sort of idea

421
00:22:51,760 --> 00:22:54,320
about the people involved. 
Now we can click people with 

422
00:22:54,320 --> 00:22:57,440
significant control. 
We find out that that is 3 

423
00:22:57,440 --> 00:23:00,440
active people. 
Now Christopher Harbourne's 

424
00:23:00,520 --> 00:23:02,240
sister is no longer a part of 
this. 

425
00:23:02,240 --> 00:23:06,720
Oh, there she is, yes, ceased. 
So we have a apparently a Thai 

426
00:23:06,720 --> 00:23:09,880
citizen, a Finnish citizen, and 
Christopher. 

427
00:23:09,880 --> 00:23:12,680
As people with significant 
control, we can go to filing 

428
00:23:12,680 --> 00:23:14,280
history. 
And the beauty of the filing 

429
00:23:14,280 --> 00:23:18,600
history is that we can see 
things like when the exact date,

430
00:23:18,600 --> 00:23:21,760
when his sister stepped down as 
a person with significant 

431
00:23:21,760 --> 00:23:24,440
control. 
So we can look at exactly when 

432
00:23:24,440 --> 00:23:26,760
the incorporation occurred. 
And when we click that, we can 

433
00:23:26,760 --> 00:23:29,000
actually see. 
So now we can see this is 

434
00:23:29,000 --> 00:23:32,960
actually the incorporation like 
exact corporation date. 

435
00:23:32,960 --> 00:23:36,000
And we can find out kind of some
distinct things about it. 

436
00:23:36,000 --> 00:23:41,360
We can find out who was involved
the day it became a company. 

437
00:23:42,000 --> 00:23:46,840
We can find out if we Scroll 
down everyone who has shares, we

438
00:23:46,840 --> 00:23:49,240
can find out what we got. 
Articles of like. 

439
00:23:49,240 --> 00:23:52,320
All this stuff is usually pretty
nondescript. 

440
00:23:52,320 --> 00:23:55,360
We don't need to worry about it.
I think this is all kind of 

441
00:23:55,360 --> 00:24:01,120
legalese, but yeah, you can, you
can go through and click any of 

442
00:24:01,120 --> 00:24:03,680
these things to find out extra 
information about this, where 

443
00:24:03,680 --> 00:24:07,280
they're registered, who's 
involved, and you can try to 

444
00:24:07,280 --> 00:24:08,960
find out more about them after 
that. 

445
00:24:08,960 --> 00:24:11,880
You're not going to get a ton of
information from this stuff. 

446
00:24:11,960 --> 00:24:14,800
You will get people involved, 
their whereabouts, where they're

447
00:24:14,800 --> 00:24:18,040
from, and whether or not they 
have a controlling interest in 

448
00:24:18,040 --> 00:24:19,320
the company. 
All those things are actually 

449
00:24:19,320 --> 00:24:22,960
quite important and I think that
this is a great resource for, 

450
00:24:22,960 --> 00:24:24,200
again, figuring these things 
out. 

451
00:24:24,200 --> 00:24:26,800
It's why all three of the things
that we've discussed so far, 

452
00:24:26,800 --> 00:24:28,480
whether you're going on the 
website and finding out the 

453
00:24:28,480 --> 00:24:31,440
company names and people 
involved or using open 

454
00:24:31,440 --> 00:24:35,160
corporates or company's house to
try to find out more information

455
00:24:35,160 --> 00:24:37,960
about these individuals or 
companies, where they're 

456
00:24:37,960 --> 00:24:40,840
incorporated, how they're 
incorporated, what industries 

457
00:24:40,840 --> 00:24:44,600
they're involved in, et cetera. 
Yeah, that should do it. 

458
00:24:44,840 --> 00:24:48,000
Well, and I think like the thing
to remember is that the UK is 

459
00:24:48,000 --> 00:24:51,920
somewhat unique in that they 
allow free and relatively 

460
00:24:51,920 --> 00:24:54,920
unfettered access to their 
corporate registry, but it's 

461
00:24:54,920 --> 00:24:58,320
valuable to check the corporate 
registry often wherever you're 

462
00:24:58,320 --> 00:25:01,080
looking. 
Like I know I've been able to 

463
00:25:01,080 --> 00:25:04,680
report on a few stories by going
through a six, which is the 

464
00:25:04,680 --> 00:25:08,200
Australian registry there. 
You have to pay for most of the 

465
00:25:08,200 --> 00:25:12,680
documents, but the documents you
do get are pretty detailed, like

466
00:25:12,680 --> 00:25:15,440
down to the specific 
shareholders and things like 

467
00:25:15,440 --> 00:25:17,880
that. 
Similarly, both Cass and I have 

468
00:25:17,880 --> 00:25:22,040
had been able to report stories 
by pulling documents from ICRIS,

469
00:25:22,040 --> 00:25:26,760
which is Hong Kong system. 
It is not easy to use. 

470
00:25:26,920 --> 00:25:30,160
It is easy to spend money that 
you didn't realize you were 

471
00:25:30,160 --> 00:25:34,480
spending, but it is possible to 
get useful documents from it. 

472
00:25:34,680 --> 00:25:37,400
And so once you have the 
corporate name and have moved 

473
00:25:37,400 --> 00:25:40,840
through the broader resources 
like open corporates or and 

474
00:25:40,840 --> 00:25:44,200
things like that and you've 
identified what country it is, 

475
00:25:44,520 --> 00:25:47,520
if there's more information you 
need to know about that entity, 

476
00:25:47,520 --> 00:25:51,080
going to that country's 
corporate registry is generally 

477
00:25:51,120 --> 00:25:53,480
a good place to start. 
Yep, I agree with all of that. 

478
00:25:53,480 --> 00:25:56,360
And I also think obviously 
you're right where the 1st place

479
00:25:56,360 --> 00:25:59,760
is to go to the website and just
kind of check other company 

480
00:25:59,760 --> 00:26:02,200
names, the real company names 
essentially because they're, 

481
00:26:02,480 --> 00:26:04,840
they're usually doing business 
as something, they're 

482
00:26:04,840 --> 00:26:07,960
incorporated as something else. 
And then after you have that 

483
00:26:07,960 --> 00:26:11,440
information you, that's when you
can actually start to explore on

484
00:26:11,440 --> 00:26:14,480
a more comprehensive scale. 
And it's again worth noting, 

485
00:26:14,480 --> 00:26:17,640
like you, you can delve into 
corporate documents. 

486
00:26:18,040 --> 00:26:20,840
It will often cost you money 
even in the United States 

487
00:26:20,840 --> 00:26:24,400
sometimes to access, Yeah, to 
access these corporate 

488
00:26:24,400 --> 00:26:27,920
documents, right. 
If it's in specific states, it 

489
00:26:27,920 --> 00:26:30,400
will cost you money. 
And the reality is in a lot of 

490
00:26:30,400 --> 00:26:33,400
states like Wyoming, you're 
probably not going to get very 

491
00:26:33,400 --> 00:26:36,160
much information from any of 
those corporate documents. 

