Spencer Bogart. He’s a managing director and the head of research for Blockchain Capital, the premier venture firm for investing directly in the blockchain companies. Prior to joining Blockchain Capital, Spencer was a VP of Equity Research where he covered traditional software and internet stocks. He had his first industry report on blockchain technology and is the most active analyst covering bitcoin.
Famous Five:
- Favorite Book? – Zero to One
- What CEO do you follow? – Balaji Srinivasan
- Favorite online tool? — Telegram
- How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6
- If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I just wish I would have spent more time on bitcoin”
Time Stamped Show Notes:
- 01:48 – Nathan introduces Spencer to the show
- 03:10 – Crypto hedge fund has created a “honey pot” for hackers
- 03:18 – The “honey pot” is actually bigger on the exchanges
- 04:23 – Most companies are now making bitcoins more accessible
- 04:45 – Spencer shares how to use Coinbase
- 05:00 – Spencer has predicted that there’s a sub 25% chance that the US SEC is approving a bitcoin ETF
- 05:21 – It is difficult for regulators to get comfortable with bitcoin
- 05:30 – Spencer shares the pros and cons of approving a bitcoin ETF
- 06:02 – There has been changes in US SEC’s administration that could be favorable with the approval
- 06:39 – There’s an ETF that was disapproved, but appealed and it was then granted
- 07:34 – There are speculators who moved in beforehand
- 08:03 – Blockchain Capital is a VC firm that has focused on blockchain for the last 4-5 years
- 08:14 – The last fund they did was their own ICO
- 08:23 – Their cap was a $10M offering
- 08:33 – Their offering’s sold out in just 10 minutes
- 08:50 – They are currently raising their fourth fund
- 09:10 – The industry has been changing consistently
- 09:36 – “We’re just all hands on deck”
- 10:08 – Blockchain Capital’s fund one was $3-5M and fund two was $15M
- 10:40 – Target fund for the fourth one is $250M
- 11:12 – Spencer shares about their Civic deal
- 11:50 – Civic allows you to provide your identity to others without them getting your identity
- 12:28 – Civic’s ICO
- 12:50 – Spencer discusses with his team how they handle situations where they had an initial investment of token sales
- 13:22 – Tokens are not dilutive
- 13:57 – People who bought into token issuance won’t directly benefit from the acquisition of companies
- 14:08 – There’s a lot of demand for under-line technology
- 15:35 – Spencer shares the problems Civic is trying to solve
- 16:18 – Civic wanted to sell enough tokens to get the attributions abroad to create an initial user base
- 16:35 – A company won’t sell its equity upfront
- 17:45 – Spencer made their acquisition and token issuance in two totally different time frames
- 18:13 – Token offerings have different models
- 20:19 – Nathan asks Spencer how an entrepreneur can manage his money in order to run the business vs. what to keep
- 20:31 – Most of the funds that have been raised should be converted to dollars so they can pay the bills
- 21:05 – Spencer is liquidating usually 80%
- 21:19 – “Do yourself a favor, convert into a currency that you can actually pay your bills in and pay the developers in”
- 21:57 – Spencer believes that Coinbase is the biggest brand in the space, especially in exchange
- 22:38 – Nathan asks Spencer, “what if any government starts normalizing crypto?”— the demand for the exchange would decrease drastically
- 22:58 – Coinbase was incentivized to not see widespread government adoption of cryptocurrency because they need people to put money into their system
- 23:20 – Spencer believes that if this happens, this will be a high class problem for Coinbase
- 23:25 – There are companies who are using Coinbase, not just for exchange
- 26:24 – The Famous Five
3 Key Points:
- Bitcoin is becoming more accessible to people because of the demand.
- The government’s regulation on cryptocurrency is still in its beginnings.
- Liquidation of the funds depends on the company’s decisions regarding what they need and their what their goals are.
Resources Mentioned:
- Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost.
- The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
- GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more
- Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
- Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience
- Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
- Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
- Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books
- Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives