Hey there, this is from Constant and you're listening to Bitcoin
for Millennials. Together with my guests on this
podcast, I go on a journey to discover how our current
financial system works, why it's flawed and why Bitcoin is much
relevant technology that you should understand and adopt.
In this episode I'm joined by Julian Linegar.
He's the CEO and Co founder of the Swiss Bitcoin only platform
Relay. After bachelor's in psychology
and a Master's in Business Administration.
He worked in banking and management consulting and after
that he Co founded several companies including
Switzerland's leading blockchain training course for the
financial industry. As Relay is one of the biggest
European on RAMPS Bitcoin, I'm excited to talk with him today
and talk about the future of Bitcoin in Europe and beyond.
So welcome, Julian. Wow.
Let's go Brown. Thank you very much for this
invitation. Really looking forward to to
having this conversation. Yeah, awesome to talk to a
fellow European bitcoiner. I mean there are a lot, but I
haven't talked to that many on the on the podcast yet.
And of course you're based in Switzerland which has a certain
also you know, history in the financial world.
So I was super interested to to explore that too.
But first question, I saw you were born in 93.
So 9292, There's a lot of misinformation lately there
there was an article in a Swiss newspaper that said I'm 29, I'm
actually 31 and I was born in 1992.
OK, so 92 but still a late millennial then, right?
How? How do you experience explaining
Bitcoin to like our generational fears?
I do definitely identify as a millennial.
I mean many people also tell me you look very young.
I know I look very young because I'm into Bitcoin for almost 10
years. This keeps me young and I also
feel like I'm 20. You know, I think my lifestyle
is not really the the one from a beginning 30 year olds.
It's more like a 20 year old and it's fun, definitely.
I am a millennial, I feel like a millennial and I love this
generation. I think it's the most important
generation. It is the generation that is
already the the biggest consumer that we are the biggest
consumers in the world. And in the next 10 years, we
will be the biggest investors in the world because we will
inherit a lot of money. We will make a lot of money, We
will control a lot of money through being in executive
positions at financial institutions etcetera.
And that's why I think it is so important to explain our
generation, the millennials, what money is and what Bitcoin
is, what good investments are etcetera.
And I think it's not done efficiently through like the
education system or whatever, you know, public information
people get. It's I think really important to
to create this mindset and to continuously educate yourself
about finances and including Bitcoin, obviously.
And so how I explain Bitcoin to this generation is really, this
is our number one chance to fix the financial system.
This is one of the most exciting investments of our century and
it has really the potential to profoundly change how the world
and our society and our economic and financial system works.
So it's a huge opportunity that we should not miss as a
generation. Yeah.
And so how do you experience it when you when you talk about
that like I, I, I have the same as in you know we never got
taught this in school, you know what is money and you know or or
about personal finance and finance as a whole actually.
So like my experience is that once you say this, what you just
said, then the question will pop up like what is wrong with our
current system, you know, because especially in the
Western world, you know it just works well in your country it
works even better, you know. So how, how do you view that?
Like how do we, how do we get people to see or what are your
angles to talk about when you talk about like what what is
wrong? I mean the first reaction
usually is you are totally nuts. Like what is wrong with you?
And that's fine. We're still so early, you know
and we as as bitcoiners, we sometimes also should be a bit
reflective of this and like you know not take us too seriously
because we are super early and whenever you're super early to
something, you're also viewed as a as a bit of a freak, as a bit
of an outsider and and that's fine.
So I just enjoy these conversations, even though they
don't really many of my friends, they don't really take me
seriously still, even after having the success with Relay
etcetera. And they do get into Bitcoin
slowly but steadily, but they still look at it as like a
speculation and oh, now it's too late to get in and when it goes
down like oh maybe should I buy now, but then I need to get rid
of it quickly. It's really it's a speculation
for them. It's fun to read about it and
most of them don't really take the necessary hours to really
understand how profound it is. And I just, I just keep on
talking about it and then I think they are making their
steps towards really understanding it.
And at one point they will adopt it.
But at this point even in Switzerland, which is which is
pretty progressive in that regard, we are at 15 to maybe
20% of the people that have actually accessed Bitcoin
already or have invested in Bitcoin or at one point owned
Bitcoin or still owned Bitcoin. It's quite high.
I think in Germany and most other European countries like
10%. In the world it's more like 5-6
percent. So the the option rate is really
low still on a on a grand scale. But yeah, and then especially
here in in Switzerland, as you said, people like, oh, I mean
money just works. Why do we need another money?
We already have digital money. We already have credit cards.
I can buy stuff online with twins, for example.
Twins in Switzerland is basically like the the Cash app
or the Venmo in in the US So a very cool payment app.
Works great. Nice pentech, you know.
So they're like yeah, what? What's wrong?
And and it is important to to tell them and help them
understand and make very quick and easy to process pieces of
information. What is wrong?
Because it's true. Like there needs to be a
problem. I mean we're we're
entrepreneurs, right? There needs to be a problem in
order for a solution to make sense.
If there's no problem, then let's not try to, you know, find
a solution for a problem that doesn't exist.
Let's focus our time on on something else.
But I do think there are, you know, basic things, basic
problems in the financial system, how it works now in Fiat
money that I think our generation should not just, you
know, accept. They should at least look for
alternatives and in the end just check both and adopt and use
whatever they like more. I, for my part, definitely like
Bitcoin more than our current financial system.
So what is wrong with current Fiat money?
I think it's just too centrally controlled.
So you cannot do anything with money basically, at least not
online, without having to fully trust the central banks that are
just, you know, printing, expanding money as they as they
wish and banks that hold your money and help you transfer your
money. You cannot transfer money
digitally at all without asking your bank's permission, right.
So it's not, it's not decentralized, it's not
permissionless and that's what I really like for example about
Bitcoin. It gives you this freedom of
controlling your money yourself in a self custodial way and
sending it in a decentralized, censorship resistant,
peer-to-peer way very efficiently globally for low
cost and quick and and and and and fast in in low time
basically, which which I really like.
So I I like this kind of aspect of it and what I like most as
well as it does is independent from politics and from central
banks that can just print it away.
So the value is stable and even increasing on the long run
because it really is really similar to gold in all the great
characteristics of of gold that has made gold the dominant store
of value in the last 1000 years. But so it has all the benefits
but it doesn't have to be the downsides of gold, whereas
mainly the the scarcity that it it cannot just be printed or
produced like like Fiat money. So in the long run, this leads
to Bitcoin being volatile maybe in the short run, but going up
in value in the long run. So it makes it a very good store
of value and an asset that keeps your purchasing power in the
long run. Whereas the Fiat is the
opposite, it's in the short run, in short term it's quite stable.
That's why also, for example Swiss people, they like it, but
even in Switzerland and mostly also in other countries, in the
long run the value goes down, which is safe because there is
always inflation. And even if inflation is like in
Switzerland around 1 to 2%, still in 10 years it will be
worth much less. You will not be able if if you
are trying to save for a house now it will take you 10 years to
get the down payment for a house now.
Well this money that you will have saved for the next 10 years
it will not be able to buy you the same house and then so and
even worse in other countries like for example Turkey of
course there it takes a year to to basically cut your cut your
purchase and power in half when it comes to Fiat mine.
But these are the these are the main points I I tried to bring
up where people in in like especially in our generation as
well in like their daily business and like every day they
they focus on other stuff. Right.
You don't really see it because they say yeah look it works.
I can hold my money I can transfer my money the value is
roughly the same from one day to another.
So it's fine what's the problem. But then when you zoom out a bit
and you look at things in a 10/20/30 year time frame, then
they start understanding the problem and that's where they
are becoming more and more open to to alternatives like Bitcoin.
Yeah. Hey there.
Thanks so much for listening to this episode.
I just really want to ask you for a quick favor.
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I want to thank everyone who's been viewing and listening to
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So I really want to ask you to please hit the subscribe button
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are enjoying this podcast. Thanks again for joining me on
this journey. Now back to the conversation.
Yeah, what I also really like is that the information is so
readily available, right? I I don't think we need like
more. There's not necessarily a need
for like more content that explains how Bitcoin, you know
functionally works. But it's more about you know,
because anyone can study that anyone can can find that on the
Internet, right. It's more about finding you know
what are the threads that you can give to people that they can
pull on to start you know researching this for themselves.
You know when I when we talk about the problem or like what
is how is the money system that you are participating in, how is
that actually constructed. And so I also think that you
know especially our our generation, I mean this podcast
this is focused on the on that you know we are going to be the
first generation who's going to move more into power and own
more of the wealth right. And there will be a
displacement. I think of wealth.
Like there will be a certain group will stick with the old
system and a certain group will move to that new system.
But I also really enthusiastic about Gen.
Z in some way. You know, like I think a lot of
people shit on Gen. Z, but I don't think it's it's
fair because they understand like all these main
characteristics of Bitcoin. Like they they understand the
entire digital aspect, the portability aspect, the fact
that the that it doesn't really make sense that you know or well
they they are they say like they are not they are familiar with
like digital assets like owning stuff in games and and etcetera,
right. But they also have access to all
this information that for you know growing up that for example
the Boomers or Gen. X obviously did not have right.
And so they have a chance, I think to early in their life
learn more about the financial system and what is money, but
also even more than us, right? Even though we grew up with the
Internet, like they just have more information.
So I do have like faith in the fact that they will, they
understand that everything that's known is free on the
Internet already and they don't have to trust, you know,
whatever someone says to them, like they can already search for
the right information. So I'm also optimistic to see
that generation follow us. Definitely.
And I mean these are the the the we had digital natives, like our
parents were not digital natives, but they still they
when they were maybe 20 or 30, they got in touch with the
Internet, right. And they adapted of course, but
also not everyone like fully adapted, like there are still 50
year olds, 60 year olds now that don't really want to do stuff
over E banking that are not really into social media
etcetera. You know, not all of them have
adapted. And then, but the next
generation, our generation now we're fully digital native.
We grew up with it. For us, it's clear like there's
not even a question whether or not the Internet is a good thing
or whether it's going to come or not or it's going to go away.
No, the Internet is like part of our infrastructure, global
infrastructure. It's just clear and same
probably happens now with our generation.
Some of US are embracing Bitcoin and AI and like all these big
trends. Some say, you know, it's just a
fad, it's going to go away and there's this this kind of fight,
whereas the next generation Gen. X or even the the Chen, what is
it next? Gen.
Z, Yeah. Then after Gen.
ZI. Don't even know.
What they call it. Gen. next I think it's not
really this is just the next generation.
They will grow up with it. They there will be no question.
Like Bitcoin is just when he's here.
It's part of the global infrastructure.
Like of course I, of course if I have some spare money I will put
it in a Bitcoin. It's not going to be it's not
going to be a question. So that's also what makes me
feel very excited about the future is that there's no way
the coin can go away anymore now that it has passed this point
where you know it's, it will be accepted by future generations
because it's, it is here, BlackRock is into it, big
companies are into it, countries are into it.
So many people are into it, experts like thought leaders are
into it. And it's just because they are
digital native of course and they are aware of digital assets
etcetera. And because it's it's so big and
the network effect is so high, it's just clear it's not going
to go away. Maybe these current generations
are still, you know they still struggling struggling with it
especially the the the older people like CEOs from JP Morgan
and Vanguard etcetera, they're sometimes they're still
struggling with it. But the the CEOs of these
company in 1020, thirty years from now, of course they will
not struggle with it. Of course they will embrace it.
Yeah, I agree. I also say this a lot to to
people like, you know what your signal should be.
If like, you know, veterans of Wall Street with 30 to 40 years
of experience, like do a 180 and go all into Bitcoin, like that
should be your signal. Do you know how hard it is to,
you know, recognize that you got wealthy of a broken money system
and then you found the solution to that?
And then you actually, you know, overcame the ego challenge and
and went into that direction like that.
That is for me the purest signal, right.
So and and there's not a lot, but I think the ones that do get
it and talk about it, that I think their voice is really
powerful. So you know, like people like
Lawrence LaPorte or Bob Burnett or can't come up with his name
like like these these classic like Druckenmiller, Paul Truder
Jones, like all these Wall Street legends that just say,
you know, this is the the most, the best thing I've ever seen
basically. You know, then I think like I am
45, like that is that is like his entire career of experience.
And so, you know, you do see those people also in the boomer
generation. But it's interesting to see like
how it permeates, you know, between digital natives and and
the boomers. So yeah, we'll, we'll see where
it goes. But I think it's fun to also
talk about, you know, again, like I think anyone can find
information about how it works. But like for this podcast, what
I love also to talk about like how how did you discover
Bitcoin? But also how did you come to
understand money? So who or what has been like
most influential in shaping your views about like money, risk,
wealth? Like, how did you learn about
this? Well, I didn't grow up in a
family that cared too much about money at all.
So and also the school system, the education system here in
Switzerland, even though Switzerland is this financial
hub etcetera and known around the world for this.
And there are a lot of banks and private banks and there's a lot
of gold and it's a bit one of the best currencies etcetera.
Despite all that, like I have learned zero about finances
until I'm I was like 20, like 0. My mom was always still a
pharmacist. My dad was or is a language
teacher and and artist. So money was always there was
enough money. There was never a lot of money,
but it was never a topic. It's never a topic to educate
your kids about money. It's just still still now it's
not a topic. So then when I only when I
started studying and I chose psychology because I you know,
like people and I at that time thought I want to work with
people and one good Ave. would be to study psychology, I had to
choose a minor. So 2/3 of my studies the major
was psychology, but I had to choose a minor.
I was like, OK, maybe something good would be business.
It seems quite easy. To learn and kind of everyone is
doing it and it seems to be applicable to the to the world.
If you are are looking for a job it makes makes your life easier.
So I was like, Nah, sure, why not let's let's try business
administration. And I started liking it and
there that was when I started to learn about finances and the
corporate finance courses in the in the accounting courses and
then obviously in the economic courses they were cool but but
also it doesn't really teach you about personal finance at all
that that really just came out of my interest then that I was
reading more about investing in stocks and bonds and how to how
to make more money, how to calculate return on investments,
etc. And the risk reward that is
always, you know an important thing to consider and what what
different assets classes are there.
OK, invest in stocks and bonds and different currencies and
precious metals like gold and real estate and etcetera and
then you make portfolio. And so I I just learned a lot
about this in personal research and YouTube videos and reading
books and articles and talking to friends who are who are more
into it etcetera. And that's then also how I
actually got into bitcoins there.
There was one guy that didn't stand it with me, but he was we
we grew up together, We're very good friends, and he was more
into tech usually. I was more into like business
and finance and stuff like that. And so it was interesting that
he actually came to me with Bitcoin.
But from a tech perspective, he thought that Bitcoin is just the
coolest thing ever in terms of tech.
That was 2015 and he told me about it.
I saw it. I didn't understand the tech,
like at all, nothing of it. But I thought it was super
interesting from another perspective, the financial
perspective and like, OK, this is something that looks like an
asset, right? The price goes up and down 24/7
in, in seconds. So it looks like a stock, but
it's not a stock. If there's no company, there's
no dividends, there's no cash flow, It's not a stock, it's not
a company. But so then it looks like a
currency, but there's no nation behind it or any like group
issuing group of the currencies that candles and it's not
accepted for payments. So now it's also another
currency and it looks like gold, something like digital gold,
like a digital commodity. And then that's why that's what
I, when I realized OK, it's probably closest to to a digital
commodity and basically the the framework that Michael Saylor is
also offering to to think about it, it's a digital property,
digital commodity. But in the end it's all of this
together somehow and it's I still really haven't figured out
what exactly it is. It's just it just seems like the
best way to store wealth and money for the future.
And I just think the the value is always going to go up and up
and up and purchasing power will only increase because of all the
characteristics. And I think it's in the end
something that we haven't seen before.
It's a mix of all these things just mentioned, much more
probably it's just the network to you, a protocol to use for
storing and transferring value in time and space.
Just fascinating. And that that's when I was
really hooked and learned more and more about it and got into
into it, first as a hobby, then as then more professionally.
And now I think I would probably spend my whole life in in this
industry. It's so fascinating.
So do you like, as you said, like you didn't understand it
technically? I think no.
Nobody understands Bitcoin at the first impression or the 2nd
or the 3rd or the 4th, right? Like it's, it's, it's it's so
eventually you realize it's so big and that is why it takes so
much time to understand. But do you know, can you
remember like what what kind of, like personal belief or no
arguments you had that made you, like not not get it?
You know, like like what I said before, I think it's
interesting. Like a lot of people dismiss it
in the beginning or they're like, no, this can't be dead.
What people say it is, you know, like do you, do you remember
that? But then also what what like
really made you like get it. I think I really got it after
being like five years into this or something where I actually
realized, OK, if if we have an exchange of value, right, we
shake hands on you doing something for me and I give you,
you give me value, I give you value in return.
That basically represents energy, right?
You expend energy, physical or or mentally, and I have money
which is captured energy that represents that.
That is our exchange. And once I realized that we are
storing our energy in to future time and space in a system
that's stealing that energy at least at 2% a year and in effect
way more. If I can move that block of
energy that I gathered into a system that protects that block
of energy, then I was like, yeah, I of course I should do, I
should, I should do that, right. It's it's being stolen from
versus protecting yourself. And then I was like, OK, then I
got into a rush. Basically I was like, OK, I need
to, I need to move like do you have any any of that that you
can recall? Yeah, I think first why I
dismissed it or why I just couldn't believe it's going to
work on the long run. I'm from the beginning, I was, I
was hooked, I was fascinated and I thought it was a great, at
least experiment or a great innovation, a great idea.
I just had trouble the first probably two or three years to
really believe that it's going to work on the long run because
there is nothing behind it. And there's this is still a
criticism like that a lot of boomers come up with because
like a lot of skeptics come up with, it's like there's nothing
behind it. We we're always taught that
there must be something behind something in order to work.
So for example even with gold they say Oh yeah, but it's used
in the industry and it's used for luxury goods etcetera and
jewelry whatever. Which is bullshit because it's
only this only represents like 20% of the gold's market cap and
80% is the monetary thing where also nothing else but gold which
cannot eat is behind it. But anyway that that's the the
criticism or like behind Fiat money there is there is the
nation, this whole government and the whole economic power of
this this nation, right? There's not there's something
something behind it, something to touch, something concrete.
And this this is what we are taught right, the 1st 20 years
of our lives. And so when I saw this, this
would be super cool if it would work, but it only is based on a
belief system that a community of people believe that it has
value. And maybe because then also in
2015 this community was still globally very small.
And so I thought, yeah, probably just the hype and it will go
away because all of these people will move on to something else
that will stop believing in it. And then it will have almost,
almost 0 value or only a value for a very small community of
believers that, you know, still go with it, but most of them
will just move on to the next cool thing.
And then you know, it's not going to become a global thing.
That was my biggest worry. But then after two or three
years and especially after the big bull market in 2017 and this
whole ICO craze, etcetera and the the big block war and all
this, all this drama, all this chaos and Bitcoin was still
there. And it was not only still there,
it it was much stronger and the community was was only growing
and new thought leaders, new experts, new companies came in
and more and more people came and stayed on the long run.
More and more content was produced about it, books are
written about it, movies were released about it, etcetera.
Less and less. I thought it was a worry that
this thing is just going away, No one believes in it anymore
because also the fundamentals like it's just it's not only a
belief system, it's a good people believe in it for a good
reason, because it is just the best money and store of value
asset that human beings have ever invented.
If you look at how money needs to look like in order to work,
sound money and the sound store of value, then it has to be, you
know, the scarcity is important, portability is important,
divisibility is important. They're like these seven, these
seven traits that it needs to have.
And Bitcoin just excels against any other commodity or any other
asset by far. It's better than Fiat money in
these regards, better than gold and other precious metal in this
regard. It's better than anything in
this regard. Isn't this?
Also, isn't this also the thing that I really want to emphasize
more? Like I think the invitation to
people listening or watching or, you know, whatever content they
consume about Bitcoin, the invitation should be about you
should study it. The whole point is that we
don't, we don't have faith or what did you say?
Like, yeah, we don't have faith or we don't believe in this
because someone else says, says it's going to be something.
No, we believe in it because we can actually verify it.
We can verify that how it's proposed to work, that it
actually works like that. That is the entire point, right?
The entire point is that you do not have to believe what someone
else says. Please don't believe us.
But then also go out there and try to verify for yourself that
the money is broken, that Bitcoin works in a certain way.
How that is a complete 180 as opposed to the money system that
you currently participate in, right?
Like you, you have to do the action.
The action is not by Bitcoin. The action is study Bitcoin and
and try to disprove us. Because I would love to be
disproven in my understanding and belief in what this could
be, right. And so when people yesterday, I
had some fun interactions again. When people say, oh, it's a cult
or it's a religion or whatever, and I say, well, I actually
believe in something that I can verify, try that for any belief
you have currently, it's because someone else said so And you
just adopted that thought because you know, whatever
reason, there's nothing you can factually verify, right,
cryptographically even verify, like this is the only thing.
And so it's a super rational. It's, it's it's so rational that
lots of people just cannot wrap their heads around it, right.
Because also to to your point, like your first thought about,
oh, it, it cannot be this what is behind this, like all these
questions, you know, you're doubting and all these things.
And this is also I think a symptom like that nihilistic
approach instead of optimistic approach, right.
That that is a symptom of of the fee of money.
Yeah. You know this cannot be true.
It it's it's so profound. It cannot be true.
It's so simple. It cannot be true.
You know why would it be true? I'm usually always abused, you
know subconsciously in the system that I participate like
and you know and and so I love that you said that because
that's what I see a lot and I had the same, right.
I mean this is what is been created and and I think it's
really freeing once you're aware of it, that all the other people
that you are supposed to listen to are just other people.
They are not smarter than you. They are like it's just other
people trying to figure out their life as well, right.
And so when someone says something, it is up to you
whether you listen to it or follow it or not, right?
It's not, it's always your choice, but also always your
fault if you do right. And I think what is so
contradictory in Bitcoin is that you can actually consciously
decide do I adopt this or not. And you can find all the
information you need to also make that conscious decision.
And with everything else in the world, especially fueled by Fiat
money system that is just obscured, it's vague.
It's very hard to really make an objective decision.
And that's also why it's so hard to understand that that could
actually be possible, I think. Yeah, and for for for decades
now, even centuries, you just had to trust.
You just had to trust these leaders, right?
When it comes to money or these institutions may be better, the
institutions, these leaders, these small committees like the
central bank and the bank where you hold your money, you have to
always trust them. And so it's clear that we it.
This is a very hard switch to do from thinking, OK, money.
What makes money valuable is the trust that we put into the into
the institution that that manages it to know that trust
comes from the verifiable, you know, foundations, principles of
the protocol, that it works as post, that it is well designed
and it has these mathematical and cryptographical and game
theoretical, you know principles that just work together.
But this is, this is very hard to trust something invisible,
untouchable, and it's much easier to trust a group of
people, and especially because we were wired like this for
generations and generations and generations, even though these
people also sooner or later always are being corrupted.
So they're not trustable at all. For example, we always would
trust, if we have, you know, Fiat money, that this is backed
by gold. Well, not anymore since the 70s.
And we just still now trust that they don't print too much, which
they do, they hyper inflate a lot of currencies.
But we there there was no other alternative.
We just had to trust these people.
We just had to hope in the the the, the, the good character of
these people or the good faith of these people.
For us there was no choice. Now there is a choice, but it's
very hard to, to rewire our brains, right?
And this will maybe take generations.
And it's only a few people who are very open I think to to
innovations and to to new paradigms and that are
questioning a lot that are questioning things like religion
or or or governments or institutions or things like Fiat
money or or nation states or whatever.
Like these very basic things that we grew up with.
There are there is a small handful of people who are
questioning these things, and I think these are the same people
that are now starting to adopt Bitcoin.
For the rest, it might take decades or even generations to
catch up. Yeah, and of course it's also
really hard. Because once you realize this,
you also realize, oh wow, I really have to take care of
myself. You know, like you take on.
Once you realize that you like outsourced responsibility over
your life, then once you take that responsibility it is a lot.
And and I think that is one also one of the biggest things people
need to integrate and it takes a long time and it's not something
that is fun to do right. Like it's easier to just stay
where you are and that's I don't, I don't think a lot of
people like the comparison to like Matrix movie.
But it is that like once you know and you have the choice
then life becomes pretty hard actually in the choice stage
right. And but still I I believe like
you know if you take the blue pill like in the Matrix and you
stay in the Matrix you want to still eat the steak right from
the movie. Like I still want to eat steak.
I eventually that will hit you. I I because you know that
there's an alternative choice right.
You can be subconsciously just active in the blue pill type
world, but then nothing bothers you.
But once you know that there's another thing that you can
actually choose, then it will bother you If you ignore that
eventually, I think. And then maybe that's also why
sometimes people are such harsh critics, right?
Like, sometimes I get replies on Twitter or I think like, wow,
like, really? Did this?
Did my fault trigger you? Wow.
OK that's that's fascinating. Right?
Like, I don't know. Like that I I think that's it.
I think that's it's you know that that that is just hard and
and that's also why we have to you know I think share also our
own stories because maybe you know even if we now reach like
one person who now starts thinking about that right.
I think that would be awesome already if we could achieve
that. Yeah, definitely.
And I think people will on their own, they will find their path,
some not, so some will always be skeptic and passive about it.
That's fine. But more and more people,
especially also in the coming like younger generations, more
and more of them will do the hard work.
And it is hard work. There's some homework to do.
On 1st you need to understand the problem, then you need to
understand the solution Bitcoin. And then you need to understand
how to really hold it. What what like what?
How does it make sense to buy it?
It's not trading, it's not like it's not even investing, it's
more like saving. So yes, you should do regular
investment like dollar cost averaging.
You should not freak out when the price tips 2030%.
It's just, you know, it's just a short term volatility.
You need to zoom out and look at it on a long term perspective.
How do you hold it? Especially once you have quite
some funds, then don't use a custody solution because there's
a there's a centralization and the counterparty risk.
You need to take it under your control, You manage your private
key and then how to do this, you know, set up a hardware wallet,
et cetera. This is a lot of this
responsibility is a lot. I mean, there's a lot of
homework to do that you don't really need to do today.
If you just go to work and you get some Fiat money in your bank
account, you can spend it with your credit card and it's fine
this is all things. But but as you said before I
think it's worth to do this work and just out of cue curiosity
and just because of the network effect and more and more people
adopting and talking about it to other people and it's more in
the media and it's just the the benefits are are are spread
distributed to more and more people by also influential
people like Larry Fink now etcetera and all these big
newspapers Bloomberg Financial Times, there are always you know
writing about it in regular. Basis it it it will come
naturally that more and more people take the orange pill,
even though it's a bit hard. And then that's how we will end
up with a dominant new financial system.
But it takes time. Again, it will take decades or
even generations for for the majority of people to catch up.
Yeah, yeah. And So what?
What is like the? What is like the the main
misunderstanding about Bitcoin that that you would wish to
debunk if you had the chance? Like, what's the most common
thing you hear that you think you know People should
understand? It's not true.
That's a good point. I think it's still that the
energy consumption is still a very big thing that people use
people who don't understand that because also it it sounds scary
at the beginning like how much energy Bitcoin uses and people
just don't know that most of the energy that it uses is basically
coming from sustainable sources. And the way how Bitcoin mining
works is that they don't take away energy from like others
like not. It's not that because Bitcoin
uses a lot of energy, is that all the people in your country
now pay more for their for their electricity bills.
Because you know, you can be as a minor, you can be somewhere
else, you can be wherever you want, where there is excess and
cheap energy you actually want to be, where there is cheap
energy that is not otherwise being used.
Because then your model becomes more economically and
financially, you know, viable. And that actually there are
studies that show that already today 70 to 80% of the energy
usage from Bitcoin miners are coming from sustainable sources
and that the trend is positive. So in the next 10 years, we
actually even assumed that there will be 90% or more.
