E33: Blockchain Investor and Innovator: Achieving Change in the Age of Shortcuts - Rodrigo Barakat

35:30so you have all these beliefs everything makes a lot of sense but you live in Dubai the most superficial place on the planet where pretty much if you go there like it's all about I mean not probably all but the first picture you get there is like people show off everybody like does a lot of kind of very DJing things doesn't look like a place that's really a place where you can develop trust easily and where you have the it doesn't look like a place that attracts the right kind of people so what do you think about dubai what do you like about dubai um for me dubai i think i told you that dubai feels like the right place in the right time.

36:22And I'm lucky enough to be surrounded with what I think is the right people. But the term right is very relative, right? Right can be like for someone who has a very heavy personal agenda, the right people can be mercenaries, right? The right people can be like politicians that are corruptible, right? So this is very, this is a very delicate topic. Why I think Dubai is the right time and it's the right place for me to be is because Dubai right now is like this international financial hub. Everything and everyone eventually passes by, you know, and there's a lot of things. It's the center of the world.

37:11It's the center of the world. I was about to say, it's the center of the world. It's the center of the world. Like you have a plane, you can go by plane pretty much everywhere. Yeah. Straight. And I work with Bud3, right? And green technology. So that means that I work with global industries. So it's the best place for me to be right now. Even though like I love Southeast Asia, Southeast Asia is like, it's living through a great momentum, let's say. And momentum still building up. There's so very many things that are going to be happening here. I feel that still the best thing for me to be based there.

37:45because again, I'm one flight, one Emirates flight away from everywhere in the globe. Every single week, there's like a big event going on in Dubai. There's a friend calling me like, say, I'm going to spend like two days, three days in Dubai or calling me and say, hey, I have a very good friend that I would like you guys to meet. And it's like, it's very dynamic. And I like to learn. And the best source of learning for me, it's not like a book or Google or chat DPT. that's people right the the most important books i've read in my life i didn't pick up on a shelf it was recommended by someone i trusted someone i admired right and so on and so forth with books with same thing with like movies same things with experiences right and i think that dubai is is is playing a big role in my development i i'm the kind of guy that i whenever i i'm not learning enough, whenever I don't feel like I'm growing enough, I have to do something.

38:49I have to promote change. That's why I'm not a good fit for corporate, even though I'm dressed like a penguin today because I was having a very important meeting before here and I had to dress up like that. But I would never be a good fit for a corporate role. Yeah, because it's too repetitive and bureaucratic and you can't evolve. You're just like, let's say, part of a bigger engine. Yeah. You're not there because of your singularity. Yeah. You're not a free creative soul, basically. I mean, you can't. You're like too constrained.

39:29But Dubai is a good place. Dubai is a good place. And there's a lot to learn. From what you just said, it's basically all very positive about Dubai. It is not only because I've also, you can learn a lot from the Arabic culture. There's like the Arabic culture as a whole. Unfortunately, the Western media picture of the Arabic world as a very conservative, like Batu woman kind of thing. But this is so silly. This is so superficial. there are so very many values that they are a big road praise and that they they really work for to sustain that to maintain it Dubai is the foot probably the safest place in the world right now it is absolutely and they don't even have your wallet you think is even better in Singapore like and here it's good like in terms of safety but like you go Dubai you just throw your wallet in the street or whatever like and someone's gonna call you it's hey I found your wallet completely and there is not even like police men out in the So this is like a matter of like culture, right?

40:33So this is like Dubai, I think that also taught me a lot on living in a place that is not a democracy. Because as Westerns, we tend to think that everything that is not a democracy is bad. And not only, I live in Dubai, but I do a lot of business in Saudi too. And I see whole Saudi people, most of them that I deal with, they really like having a king, being a kingdom. having a ruling family, having a ruler that they feel that really takes care of people, right? We can go down this rabbit hole. Absolutely. It works. Like you see it in Singapore too. It works. And larger scale, like, I mean, there is a lot of things to say about China, positive, negative, but like the way they were able to develop the country, like it doesn't work it it wouldn't work that well in a different system that's pretty obvious it's a lot more efficient in many ways like let's say let's put it like this there is a hole in in the road right in a democracy let's just like this as an example like a silly illustration in democracy you take like months maybe to fix that hole because like okay someone has to apply and the Congress has to approve a budget and then they have to hire a company and they have to do a public hearing.

42:01It takes too long because everything has to be added and everything. And in places like Dubai and Saudi, if the ruler or someone in the government or even a citizen point out that there's a hole, it's going to be fixed in the next day. And also the next thing is they get to make plans, like Saudi right now. Saudi has this Saudi 2030 vision plan that's been out there for like almost 10 years already. They're still working on that. But they can plan. They have these plans. They have long-term plans. They don't have to worry about politicians making four-year plans. We can also have to worry that they need to be re-elected.