492
00:26:36,160 --> 00:26:40,560
They specifically create their 
their corporate structure to be 

493
00:26:40,720 --> 00:26:44,880
very privacy focused. 
Now, if it's in a place like 

494
00:26:44,880 --> 00:26:48,440
Florida, Florida's great. 
You get free access to their 

495
00:26:48,440 --> 00:26:51,040
corporate registry and they tell
you like everything. 

496
00:26:51,200 --> 00:26:54,040
You get like almost complete 
access to every document they've

497
00:26:54,040 --> 00:26:55,920
ever filed with the Secretary of
State. 

498
00:26:56,080 --> 00:26:59,120
You can get specific detail 
about shareholders and members. 

499
00:26:59,400 --> 00:27:02,200
Florida is a good place if 
you're trying to do research on 

500
00:27:02,200 --> 00:27:04,400
that type of thing. 
So after we've learned a little 

501
00:27:04,400 --> 00:27:08,280
bit about the company, what's 
the next thing we should do? 

502
00:27:08,560 --> 00:27:11,480
It depends on what kind of 
company company it is. 

503
00:27:11,720 --> 00:27:15,200
If for instance, I think maybe 
I'll, I'll pass this one off to 

504
00:27:15,200 --> 00:27:19,400
you, Bennett. 
But if it's AUS, let's say AUS 

505
00:27:19,400 --> 00:27:22,480
publicly traded company, where, 
where would you go next? 

506
00:27:22,480 --> 00:27:24,960
What would be the next move in 
your opinion? 

507
00:27:25,160 --> 00:27:27,520
Like Cass was saying, when 
you're dealing with publicly 

508
00:27:27,520 --> 00:27:32,160
traded companies, you can search
all of their SEC filings by 

509
00:27:32,160 --> 00:27:35,160
going to the SEC search, which 
they call Edgar. 

510
00:27:35,400 --> 00:27:36,560
I don't know why they call it 
Edgar. 

511
00:27:36,760 --> 00:27:39,560
It's apparently an acronym. 
But like if we look up micro 

512
00:27:39,560 --> 00:27:43,520
strategy, we can see their 
current reports, they're insider

513
00:27:43,520 --> 00:27:46,080
trading reports, they're 
different registrations of 

514
00:27:46,080 --> 00:27:47,480
sales. 
And so if I'm trying to 

515
00:27:47,480 --> 00:27:51,160
understand like their most 
recent financial situation, I'm 

516
00:27:51,160 --> 00:27:54,080
going to look at their most 
recent filed quarterly reports 

517
00:27:54,080 --> 00:27:56,560
or updates like that. 
And I want to, I, I just want to

518
00:27:56,800 --> 00:28:00,200
put this out there for 
everybody, but don't expect to 

519
00:28:00,200 --> 00:28:04,120
jump into these filings and be 
like, oh, this is very clear and

520
00:28:04,120 --> 00:28:06,880
easily understandable. 
I can decipher this very 

521
00:28:06,880 --> 00:28:09,840
quickly. 
These things are complicated. 

522
00:28:10,280 --> 00:28:13,520
There's a lot of moving parts. 
There's stuff that even to this 

523
00:28:13,520 --> 00:28:16,720
day I do not understand. 
Bennett and I have recently been

524
00:28:16,720 --> 00:28:20,240
talking about convertible notes 
and stock warrants, which are 

525
00:28:20,240 --> 00:28:24,520
just a complex mess. 
But there's he's he's looking 

526
00:28:24,520 --> 00:28:27,320
through this right now and you 
can just see it's numbers on 

527
00:28:27,320 --> 00:28:30,360
numbers on numbers. 
It even the idea that like it 

528
00:28:30,360 --> 00:28:31,960
looks like we're talking about 
thousands. 

529
00:28:31,960 --> 00:28:35,400
Well, we're not, you know, this 
is in millions or in whatever. 

530
00:28:35,400 --> 00:28:40,440
Like there, you really got to 
know your math and know what the

531
00:28:40,440 --> 00:28:46,800
hell is happening before you can
even try to publicly comment on 

532
00:28:46,800 --> 00:28:49,840
what these reports are 
suggesting. 

533
00:28:49,960 --> 00:28:53,320
Well, I know from experience. 
You can try publicly commenting 

534
00:28:53,800 --> 00:28:56,800
even before you really fully 
understand them, but it's 

535
00:28:56,800 --> 00:28:59,200
helpful to spend some time 
trying to understand it. 

536
00:28:59,240 --> 00:29:02,880
So yeah, this is helpful to look
into things about different 

537
00:29:02,880 --> 00:29:05,560
companies. 
The other one that can be good, 

538
00:29:05,560 --> 00:29:07,800
especially if you're doing 
something like crypto research 

539
00:29:07,800 --> 00:29:13,120
or financial research, is 
looking for their money 

540
00:29:13,120 --> 00:29:16,560
services, business registration.
What does Coinbase have theirs 

541
00:29:16,560 --> 00:29:17,560
under? 
Oh, here we go. 

542
00:29:17,880 --> 00:29:21,080
Like if we want to look at coin 
bases, we can see all the places

543
00:29:21,080 --> 00:29:24,360
they are registered. 
We can see their address that 

544
00:29:24,360 --> 00:29:28,120
they're registered at when it's 
valid for and we can even 

545
00:29:28,120 --> 00:29:31,080
download that registration and 
take a look at it. 

546
00:29:31,240 --> 00:29:36,120
So registered out of their 
address in New York, they are 

547
00:29:36,120 --> 00:29:40,040
registered in basically probably
every state for activity. 

548
00:29:40,080 --> 00:29:42,480
I'm not going to count to make 
sure that all the places are 

549
00:29:42,480 --> 00:29:46,160
there, but they're there. 
And so it's, it's good to do 

550
00:29:46,160 --> 00:29:48,520
that. 
Sometimes those types of things 

551
00:29:48,520 --> 00:29:51,520
will include a little bit of 
extra information about the 

552
00:29:51,520 --> 00:29:54,320
company, like based on where 
they're registering it or things

553
00:29:54,320 --> 00:29:56,240
like that. 
And so starting to look at what 

554
00:29:56,240 --> 00:29:58,800
I think of as regulatory filing.
So like going through Edgar, 

555
00:29:58,800 --> 00:30:01,840
going through Vincent, going 
through things like that helps 

556
00:30:01,840 --> 00:30:06,480
you make sure that the company 
is like valid, current and like 

557
00:30:06,480 --> 00:30:09,080
up to date, right? 
That if their money services 

558
00:30:09,080 --> 00:30:10,880
business, they've got that 
registration. 

559
00:30:11,120 --> 00:30:13,840
If they're a public company, 
they are up to date with their 

560
00:30:13,840 --> 00:30:16,040
filings. 
And when you check the Secretary

561
00:30:16,040 --> 00:30:18,800
of State or the corporate 
registry, sometimes you'll even 

562
00:30:18,800 --> 00:30:23,440
find there that companies are 
behind on their filings, and 

563
00:30:23,440 --> 00:30:27,120
that can be useful information. 
And that's that's with publicly 

564
00:30:27,120 --> 00:30:30,800
traded stocks, I think or sorry,
publicly traded companies, I 

565
00:30:30,800 --> 00:30:32,160
guess some private companies as 
well. 

566
00:30:32,160 --> 00:30:35,160
It depends on who they're 
acquiring money from, whether 

567
00:30:35,160 --> 00:30:38,240
they have to file with the SEC. 
If it's a company that isn't 

568
00:30:38,280 --> 00:30:44,440
necessarily a publicly traded 
company, maybe it's mostly AVC 

569
00:30:44,560 --> 00:30:47,880
related VC related company. 
That's when I would suggest to 

570
00:30:47,880 --> 00:30:51,120
people to explore something like
Crunchbase. 

571
00:30:51,200 --> 00:30:56,720
Now, I will say that I have an 
account, so I am able to kind of

572
00:30:56,720 --> 00:31:00,240
utilize it in a better way than 
some people might be able to. 

573
00:31:00,480 --> 00:31:04,480
However, if we look at a company
like Tether, what I'm able to 

574
00:31:04,480 --> 00:31:09,160
ascertain from this is that they
have made 13 investments. 

575
00:31:09,400 --> 00:31:12,800
They've had three exits. 
I can get employee profile 

576
00:31:12,800 --> 00:31:15,440
pages. 
Some of these might be old or. 

577
00:31:15,560 --> 00:31:17,080
They're sometimes a little 
questionable. 

578
00:31:17,120 --> 00:31:20,360
The crunch basic the like the 
investment hearts is good. 

579
00:31:20,360 --> 00:31:22,840
The employee profiles can be a 
little ISO raising. 

580
00:31:22,960 --> 00:31:25,520
There's some confusing bits 
about this, like they say it's 

581
00:31:25,520 --> 00:31:27,920
located in Seattle, WA. 
That's wrong. 

582
00:31:27,920 --> 00:31:30,600
There's a different company 
called Tether that is located in

583
00:31:30,600 --> 00:31:33,440
Seattle, WA. 
So like there are things that 

584
00:31:33,440 --> 00:31:35,400
you have to, you have to know 
what you're getting yourself 

585
00:31:35,400 --> 00:31:38,400
into when you're using a site 
like Crunch Base because there 

586
00:31:38,400 --> 00:31:41,600
can be plenty of errors. 
But as Bennett pointed out, the 

587
00:31:41,600 --> 00:31:44,440
investment part is generally 
pretty reliable, Reliable. 

588
00:31:44,440 --> 00:31:47,640
So we go here, we can see how 
many investments over what 

589
00:31:47,640 --> 00:31:50,640
period of time the investments 
were made and whether or not 

590
00:31:50,800 --> 00:31:54,040
Tether was a lead investor. 
Lead investor simply meaning 

591
00:31:54,040 --> 00:31:58,760
more or less that they were one 
of the higher capital, one of 

592
00:31:58,760 --> 00:32:01,640
the companies that put in a 
larger amount of capital into a 

593
00:32:01,640 --> 00:32:02,800
raise. 
And they'll tell you the most 

594
00:32:02,800 --> 00:32:06,480
recent investment for and how 
much the raise was for. 

595
00:32:06,480 --> 00:32:10,040
That doesn't mean to keep, to be
clear here like this says, oh 

596
00:32:10,040 --> 00:32:13,960
they, they went into a company 
called X Rex and raised 8 which 

597
00:32:13,960 --> 00:32:16,360
raised 18.8 million. 
Well, that doesn't mean 

598
00:32:16,360 --> 00:32:21,920
necessarily that they raised 
$18.8 million from Tether. 

599
00:32:22,080 --> 00:32:26,200
It means that they raised that 
in total and that Tether was a 

600
00:32:26,200 --> 00:32:28,160
lead investor. 
So if we go down here, you can 

601
00:32:28,160 --> 00:32:31,800
see it says lead investor. 
Yes, it was a corporate round. 

602
00:32:31,960 --> 00:32:35,400
And so if we click this now just
to just so everyone has some 

603
00:32:35,400 --> 00:32:40,080
sort of idea here again, if we 
click X Rex, we can see even 

604
00:32:40,080 --> 00:32:43,920
though last round they made 
18.8, they've actually total, 

605
00:32:44,040 --> 00:32:46,960
their total funding has been for
42.8 blockch. 

606
00:32:46,960 --> 00:32:49,240
It tells us what they do, where 
they're located. 

607
00:32:49,360 --> 00:32:52,040
Again, these are things we need 
to double, We need to double 

608
00:32:52,040 --> 00:32:54,320
check, right? 
We cannot, we cannot rely on 

609
00:32:54,320 --> 00:32:57,360
Crunchbase to accurately suggest
this company is located in 

610
00:32:57,360 --> 00:32:58,920
Taipei. 
It very well might be, I don't 

611
00:32:58,920 --> 00:33:02,400
know, but it will tell us their 
total funding amount and over 

612
00:33:02,440 --> 00:33:05,240
what amount of time and how that
money was acquired. 

613
00:33:05,240 --> 00:33:08,800
So we can see that the majority 
of their funding was actually 

614
00:33:08,800 --> 00:33:12,040
through seed rounds, but their 
corporate round most recent is 

615
00:33:12,040 --> 00:33:13,760
when? 
That's when Tether gave them. 

616
00:33:13,960 --> 00:33:17,000
Tether gave them million. 
So we can see there's been a lot

617
00:33:17,000 --> 00:33:20,240
of investors in this company. 
There's been roughly 21 

618
00:33:20,240 --> 00:33:22,200
investors or so. 
Maybe some of these are 

619
00:33:22,200 --> 00:33:25,320
duplicates, but there's been 
something like 20 investors. 

620
00:33:25,600 --> 00:33:27,440
There was only one investor in 
the corporate round. 

621
00:33:27,480 --> 00:33:30,120
It was Tether and they gave 
18.8. 

622
00:33:30,120 --> 00:33:32,280
So these are these are things we
can ascertain. 

623
00:33:32,280 --> 00:33:34,440
It helps us understand 
connections. 

624
00:33:34,480 --> 00:33:36,840
It helps us look into other 
companies. 

625
00:33:36,840 --> 00:33:40,560
It helps us kind of, I guess it 
depends on the company, but it 

626
00:33:40,560 --> 00:33:43,840
definitely helps you get an idea
of like what they're investing 

627
00:33:43,840 --> 00:33:47,200
in or who is investing in them. 
And I think all of those things 

628
00:33:47,200 --> 00:33:50,280
are quite valuable, quite 
valuable for us. 

629
00:33:50,280 --> 00:33:55,800
So I, I've, I've, I've had a lot
of good value from crunch bass 

630
00:33:55,800 --> 00:33:58,680
as much as I think I don't know 
who created it. 

631
00:33:58,880 --> 00:34:01,760
Is this Michael Arrington? 
Is it? 

632
00:34:01,920 --> 00:34:03,200
I do not know the answer to 
that. 

633
00:34:03,280 --> 00:34:08,080
I think it might be, and if it 
is, that feels bad, but yeah, 

634
00:34:08,199 --> 00:34:11,920
regardless it is quite useful. 
I I'm glad to hear that 

635
00:34:11,960 --> 00:34:14,400
Arrington did at least one 
useful thing in his life. 

636
00:34:14,520 --> 00:34:19,440
I'm I do think it's funny that 
he's like created his fund and 

637
00:34:19,440 --> 00:34:22,239
called it XORP. 
Like everything is XORP and just

638
00:34:22,239 --> 00:34:25,520
like how embarrassing that is. 
But anyway, yeah, let's continue

639
00:34:25,520 --> 00:34:29,520
here outside the fact this this 
actually something that Bennett 

640
00:34:29,520 --> 00:34:31,960
is going to show you right now 
is far outside the scope of what

641
00:34:31,960 --> 00:34:34,400
we were just discussing, even 
though it's it's pretty 

642
00:34:34,400 --> 00:34:36,040
applicable to everything. 
So go ahead. 

643
00:34:36,400 --> 00:34:40,400
Court listener recap search is 
an incredible tool because what 

644
00:34:40,400 --> 00:34:44,920
they do is they like index every
single docket in the United 

645
00:34:44,920 --> 00:34:48,719
States federal courts. 
And whenever someone who's a 

646
00:34:49,000 --> 00:34:53,000
free law member with the recap 
extension like I am, goes and 

647
00:34:53,000 --> 00:34:57,000
spends money on pacer like I do,
it copies that document and 

648
00:34:57,000 --> 00:34:59,360
uploads it here. 
So that way when you want to do 

649
00:34:59,360 --> 00:35:03,320
something like look up Sam 
Bankman Freed, you just type in 

650
00:35:03,320 --> 00:35:05,560
his name here. 
Give it a minute to search. 

651
00:35:05,560 --> 00:35:09,440
Because it's a nonprofit, things
run a little bit slow and then 

652
00:35:09,440 --> 00:35:14,840
we can find his docket here, 
throw it into sending and we can

653
00:35:14,840 --> 00:35:16,480
see. 
Let's find a good one. 

654
00:35:16,640 --> 00:35:20,520
You can open up the PDF filings 
and read like these specific 

655
00:35:20,600 --> 00:35:23,240
court documents and things like 
this. 

656
00:35:23,640 --> 00:35:27,480
And in any case where there is 
not a document yet, if you have 

657
00:35:27,480 --> 00:35:31,800
a PACER account, like again, I 
do, you can just go directly to 

658
00:35:31,800 --> 00:35:35,760
PACER and then it will like 
automatically prompt you to buy 

659
00:35:35,760 --> 00:35:37,600
and upload the file, which I'm 
not going to do right now 

660
00:35:37,600 --> 00:35:39,680
because that's just a notice of 
attorney appearance. 

661
00:35:40,040 --> 00:35:43,320
But this lets you like actually 
read and understand the 

662
00:35:43,320 --> 00:35:47,040
multitude of court cases going 
on at any given time. 

663
00:35:47,280 --> 00:35:50,080
Well, lets you read them. 
Understanding is a separate 

664
00:35:50,080 --> 00:35:51,520
issue you have to deal with 
yourself. 

665
00:35:51,560 --> 00:35:55,840
Bennett just mentioned Pacer 
and, and I will say Pacer is a 

666
00:35:55,840 --> 00:36:02,880
ugly system and it is all about 
value extraction And it like I, 

667
00:36:02,960 --> 00:36:07,320
I dislike everything about it. 
But I will say that again, it is

668
00:36:07,320 --> 00:36:10,240
quite valuable. 
And if you can afford it, OK. 

669
00:36:10,240 --> 00:36:13,120
And I, I totally understand 
there's plenty of people out 

670
00:36:13,120 --> 00:36:15,400
there who can't it, it can be 
expensive. 

671
00:36:15,760 --> 00:36:20,240
As Bennett pointed out to me 
today, if you spend over $35 in 

672
00:36:20,600 --> 00:36:23,680
1/4, is it every quarter? 
It's something like that and it 

673
00:36:23,680 --> 00:36:26,680
might be 30, but there's some 
minimum you can spend up to each

674
00:36:26,680 --> 00:36:28,800
quarter where you don't actually
get billed. 

675
00:36:28,960 --> 00:36:32,880
And to be clear, like it's $0.10
every document or something? 

676
00:36:32,880 --> 00:36:34,480
Every page. 
Every page, right? 

677
00:36:34,480 --> 00:36:37,680
Every page. 
So if a document is 65 pages, 

678
00:36:38,120 --> 00:36:41,960
right, you're paying like you 
are paying 6 1/2 dollars just 

679
00:36:41,960 --> 00:36:45,320
for that 65 page document. 
So it can absolutely get 

680
00:36:45,320 --> 00:36:48,280
expensive, especially if you're 
really trying to keep up on some

681
00:36:48,280 --> 00:36:51,760
big important case. 
And I, I don't want to suggest 

682
00:36:51,760 --> 00:36:53,600
that everyone can afford, afford
it. 

683
00:36:53,920 --> 00:36:59,000
We have the benefit of working 
for a organization that is in 

684
00:36:59,000 --> 00:37:03,720
the media space. 
So we tell them we bought this 

685
00:37:03,720 --> 00:37:07,960
thing, pay us back for it. 
If, especially if it applies to 

686
00:37:08,000 --> 00:37:10,480
something we're writing. 
Not everyone has that, but 

687
00:37:10,480 --> 00:37:13,320
sometimes it can be well worth 
your time, your money and your 

688
00:37:13,320 --> 00:37:15,960
energy to go for it. 
You know, it might be worth it 

689
00:37:15,960 --> 00:37:18,520
for you, especially if it's some
small case that isn't being 

690
00:37:18,520 --> 00:37:20,120
reported by the media in 
general. 

691
00:37:20,120 --> 00:37:22,440
Like if it's something you're 
really fascinated by. 

692
00:37:22,680 --> 00:37:25,800
I don't know it just, I just 
think it's worth it to have a 

693
00:37:25,800 --> 00:37:27,600
pacer account. 
So I want to, I want to put that

694
00:37:27,600 --> 00:37:31,560
out there. 
Yeah, I, I will add also it's a 

695
00:37:31,560 --> 00:37:34,640
pacer account is a good thing to
get ahead of time because it 

696
00:37:34,640 --> 00:37:36,880
takes a while to have an active 
pacer account. 

697
00:37:37,280 --> 00:37:41,160
You put in your information and 
they mail you a physical like 

698
00:37:41,160 --> 00:37:43,840
confirmation code that you have 
to type in. 

699
00:37:44,080 --> 00:37:47,640
And so there's like a weak leg 
at minimum from when you say I 

700
00:37:47,640 --> 00:37:50,320
want to pacer account until 
you're able to start reading 

701
00:37:50,320 --> 00:37:52,160
dockets. 
So if that's the thing you think

702
00:37:52,160 --> 00:37:54,840
you might need coming up, start 
getting done it. 

703
00:37:54,960 --> 00:37:57,920
So and now I know we're going to
start getting into some other 

704
00:37:57,960 --> 00:38:01,800
kind of blockchain exclusive 
tools that people can utilize. 

705
00:38:01,800 --> 00:38:05,080
But before we do that, I just 
want to utilize one other thing 

706
00:38:05,080 --> 00:38:08,920
for everybody. 
So I know, I know that there's 

707
00:38:08,920 --> 00:38:12,440
going to be qualms about this 
and people suggesting, you know,

708
00:38:12,680 --> 00:38:15,880
the New York Times is garbage. 
Look, I have my issues with the 

709
00:38:15,880 --> 00:38:18,760
New York Times as well. 
I am not suggesting, I'm not 

710
00:38:18,760 --> 00:38:21,440
suggesting that everyone should 
go out there and immediately go 

711
00:38:21,440 --> 00:38:24,280
by a New York Times account. 
The reason that I have an 

712
00:38:24,280 --> 00:38:27,440
account personally is less 
because I want to it. 

713
00:38:27,440 --> 00:38:30,640
It's less because I want to read
their current articles about, I 

714
00:38:30,640 --> 00:38:33,080
don't know, some Biden advisors 
are discussing how to persuade. 

715
00:38:33,360 --> 00:38:35,440
I don't give a shit really. 
I truly don't care. 

716
00:38:35,600 --> 00:38:38,320
Not only do I not care about 
this, but I don't care about. 

717
00:38:38,320 --> 00:38:40,640
The first thing under their 
masthead. 

718
00:38:40,680 --> 00:38:43,680
All of it all, everything about 
this does not appeal to me. 

719
00:38:43,680 --> 00:38:45,040
OK? 
I just want to be upfront and 

720
00:38:45,040 --> 00:38:48,000
and honest about that. 
But what does appeal to me is 

721
00:38:48,000 --> 00:38:50,880
there archives. 
They're archives because they 

722
00:38:50,880 --> 00:38:56,560
are the the new, the newspaper 
of record for America for over 

723
00:38:56,560 --> 00:38:59,920
100 years. 
You can utilize this archive in 

724
00:38:59,920 --> 00:39:02,160
ways that you can't necessarily 
utilize other archives. 

725
00:39:02,160 --> 00:39:05,160
So I'll go ahead and type in a 
company that is again near and 

726
00:39:05,160 --> 00:39:09,200
dear to our hearts, Deltec. 
And if I type in Deltec, we're 

727
00:39:09,200 --> 00:39:13,400
finding stories from 1968. 
Deltec banking raises profit. 

728
00:39:13,400 --> 00:39:15,360
We're finding stories about 
Deltec. 

729
00:39:15,880 --> 00:39:19,600
The shoestring one is fun. 
Yeah, Deltech shoestring laces 

730
00:39:19,600 --> 00:39:21,600
continents, Deltech encircles 
the world. 

731
00:39:21,920 --> 00:39:26,560
Deltech sees profit for first 
quarter January 18th, 1972. 

732
00:39:27,920 --> 00:39:31,600
We get all of these these 
interesting stories that could 

733
00:39:31,600 --> 00:39:35,600
teach you a lot about something 
that you do not like. 

734
00:39:35,920 --> 00:39:42,040
Deltech still an an important 
Caribbean bank that is involved 

735
00:39:42,040 --> 00:39:46,280
in all kinds of weird stuff and 
you know, you can search through

736
00:39:46,280 --> 00:39:48,520
here and find some really 
interesting stories about 

737
00:39:48,520 --> 00:39:52,680
Deltech from decades past. 
Now does that apply to Deltech 

738
00:39:52,680 --> 00:39:54,440
now? 
No, it doesn't. 

739
00:39:54,440 --> 00:39:56,360
I don't think it does. 
I don't think it's fair for me 

740
00:39:56,640 --> 00:40:01,120
to utilize a story from 1978 to 
discuss the current situation. 

741
00:40:01,560 --> 00:40:07,360
It does provide you with some 
sort of archival concept and. 

742
00:40:08,040 --> 00:40:12,000
Sometimes it's great for some 
company that you're looking into

743
00:40:12,120 --> 00:40:15,640
and you need something from 5 or
10 years ago even, right? 

744
00:40:15,640 --> 00:40:18,680
Like so I do think there is a 
lot of value to be had there 

745
00:40:18,680 --> 00:40:21,440
from the New York Times archive.
Does that mean that you need to 

746
00:40:21,440 --> 00:40:23,320
go out and immediately buy a New
York Times subscription? 

747
00:40:23,320 --> 00:40:26,440
No, and I'm not suggesting that,
but I I I have found it quite 

748
00:40:26,440 --> 00:40:29,200
useful for myself. 
Their cooking coverage is also 

749
00:40:29,200 --> 00:40:31,480
pretty good. 
Yes, but that's for you and me. 

750
00:40:31,560 --> 00:40:33,640
I don't think that's 
necessarily. 

751
00:40:34,160 --> 00:40:38,120
But you know, Speaking of 
archives, it is very helpful to 

752
00:40:38,120 --> 00:40:41,720
be able to kind of look at the 
past for certain things. 

753
00:40:42,000 --> 00:40:44,880
And so like, say you were a 
person with an unhealthy 

754
00:40:44,880 --> 00:40:48,000
fascination with stable coins 
and so you wanted to learn more 

755
00:40:48,000 --> 00:40:50,960
about the very beginning of the 
very first stable coin we're 

756
00:40:50,960 --> 00:40:52,640
getting called Tether, the first
stable coin. 

757
00:40:52,840 --> 00:40:55,080
It works for most definitions of
stable coin. 

758
00:40:55,720 --> 00:40:58,240
And so it can be like 
interesting and helpful to go 

759
00:40:58,240 --> 00:41:01,960
back and see how these companies
were marketing themselves in 

760
00:41:01,960 --> 00:41:06,760
2014, in 2015 in things like 
that, see what questions they 

761
00:41:06,760 --> 00:41:10,320
thought were going to be 
important for the firm and 

762
00:41:10,320 --> 00:41:13,400
things like that. 
And like, in doing this, you can

763
00:41:13,400 --> 00:41:18,400
often like, find changes, see, 
like at what period they added a

764
00:41:18,400 --> 00:41:21,000
certain executive to the 
website, took a certain 

765
00:41:21,000 --> 00:41:24,680
executive off the website, 
changed the way they were 

766
00:41:24,680 --> 00:41:27,480
discussing certain features or 
things like that. 

767
00:41:27,600 --> 00:41:31,320
Yeah, talking about, they remove
the part where they talk about 

768
00:41:31,320 --> 00:41:34,400
how you can get tethers without 
going through the KYC process. 