And so that it is not an environmental threat that there
are even ways how ways to think about how it will lead to a more
sustainable future because the energy used like flaring for
example can be reduced etcetera. And that this is all not
happening by coincidence but by design.
This is, this has been designed like this from the beginning and
has been thought through. It's a really systematically the
design choices that have been made is so that it will be from
an energy consumption and sustainability point of view,
very positive for the world. And it's actually also when you
compare it to other financial systems like gold or physical
Fiat money or digital Fiat money like the banking system, it is
superior, it's using less energy and it loses much, it uses much
more sustainable energy. So I think this whole energy
topic is being debunked very well.
There are great pieces of content out there, like Len
Alden's article for example. It's just wow about it.
But also there are many studies, this Oxford study for example,
or many other studies that actually and articles that
debunk it. But the problem is just still
people don't go that deep. They just see or hear somewhere
that how much energy Bitcoin is using and they also think in it,
how can it scale? Like how can Bitcoin become 10X
or 100X from now and scale to the whole world and then it will
use 10X or 100X more energy. They don't understand that
that's not how it works. Not it's not like the more
transactions the more energy is being used.
But it's just, yeah, it's it's just a problem of of
understanding it. But but the same you have in
different other industries like electric cars for example.
There's still a lot of people that say you know electric cars
with their lithium batteries and etcetera in the end or worse for
the environment and not better. There will always be these
debates. I think that's why it's it's
this is hard. This is never going to be 100%
debunked, or it's at least will take a very long time.
That's I think that's why it is still one of the biggest
problems of the Piston community.
I think people got thought in some way that using energy is
bad where, you know, if you're listening or watching this, look
around you in wherever you are, like everything you see from the
trees to I see the books to my, you know, glasses here or you
know, the wood on the floor, everything outside the
buildings, like everything takes energy to create or maintain.
So the usage of energy is not the argument, it's about where,
where does it come from. And I think you make a great
point about, you know, the entire incentive for the
business model of minors is that you find the cheapest energy.
And cheapest energy is energy that is created but not used.
So it's excess energy or it's wasted energy or it's actually
capturing energy in places where it is not captured already.
So also wasted, right, If there's a great company called
Gritless who goes to African villages who live like on the
edge of a waterfall, which is basically also wasted energy,
right, that hydro energy there. And so they capture that energy
and they give energy to the village so the people can cook
and store their food and all the all these things.
And that is the entire incentive around the business model.
And so I agree, again, this is kind of like this nihilistic
thing like, oh, I think energy usage is bad energy.
Energy usage should go down, right.
I think that's what people think.
But yeah, Interesting good. Point that's what we are taught
and we always try to use our old frameworks to evaluate this new
thing and and if it doesn't work then we think, OK, it's not
going to, it's not going to happen.
And I'm also wondering, like, how are these people looking at
something that that has been so successful in the last 15 years
and it is so huge now? Like there's more than the
market cap of Bitcoins. More.
Much more than a billion. Yeah, billion dollars.
Trillion. Trillion.
Billion Trillion.
Trillion. Sorry, I always because in
Switzerland in like, yeah. I know.
Same here. Sorry.
Yeah, it's much more than one trillion.
It's huge. And they still so.
It's not nothing, right? It's.
Nothing. And they still think like as an
ordinary person. They still think, OK, I know
something that all of these people don't know and I know
it's gonna crash, like because it uses so much engine.
Yeah, that's something I don't understand.
Yeah, but exactly like you know, I think you got this from Jeff
Booth as well, right? Like he's an investor in your
company, so you know him well it it's so interesting, right.
If you look at a new system from an old system and then just
decide to not that it's not going to work.
What I find interesting is that underlying you agree that the
system from which you are looking actually works fine.
It has no flaws, right? Because if you use that as the
framework you know, or or or the glasses you put on to look at,
you know, something new, then you assume that it's perfect,
that that's why you dismiss something something else, right?
Because if you understood the imperfections of, you know, your
your current system, then you would also be open to see like
what oh what could this new system do for to solve those
imperfections, right. So I think that ties back to,
you know, people not understanding that there is a
problem. And I mean, for many people, to
be fair, it does work somehow like in, in, in.
And these are usually the ones that exactly are the biggest
critics of the new system. Because hey, the old system
works very well for for me. If I'm a Swiss banker and that
works at UBS, I have some middle management position in the UBS.
I don't really have to work that much, but I earn shit tons of
Fiat money that is inflating only at a low rate in
Switzerland. And that I can invest in stocks
that usually beat inflation on an average yearly basis, at
least if I hold them for more than maybe five years or more
than you know. And then I have credit cards
that are quite cheap and easy to use everywhere in the world and
everything is perfect. Why, Why would I even be open to
a new system? And these are also the people,
usually they don't travel too much, you know, they're just
happy. They can also afford a house and
the car they they maybe travel a little bit, but never in, in, in
countries where you know, where where there's definitely other
situations and conditions, living conditions, etcetera.
And they also don't see that they are in a very small bubble.
You know, Switzerland, for example, is one of the one of
the richest countries in the world.
So even if you are at the lower end, you're still very much OK
things still work for you. And you don't see the problems
that actually more than half of the people in the world have and
how Bitcoin could also be a solution for them.
So yeah, only if you're really open and questioning things, you
can come from such a privileged position and and understand
Bitcoin. Otherwise it will come more from
other countries that are struggling more.
Yeah, so let's talk about your company Relay.
Can you tell me about it? And also how you decided to
start a company in a Bitcoin space.
You said I'm going to dedicate my, you know, my life to
Bitcoin. I think I have the same I I
didn't start a company yet in it, but you did what?
How? How did that start and like what
do you do? How is it going?