42:43That's how Singapore was developed and built. That's how Dubai was developed and built. You have like these 10, 20, 50 years plans, they just follow and the thing just develops and then it attracts everyone. Everyone in Asia came to Singapore now because of since COVID and like everybody is here. Everyone went to Dubai. Everyone is there. Like I'm here, you're there. Like we meet here and I'm in Dubai like three times a year. Like it's just, yeah, it's just, And then you can look at other countries. You have all these people, especially in the Western world, like people who are criticizing that, but then you look at what's going on everywhere.

43:27You look at France, you look at all these places where like it's a complete mess that has kind of no future is all going to shit. And if you're very practical, you're just going to look at, and you have to be practical, I guess, especially like if you're very, you want to build things, you're an entrepreneur, you just look at the actual reality and it's a no-brainer. Yeah, I mean, I'm in Dubai. I feel like I'm in a place where things are happening, right? And there's a lot of upside potential. And they're working to make that potential happen. I'm in Brazil. I think there's a lot of upside potential, but it's not happening, right?

44:09When I'm in the US, I feel there's not much upside potential. There's more downside potential. And it's a bit of chaos. So it depends on where you are and how you perceive value. It's also that reflects on you. I feel that when I was in Brazil, I couldn't express my value as much as I can express my value from Dubai. Because I'm limited in Brazil. Like my good old mentor would tell me I was swimming in a shallow pond. It's a matter of perspective. like the water we drink. You pay like 20 bucks for that water in the airport, but the same water in like, I don't know, 7-Eleven in a cheap neighborhood, same water would cost you$2.

44:57So value is a matter of perspective and context, right? And I feel that Dubai gives you that option. If you're in Dubai and you're for real, you're not just there like to tourism or spend money or to show off, you can actually step up your game. You can leverage your own potential because Dubai allows you to do that. Does this mean that you're going to be in Dubai now and then in the next Dubai and then in the next Dubai forever because you're someone who wants to learn? Or do you think there is a point in life where learning is very important, but like all this kind of building and giving back, becomes less important.

45:45Because some people would say the day you have a family or you have children, things change already. But you have a daughter. I have a six-year-old daughter in Brazil. And of course, I'd love to be closer to her and maybe even give her like an international education. But I am divorced and she lives with her mother in Brazil. and there are a few things that it's best for you to accept. And I think that one thing that I would never accept and maybe the only thing I would never accept in life is to be like too comfortable, you know, like to be stagnant, like in a state of stagnation. Have you ever been in that state?

46:28Like losing drive or being stagnating and kind of like not knowing what your mission is anymore? I felt like that when I was in university. That's why I dropped out. Okay. I felt like that. I felt like I wasn't learning enough. I felt like I was stuck. I felt like it was consuming way too much of my time for a degree instead of through learning. That's why I decided to drop out. I've actually dropped out of four universities. So like I've tried, you know, for the despair of my mother. She was always sad. Either my son is a desperate case, either he's a genius. Turned out to be. I don't think she has the answer yet.

47:16It's interesting. The other day we had the co-founder CEO of WellTech company listed on a NASDAQ. And we talked a lot about education. And one of the next, he said the next company is going to build is all around education. because he thinks that the whole thing is completely broken. I mean, it definitely is. And exactly what you're saying, I was feeling the exact same. I was at university and I had done between my master, my bachelor and my master, I had done two internships, two times, three months, six months work experience. And I was at university and I had this prof in these top-notch universities.

47:51The ranking of the university is based on where the professor did their PhD. But I was just there and I was like, everybody is listening to this dude or this woman. And with all due respect, like they're great human beings. But I worked six months in my life. I'm 23, 22. And I worked more than them. They spent their entire life in university. How can you teach me something? I have a good analogy for you. Like there's always going to be good teachers. let's give them the credit there are good teachers that can really teach you very well and teach you good things but I work with finance so teachers, professors and all these people that leave off academia most of them are just really bad fund managers because a fund manager his business is taking 2 % management fees and 20%, let's say, profit, let's say profit split, right?

49:02So the thing is, again, learning, I decided that the best for me was to learn by myself. Most of the things that I know, I basically taught myself. But not many people can do that because of the way they're raised, because problems in family or whatever, right? And many reasons can make someone find a very hard time to teach yourself new things. But the same thing is in finance. Let's say the best way, the most profitable way for you to invest is always going to be invest by yourself. But it's hard and the risk is higher. So sometimes people, they need, they rely on fund managers. If you look at the performance of most fund managers out there, it's ridiculous.