769
00:41:34,720 --> 00:41:37,400
At a certain point, you decide 
you don't want that listed on 

770
00:41:37,400 --> 00:41:40,440
your public website anymore. 
But thanks to wonderful tools 

771
00:41:40,440 --> 00:41:43,080
like the Wayback Machine, 
assholes who are obsessed with 

772
00:41:43,080 --> 00:41:46,320
stable Queens can still find it 
and go back and mention it for 

773
00:41:46,320 --> 00:41:49,280
years to come. 
You know, it's things like that 

774
00:41:49,280 --> 00:41:52,240
that can be really helpful on 
these archive websites. 

775
00:41:52,440 --> 00:41:54,600
Yeah. 
And so also similar thing, like 

776
00:41:54,760 --> 00:41:58,320
sometimes you can see like a 
corporate entity change at 1.3 

777
00:41:58,400 --> 00:42:01,080
years ago they were referencing 
1 corporate body, now they're 

778
00:42:01,080 --> 00:42:03,920
referencing another one. 
Now you have an opportunity to 

779
00:42:03,920 --> 00:42:06,960
figure out was there a merger? 
Was there like every domiciling?

780
00:42:07,200 --> 00:42:09,880
Why did this change and does 
that mean anything? 

781
00:42:10,080 --> 00:42:12,920
Did a bunch of new investors 
come in and it's not really the 

782
00:42:12,920 --> 00:42:15,800
same company it used to be, 
they're just using the same 

783
00:42:15,800 --> 00:42:17,440
name. 
Those kind of things happen. 

784
00:42:17,440 --> 00:42:20,800
And so looking at how it's 
changed over time helps you kind

785
00:42:20,800 --> 00:42:22,720
of figured that kind of thing 
out. 

786
00:42:22,960 --> 00:42:24,680
Yep, Yep. 
I think that's awesome. 

787
00:42:24,680 --> 00:42:28,640
The last, the last ones I I have
no other ones on my docket. 

788
00:42:28,640 --> 00:42:32,040
I think the last couple are all 
you but Bennett or the last 

789
00:42:32,040 --> 00:42:33,720
three. 
This one right here is called 

790
00:42:33,720 --> 00:42:37,160
Built With, and it's a little 
bit of a funky one. 

791
00:42:37,280 --> 00:42:39,680
It's not going to apply to 
everything, but what it does is 

792
00:42:39,680 --> 00:42:43,640
it tells you what technology a 
website is built with, what 

793
00:42:43,640 --> 00:42:46,960
libraries are loaded, which 
hosting providers they're using 

794
00:42:47,120 --> 00:42:51,680
and things like that, which on 
its own can be useful for 

795
00:42:51,720 --> 00:42:53,440
finding things. 
I don't have the advanced 

796
00:42:53,440 --> 00:42:57,440
features, but what's most useful
on this website to me and is one

797
00:42:57,440 --> 00:43:00,640
of their free features is their 
relationship tab here. 

798
00:43:01,000 --> 00:43:04,480
And So what this is showing us 
is the different like analytics 

799
00:43:04,480 --> 00:43:08,120
IDs, so Google Universal 
Analytics and Google's newer 

800
00:43:08,120 --> 00:43:12,760
analytics, What tags have been 
associated with this website and

801
00:43:12,760 --> 00:43:15,720
what other websites have those 
been associated with? 

802
00:43:15,920 --> 00:43:19,240
And so like you can see other 
websites that have overlapped 

803
00:43:19,240 --> 00:43:21,800
with this man, there are some 
nonsense on here. 

804
00:43:21,800 --> 00:43:23,800
What is going on? 
I thought the. 

805
00:43:23,800 --> 00:43:26,600
Scammers. 
Well, scammers are are probably.

806
00:43:26,720 --> 00:43:29,560
Yeah, yeah, I guess so. 
I guess what's happening here. 

807
00:43:29,800 --> 00:43:32,080
Yeah. 
So I think what's happening here

808
00:43:32,800 --> 00:43:36,960
must be that some of these scam 
websites are like copying and 

809
00:43:36,960 --> 00:43:41,000
pasting the whole source code of
the Tether website, including 

810
00:43:41,000 --> 00:43:44,040
the, like, analytics IDs. 
And so when they stand up their 

811
00:43:44,040 --> 00:43:47,640
website, it's being tracked into
the same analytics IDs because 

812
00:43:47,680 --> 00:43:51,000
most of these are not things you
would expect to be associated 

813
00:43:51,000 --> 00:43:51,840
with Tether. 
Yeah. 

814
00:43:51,840 --> 00:43:55,080
More commonly what you'll see in
this kind of thing is it'll help

815
00:43:55,080 --> 00:43:57,680
you kind of, you'll see like a 
cluster of companies that all 

816
00:43:57,680 --> 00:44:00,000
use the same marketing firm or 
something like that. 

817
00:44:00,160 --> 00:44:03,200
And so again, it's just another 
tool to start piercing through 

818
00:44:03,200 --> 00:44:05,680
relationships. 
In this case, I think most of 

819
00:44:05,680 --> 00:44:09,280
these are scammers who are like 
copy and pasting the source code

820
00:44:09,560 --> 00:44:12,080
and therefore copying and 
pasting the analytics tags. 

821
00:44:12,120 --> 00:44:14,960
Which also tells you something 
about what the what they're 

822
00:44:14,960 --> 00:44:17,280
used. 
Like it tells you that Tether is

823
00:44:17,480 --> 00:44:19,440
a essentially a payment service,
right? 

824
00:44:19,440 --> 00:44:23,440
Like that's why they're getting 
copied and scammed or copied by 

825
00:44:23,440 --> 00:44:27,000
scammers in in in such a way. 
Yeah, and this will also show 

826
00:44:27,000 --> 00:44:30,640
you perhaps more valuable the IP
addresses for the hosting. 

827
00:44:30,920 --> 00:44:34,080
And so sometimes here overlap 
can be more meaningful. 

828
00:44:34,320 --> 00:44:37,400
Early on in Tether's history was
more common for them to use kind

829
00:44:37,400 --> 00:44:40,440
of shared hosting and stuff. 
Now their addresses are 

830
00:44:40,440 --> 00:44:43,760
basically only associated with 
their domains because they're a 

831
00:44:43,760 --> 00:44:46,800
more serious company now. 
Wait, I say that then what is 

832
00:44:46,800 --> 00:44:49,160
this don-m.com? 
Interesting. 

833
00:44:49,400 --> 00:44:53,160
Not the point, but like this can
is another way to help you kind 

834
00:44:53,160 --> 00:44:56,440
of piece out some relationships.
The last two tools I kind of 

835
00:44:56,440 --> 00:44:59,080
want to talk about are the only 
two tools we're talking about 

836
00:44:59,080 --> 00:45:02,880
today that actually touch on the
blockchain, and one of them is 

837
00:45:02,960 --> 00:45:08,360
the blockchain explorer. 
For whatever your blockchain of 

838
00:45:08,360 --> 00:45:11,280
choices, Ether scan is probably 
the best. 