I first started with the fascination and the passion.
As I said before, in 2015 I I kind of learned about Bitcoin
and the subsequent 2-3 years I really delved into it and really
understand the profound development that it it will have
and that's how great it is. And so first started with this
passion and then second with an idea that I had or an
opportunity I saw in the market. So I saw that Okay more and more
people are interested in this topic, Bitcoin.
They want to buy some Bitcoin, usually small amounts and then
once they have understood, usually they want to buy us a
regular amount like weekly or monthly.
But it should be super easy because most of them just are,
you know, they they they are not tech or finance geeks.
They just want to have something that is, you know, works on
their phone with a couple of clicks, takes a couple of
minutes. They don't like to upload
documents somewhere, They don't like to look at charts or use
stop loss or market orders limit or whatever.
You know, they're not traders. They just want to have a quick
and dirty, simple, user friendly and nicely designed solution on
their phone where they can buy Bitcoin if necessary, sell
Bitcoin, set up savings plan and then send and receive and hold
their Bitcoin on their own all in one place.
And so that's how I had this idea or saw this opportunity.
And then I started to look for Co founders and other people
that are supporting me like investors.
And because I was still very young, I was broke.
I didn't really have the traits of a perfect like startup
entrepreneur at all. I was also another technique.
I didn't come from technology. I didn't study computer science
or anything else. I didn't understand shit, you
know, I didn't understand anything about tech or
entrepreneurship or any of these important fundraisings or
something. I didn't know shit about legal
compliance, etcetera. This is all the things that I am
learning on the way. But yeah, I think I had this
passion and an idea and saw an opportunity.
And yeah, and then more and more people started kind of following
my my mission and help help helping me to bring this vision
into reality. And that's then how we ended up
managing to release a first version in the app stores of
this app that we that we envisioned This was in summer
2020. So soon we will be 4 years old
or at least four years on the market.
And yeah, it was a wild ride, a lot of ups and downs.
But if if you look at it from a bit of an outside perspective
now and zoom out, these four years look like a pretty, pretty
nice growth journey and I'm still really excited about it.
Awesome, man. Can you share a bit perhaps
about like what what you see with regards to, you know you're
focused on Europe of course like what what is the adoption like
in Europe or what are like the trends you are seeing with
regards to who is buying Bitcoin and and how that is going?
I think still very early, so again probably depending on the
country in Europe between 10 and Max 20%, but more on the 10%
range of adoption rate. People that really have Bitcoin,
many of them also still have it as like speculation and you
know, they just try to maybe sell it at a later point to make
more Fiat though it's really, really believers and like people
that are committed and passionate about Bitcoin.
It's only a very small percentage amount.
I think we see that mostly millennials are buying Bitcoin
and understanding, understanding and therefore buying Bitcoin.
So around half of our users are actually millennials between 20
and 35 ish also younger, even younger ones and then the older
the less also most of them are male.
So unfortunately I think only like 15% of our customers are
women, 85% are men. So young men basically is the
dominant demographic. This probably has to do with we
are a Fintech in the end a bit. Bitcoin can be also probably
categorized as Fintech and finance.
Both finance and technology are known as being male dominant
fields. And so this is the intersection
of these two. So obviously there's not a lot
of women unfortunately, but I hope this this trend will go
into the other direction a little bit as well.
Yeah, that's kind of what I what I see from a regulatory point of
view. There are quite some
developments. It is becoming more regulated,
It has pros and cons. There's this Mika regulation
that is now basically unifying the EU approach where most of
the European countries are in this EU, the European Union.
This is unified now so there's a legal compliance framework for
Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies has quite
restrictive that's maybe on the con side.
So it's harder to do business, it's more expensive to do
business and it's also less easy to use for for for people the
services the some of them will will struggle a lot, some
companies will struggle a lot. So also depends on how you're
designed like custodial, non custodial, good con only versus
other cryptos etcetera. But even if you make the rent
centros, it's going to be, it's going to make our life harder.
But on the other hand, it also helps to give legitimacy and
credibility to this, to this new technology, to Bitcoin.
And more and more people will start trusting and therefore
investing in it if it is regulated, especially also
institutions, companies, take funds, hedge funds, whatever.
So, yeah, this is kind of what what maybe I see in a nutshell
in in Europe in in general, it is going into the right
direction with a lot of up and downs, but I think we will see
much more adoption in the next five years in Europe that's
that's for sure. Yeah.
So how do you see the future of Bitcoin in, well, Switzerland or
broader EU with with like all this regulation that you know is
introduced by all these pure technocrats.
It's so interesting, interesting to see like or or the, you know,
there's some ideas about things they want to introduce about
banning proof of work which is based on you know all these
flawed energy arguments. So, so like what's what, what?
How do you see the future? What do you think about it?
I think there will be more regulation, that's clear.
There will be always more regulation with such a financial
innovation like that. Therefore there will be less
companies unfortunately, there will be less innovation
unfortunately. So the window for new companies
is, is a bit closing. I mean there will be new ones,
but less because it's going to be harder as a new early stage
company with not a lot of track record, not a lot of human and
financial resources. It will be hard to enter this
because of the regulation that's that's one.
So less new entrance and then also less of the existing ones
because the, the small ones, the bootstrapped ones, they will
have a very hard time to to comply with all these regulatory
requirements etcetera. It's so difficult, so expensive.
So it's a lot of effort. So there will be less in like
let's say in five years, there will be less companies in the
space unfortunately and the bigger ones will get even bigger
because they will get more of the market share that the
smaller ones now cannot capture anymore and the bigger like
economies of scale, right. So it's for the bigger
companies, actually regulatory scrutiny is always good because
they can afford it like Coinbase, they have billions of
dollars on their balance sheet and getting billions of revenue
and profit. So they can afford, I think they
invest like 5% or 10% of their their capital into regulatory
legal, compliance issues, even lobbying etcetera.
So for them it's good they can afford it because the small ones
can't. So the bigger ones will get
bigger. There will be a smaller amount
of different companies that will all comply.
But then on the other side as well, I think there will be like
a counter movement to this, which is also interesting to see
like for example peer-to-peer exchanges.
There will be more of these because also more and more
people will maybe dislike this whole regulatory development and
start looking for alternatives and maybe we'll use something
else. Not something I can't base which
is super highly regulated, but more something like on the other
side, maybe even bisque or huddle hole which is on the
unregulated side as much as possible.
Of course something like relay where we're a bit in between.
We will be more and more regulated of course
unfortunately as a centralized not peer-to-peer player, but
still we are more on the other side of the spectrum because we
are Bitcoin only, non custodial and regulated in Switzerland
which is outside of the EU. So we do get some, still some
perks when it comes to that, but still many of the limitations
that come with new EU regulations we will also need to
adhere to. Yeah, it's definitely going to
be interesting. These are a bit the the
developments I see. But in the end from a user
perspective for if you're a normal like retail investors and
you just want to adopt Bitcoin, there's not a lot that will
change. You will always be able to get
into Bitcoin in different ways. Either you on the one side you
can be super super regulated and then you are you end up with
something like an ETF or then you can go down the spectrum and
use something like a bank to buy a bit more and more banks will
through this regulation get into Bitcoin, which is also good.
You still have Bitcoin, it's just custodied and highly
regulated by a bank. But you still have Bitcoin which
is cool. Then you can use an exchange
which is also regulated, but then as the risk is a bit
higher, it's still custodial but you can still do it.
Maybe the user experience is a bit better, I mean the
simplicity of it. Then you can do something like
Relay which is a regulated broker but still gives you self
custody which which is cool. And then on the lower side, you
can still use peer-to-peer exchanges like this, cuddle,
hobble, etcetera. And I think all of these will be
used more and more and then really depends on your choice on
how regulated and how KYC heavy and how custodial you want to
go. But yeah, I think in the end it
is good and is inevitable sole regulation.
So it's just about the companies need to navigate it and the
users as well. But in the end there will be
more and more competition and therefore also better offerings
for using more different offerings for users to access
Bitcoin, which in the end this is, as everything great for
Bitcoin. Yeah.
All right. So what advice would you give to
a millennial just starting to explore Bitcoin?
What would be like the main thing?
First, educate yourself about it before you really, like start
jumping into it. I think that's a big mistake
that many people are doing is, oh, the price went up.
I don't have a lot of time. I just buy a little bit and then
they don't understand anything of it.
Then when the price goes down they sell again.
The longer the more you do this, the longer you do this.
You end up with always buying when it's high because that's
when you read about it in the newspapers and then sell when
it's low because then is also when you read about in newspaper
you think oh fuck, now it's all going to crash and because you
don't understand because you don't have this long term
conviction in it, you will sell and so in the end you will just
lose money. That's why important that first
you educate yourself about it. You see it in a very long time
horizon. As Warren Buffett said, don't
buy anything that you would not hold for 10 years, then rather
don't even hold it for 10 minutes.
So you need to get this conviction and this commitment
that, OK, I want to hold Bitcoin for 10 years and then I would
advice, obviously it's not financial advice, but what works
best I think for the most people is just set up a savings plan,
you know, dollar cost average, you have your set amount of Fiat
money per week or per month that you don't did, you want to save
and you don't have to touch in the next couple of years.
And then you put this into Bitcoin.
And also you learn how to store this Bitcoin safely, ideally
with yourself without any counterparty risk, etcetera,
self custodial. And then the the longer you will
do this, the more happier you will be.
Because if you do it at least four years then at least
historically no one has ever made the a loss and you will
understand it more and more. So probably your conviction will
grow and then, yeah, you will. You will just do very well.
Awesome man. That's good advice.
So last question and I asked everyone the same question.
What is a core belief that you will never let go?
That's a very good question. My core belief is that human
beings are curious and open and productive and entrepreneurial,
so they will always find solution to every problem.
And that's also what excites me about Bitcoin is this community
that is coming together to create a better world in fixing
the financial system or creating an alternative to new financial
system. And I think you can look back
10s of thousands of years of human history and basically what
we were always good at, what is basically in our DNA is we
always solve all the problems that are coming.
We always keep making better things.
We keep enhancing our living standards.
So that's also making me look into the future.
You know in in very the future looks very promising to me.
In a lot of people are like kind of have quite a negative view on
the future now because a lot of things are going wrong.
I I see that we have a lot of problems, but every generation
usually thinks, oh now we're fucked like this, this was it.
I think every generation has that.
But I my core believe is that in the end it's a very optimistic
one that in the end we will together solve all these
problems and create a better future for our next generation.
Awesome. Manuel, thanks so much for this
conversation. I really enjoyed it.
And if I'm ever around where you are in Switzerland, I'll
definitely come by and yeah, let's stay in touch.
Hell yeah, we will. Thank you so much for everything
you do. I really love your podcast and
your ex or Twitter engagement. So keep up the great work and
spreading the word. And yeah, talk soon.
Thanks for having me. Cheers.
I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you did, it would be amazing
if you could rate, review and subscribe on the podcast
platform of your choice. It will help us educate more
millennials on the importance of Bitcoin.
You can follow and connect with me on Twitter.
I'm Brom K That's at BR AM K and if you are or know someone who
has an interesting perspective on Bitcoin that's worth sharing,
hit me up. I read and reply to every single
message. I appreciate your support and
hope you'll be here for the next episode.
Thanks for listening. Bye.