839
00:45:11,480 --> 00:45:13,240
Yeah, there might be. 
Like if you're, if you're a 

840
00:45:13,240 --> 00:45:16,640
Solana user, there's soul scan. 
If you're if you're a Tron user,

841
00:45:17,160 --> 00:45:20,640
there's a Tron scan. 
There's usually if it's a a well

842
00:45:20,640 --> 00:45:25,120
known blockchain, it will have 
its own kind of scanning site. 

843
00:45:25,200 --> 00:45:27,880
Exactly. 
And what that lets you do is 

844
00:45:27,880 --> 00:45:32,240
take an address that you have 
that you found somewhere, and 

845
00:45:32,240 --> 00:45:35,040
look at who is that address 
transacting with? 

846
00:45:35,120 --> 00:45:37,840
What kind of tokens are they 
transferring in and out? 

847
00:45:37,960 --> 00:45:41,480
What kind of assets have they 
like held over time? 

848
00:45:41,640 --> 00:45:43,640
This is one of Justin's old 
addresses. 

849
00:45:43,640 --> 00:45:46,280
It's mostly abandoned now, 
except to hold a bunch of value.

850
00:45:46,440 --> 00:45:50,120
What kind of tokens do they 
still hold and things like that?

851
00:45:50,560 --> 00:45:54,360
And so this is like before I had
the more advanced tool I'm about

852
00:45:54,360 --> 00:45:58,880
to show, I did like entire long 
blockchain tracing things, just 

853
00:45:58,880 --> 00:46:02,160
carefully following transactions
through blockchain explorers. 

854
00:46:02,400 --> 00:46:06,040
This one funded, this one, this 
one Co spent with this one, 

855
00:46:06,040 --> 00:46:08,040
etcetera. 
And like gradually building that

856
00:46:08,040 --> 00:46:09,680
up. 
And you can do that just with 

857
00:46:09,680 --> 00:46:12,800
the blockchain explorers. 
And really dating us here. 

858
00:46:13,200 --> 00:46:17,000
I think you and I both started 
utilizing blockchain explorers 

859
00:46:17,240 --> 00:46:22,520
with Omni more so than Ethereum.
So we were, we were because Omni

860
00:46:22,520 --> 00:46:25,960
was the main chain of choice for
Tether. 

861
00:46:26,160 --> 00:46:30,600
We were utilizing Omni Omni scan
which I don't even I'm not sure.

862
00:46:30,600 --> 00:46:33,320
Omni Explorer it. 
Does and it was quite useful for

863
00:46:33,320 --> 00:46:35,080
us back then. 
It was great actually. 

864
00:46:35,080 --> 00:46:38,960
It was really, really, really 
useful and getting, getting 

865
00:46:39,080 --> 00:46:42,720
proficient in utilizing these 
these things, while it's not as 

866
00:46:42,720 --> 00:46:46,160
good as some of the tools that 
you can use, as Bennett is about

867
00:46:46,160 --> 00:46:50,160
to show, it is pretty like if 
you're, if you're proficient, it

868
00:46:50,160 --> 00:46:52,360
can be really, really useful for
you. 

869
00:46:52,440 --> 00:46:55,640
Yeah, yeah. 
And then if you are doing more 

870
00:46:55,640 --> 00:46:59,040
advanced blockchain analytics, 
I've had really good luck with 

871
00:46:59,040 --> 00:47:01,920
bread crumbs. 
They have some inexpensive 

872
00:47:01,920 --> 00:47:05,280
tiers, relatively inexpensive, I
think like five to 10 bucks a 

873
00:47:05,280 --> 00:47:08,440
month that give you access to 
like Bitcoin and Etherium. 

874
00:47:08,600 --> 00:47:11,720
And then they have ones that 
scale and price beyond that up 

875
00:47:11,720 --> 00:47:14,080
to those targeted at 
organizations. 

876
00:47:14,480 --> 00:47:18,120
But like you can take an address
you have like that, plug it in 

877
00:47:18,120 --> 00:47:22,320
here and start to see what other
addresses are we sending to? 

878
00:47:22,640 --> 00:47:24,840
What other addresses are we 
receiving from? 

879
00:47:25,120 --> 00:47:29,840
How are those interconnected? 
What do the transactions coming 

880
00:47:30,000 --> 00:47:32,840
into and out of this look like 
and things like that. 

881
00:47:32,960 --> 00:47:37,240
All which help you kind of gain 
a better understanding of where 

882
00:47:37,240 --> 00:47:42,080
this address sits and how it 
matters or if it matters. 

883
00:47:42,880 --> 00:47:46,240
Again, this is a little bit more
of another one of those advanced

884
00:47:46,240 --> 00:47:48,800
tools. 
I think blockchain analytics is 

885
00:47:48,800 --> 00:47:52,240
not something even a lot of 
people who want to investigate 

886
00:47:52,240 --> 00:47:55,760
crypto really need to 
necessarily use a tool like this

887
00:47:55,760 --> 00:47:58,200
for. 
You can get really far just 

888
00:47:58,200 --> 00:48:01,400
using like regular blockchain 
explorers and things like that. 

889
00:48:01,880 --> 00:48:05,680
If you picture yourself someday 
being the next Zac XPT, then 

890
00:48:05,680 --> 00:48:08,160
yeah, start cutting your teeth 
on bread crumbs. 

891
00:48:08,160 --> 00:48:11,360
Get a little comfortable and 
spend some time making sure you 

892
00:48:11,400 --> 00:48:14,840
understand how it works so you 
don't end up making a bunch of 

893
00:48:14,840 --> 00:48:18,560
crazy claims online like 
metallic Buterin funded the 

894
00:48:18,560 --> 00:48:22,040
Chinese mafia or whatever 
different people try to claim 

895
00:48:22,040 --> 00:48:24,200
sometimes because they don't 
know how to read these things. 

896
00:48:24,600 --> 00:48:26,920
Spend some time, look at the 
transaction. 

897
00:48:27,120 --> 00:48:30,600
Remember, anyone can send 
anyone, so receiving from 

898
00:48:30,600 --> 00:48:34,160
someone doesn't necessarily 
incriminate someone. 

899
00:48:34,480 --> 00:48:38,040
Spend some time, look at it, 
think it through, but can be a 

900
00:48:38,080 --> 00:48:41,080
really useful tool, especially 
as you get into more kind of 

901
00:48:41,160 --> 00:48:44,080
advanced blockchain analytics. 
Yeah, I would. 

902
00:48:44,160 --> 00:48:47,200
I would say always for everyone,
no matter what tool it is. 

903
00:48:47,200 --> 00:48:50,960
We mentioned whether it's the 
New York Times or bread crumbs 

904
00:48:50,960 --> 00:48:54,720
or whatever, if you can utilize 
it for free, utilize it for free

905
00:48:54,720 --> 00:48:57,320
to the fullest extent that you 
possibly can. 

906
00:48:57,480 --> 00:49:01,760
And if you feel like you've 
either accumulated enough value 

907
00:49:01,760 --> 00:49:08,440
from it or or need to utilize 
kind of more complex tools that 

908
00:49:08,440 --> 00:49:12,560
they offer to find out more than
I would, I would recommend, you 

909
00:49:12,560 --> 00:49:15,400
know, just just ride it until 
you can and and when you're 

910
00:49:15,400 --> 00:49:18,680
ready to pay for it, pay for it.
But all of these tools hopefully

911
00:49:18,760 --> 00:49:21,160
prove to be be quite useful for 
everyone. 

912
00:49:21,800 --> 00:49:25,720
And like I assume most people 
are quite familiar with most of 

913
00:49:25,720 --> 00:49:28,480
these already. 
But if you're not, hopefully we 

914
00:49:28,480 --> 00:49:32,880
introduced you to introduced you
to a tool that you'll be able to

915
00:49:32,880 --> 00:49:34,800
utilize in the future at some 
point. 

916
00:49:34,960 --> 00:49:37,920
And these things can be really 
intimidating. 

917
00:49:37,920 --> 00:49:41,400
But I do want to add that like 
Cass and I are almost entirely 

918
00:49:41,400 --> 00:49:44,080
self-taught in this regard. 
There were some people on 

919
00:49:44,080 --> 00:49:47,120
Twitter who helped us out or 
introduced us to some of these 

920
00:49:47,120 --> 00:49:49,920
tools early on. 
But in terms of like their daily

921
00:49:49,920 --> 00:49:53,520
use, it was mostly just like 
trial and error working through 

922
00:49:53,520 --> 00:49:57,480
it, trying to understand it step
by step and going back over it 

923
00:49:57,480 --> 00:50:01,080
and back over it. 
And I think that lots of people 

924
00:50:01,200 --> 00:50:03,640
can benefit from trying out this
kind of thing. 

925
00:50:03,840 --> 00:50:07,960
And I think practicing this kind
of thing makes like the useful 

926
00:50:07,960 --> 00:50:12,160
skepticism we talked about way 
back in episode 100 way easier 

927
00:50:12,160 --> 00:50:15,720
and way more like natural. 
When you have some familiarity 

928
00:50:15,720 --> 00:50:18,840
with how to vet certain types of
claims or how to look into 

929
00:50:18,840 --> 00:50:22,320
certain things, it is way more 
easy to be an effective skeptic 

930
00:50:22,320 --> 00:50:23,760
at that point. 
Yeah, exactly. 

931
00:50:23,760 --> 00:50:27,760
Like instead of it, I think it's
really daunting to actually be 

932
00:50:27,760 --> 00:50:31,400
skeptical in general. 
I think you and I feel far less 

933
00:50:31,640 --> 00:50:34,480
like there is no daunting. 
We don't feel daunting at all 

934
00:50:34,480 --> 00:50:37,640
when we're sceptical because we 
can utilize any of these tools 

935
00:50:37,640 --> 00:50:41,080
to instantly be like, is my 
scepticism founded or am I 

936
00:50:41,080 --> 00:50:44,120
crazy? 
And if you start, you've been 

937
00:50:44,240 --> 00:50:46,560
crazy. 
I mean, you, you, we're crazy 

938
00:50:46,560 --> 00:50:48,960
for sure. 
But it we can, we can at least 

939
00:50:48,960 --> 00:50:52,640
stop ourselves from from 
announcing it publicly by 

940
00:50:52,640 --> 00:50:56,960
utilizing some of these tools. 
And I will add that this will 

941
00:50:56,960 --> 00:51:00,360
not always be possible. 
It is helpful to have a partner 

942
00:51:00,360 --> 00:51:04,400
in crime where you can text them
or message them and go hey am I 

943
00:51:04,400 --> 00:51:07,320
crazy or is this what I think it
is? 

944
00:51:07,640 --> 00:51:11,200
And having someone or a couple 
of someones who are on the same 

945
00:51:11,200 --> 00:51:13,440
journey as you who are willing 
to go. 

946
00:51:13,440 --> 00:51:15,680
I think you've misread that 
completely. 

947
00:51:15,880 --> 00:51:18,600
Can help you avoid some 
embarrassing missteps. 

948
00:51:18,880 --> 00:51:23,640
Yeah, and and you know, this is 
another thing I think X has like

949
00:51:23,640 --> 00:51:26,640
if you're just starting on, on 
Twitter X or whatever you want 

950
00:51:26,640 --> 00:51:28,680
to call it, it's far less useful
than it used to be. 

951
00:51:28,680 --> 00:51:33,480
But Bennett and I were able to 
grow followings to the point 

952
00:51:33,480 --> 00:51:37,200
where we can at this point, 
again, I think this is we, we've

953
00:51:37,200 --> 00:51:41,320
benefited from timing on this, 
but we can reach out to people 

954
00:51:41,320 --> 00:51:44,640
or publicly say, I don't 
understand this thing. 

955
00:51:44,640 --> 00:51:47,920
I would love if someone who does
understand it could talk to me 

956
00:51:47,920 --> 00:51:50,160
about it. 
And we actually get a response. 

957
00:51:50,160 --> 00:51:52,840
Now, not saying everyone is 
going to get that, especially if

958
00:51:52,840 --> 00:51:55,880
you're new and you have like no 
followers on X or something like

959
00:51:56,040 --> 00:51:58,720
probably no one's going to see 
your, your call to help. 

960
00:51:58,960 --> 00:52:00,720
We have been able to utilize 
that a lot. 

961
00:52:00,720 --> 00:52:04,000
And I will say that experts are 
often quite responsive. 

962
00:52:04,000 --> 00:52:07,640
And it's, it is worth it's it's 
worth at least shooting them a 

963
00:52:07,640 --> 00:52:11,080
cold e-mail or whatever, even if
they I don't respond and don't 

964
00:52:11,080 --> 00:52:12,600
get upset with someone if they 
don't respond. 

965
00:52:12,600 --> 00:52:14,200
People are busy. 
Like don't be an asshole. 

966
00:52:14,280 --> 00:52:17,120
I think it's worth reaching out 
to these people just to at least

967
00:52:17,120 --> 00:52:19,680
be like, hey, I don't know this,
could you help me? 

968
00:52:19,840 --> 00:52:22,880
And oftentimes you'll find out 
that they'll be like, sure, I'd 

969
00:52:22,880 --> 00:52:25,600
love to help. 
So, yeah, I mean, this is the 

970
00:52:25,600 --> 00:52:27,600
best summary Bennett and I can 
give. 

971
00:52:27,600 --> 00:52:32,120
I know that we've had Zac XBT on
before to discuss like other 

972
00:52:32,120 --> 00:52:36,040
cryptocurrency tools and and how
to be careful in general when 

973
00:52:36,040 --> 00:52:37,920
investing or putting money into 
crypto. 

974
00:52:38,440 --> 00:52:41,320
So feel free to listen to that 
episode if you're so inclined. 

975
00:52:41,640 --> 00:52:44,720
Otherwise, please don't look up 
Cascoin on any of these tools 

976
00:52:44,720 --> 00:52:45,760
that we've talked to you about.