49:50underperform the benchmark. They're underperforming a lot and they're still racking their 220s, right? Their 2 % management fees and 20 % out of whatever profits they get to make, right? So when it comes to like education, it's the same thing. When sometimes people have to, let's say make, they need teachers. You're outsourcing the guidance of your education, basically. Yes, and then you rely on someone else. because it's easier because you can blame someone. And also the whole educational system, like you're paying an university, right? You're paying to get a degree. So that means that, of course, you have to succeed.

50:32You have to have good grades, but that doesn't necessarily mean that you've learned. Yeah, because they also don't have, because you're paying, they also don't have, I mean, if we talk about private education and all these big universities, that is a huge business in itself. They don't have any incentive. It's almost impossible to fail because they don't have an incentive to kick you out because you're a great customer. Exactly. And then most of the big companies today still hire. I mean, there is, of course, this concept of academic inflation where there is too many people who are graduated and therefore too many people with kind of university papers and it's kind of harder and harder to get jobs.

51:12But a lot of companies, maybe less so in the startup world, But a lot of companies still, depending on the countries, for example, Switzerland or even Singapore, like still very looking at even moving to Singapore. If you want to move to Singapore to get what we call EP employment pass and all that, they're looking at your universities and your grades. That's what companies and even some countries look at still today. And is it a reflection, true reflection on how bright or how much potential you have? absolutely not but it's still a way for most companies to you know you receive 2 ,000 applications like you need something to kind of filter out through that but that's changing I think everything's changing it's changing very fast I think like I think maybe not my daughter right but my daughter's daughter probably is not going to school anymore that's the way I feel yeah she might have a few mentors right people that human beings that that will teach them how to behave how to defend themselves how to do many things but the real learning will come probably in my humble opinion from their personal ai algorithm let's say the the same way you have your own recommendation algorithm in netflix right that learns with your preferences that is always there to to make recommendations for you think of an ai that can grow with your with your with your son or your daughter right and then it's so exciting to think about that because then the kid the kid the one thing that the kid is that every single like let's say young human being is is curious we're curious And the problem with the current educational system is that it kills that.

53:13Completely. It kills that curiosity. Curiosity and creativity. There's an amazing TED talk from like 20 years ago by, I think it's called Sir Ken Robinson. Why school kills creativity. Amazing. talks about all this and that basically you should be taught much more like kind of arts things at school and not all these very objective objective lessons but anyway continue no that's why I believe that this would be amazing because most people also like fear AI think oh AI is going to control or then with AI our kids are not going to learn anymore because AI is going to solve everything for them and they don't have to think this is like this is like being in the 90s and thinking that internet is like is a stupid thing right so it's not it's not scaring for you it's very exciting it's very exciting I mean of course there's a chance that someone uses AI for the worse there's always this chance same with like atomic energy right oh there's atomic bomb someone's gonna blow the world like but I like to look at the bright side of things and i think that the the bright side the upside potential that we have with ai it's it's enormously and a lot more expressive than the the bad side of it the downside of it which is like think of it this way if my if my kid could grow asking an ai everything that she wants to learn like why is this bottle like this why is why is the color black or red like in the AI AI explains to her everything on the go so it's basically AI and voice together technology it's like real time yeah kind of real time interaction real time technology you don't even have to text anymore like take a Google or touch LGBT and like write down you just ask the thing and boom get fed with the answer I think three things three technological let's say breakthroughs are going to change society drastically So we're living through Web3.

55:24That's what connects us here. That means that we can actually see a digital economy take place, right? Because there is like digital unity, cryptographic unity can actually allow us to move value on the digital realm. AI, which is an enhancing or process, information processing capability exponentially, right? And there's also the third technology that is actually going to be a trigger for a bigger, even bigger change, which is brain-machine interface. So we don't have to type anymore. If you think of it this way, it's like it's still, we still are very mechanical. mechanical but no like i have we we have a very like well something that i i wish brazilians would i mean give more value to things like that we have a brazilian researcher in an university of north carolina i think his name is miguel nicolelis miguel nicolelis has been researching like brain machine interfaces for many years now.

56:36And when the World Cup in Brazil, when we had the World Cup soccer of soccer in Brazil, the one that we lost to Germany to 7-1. Yeah, yeah, and semi-finals. That's the only thing that the Brazilians remember from that World Cup, like losing 7-1 in Brazil to Germans. Like the first kick, you know, the first kick in the first game of the World Cup was made by a paraplegic person wearing an exoskeleton that that person was controlling with brainwaves. Megan Nicoletti was capable of teaching a monkey to move a robotic arm, a monkey in Brazil moving a robotic arm in Japan with his brain. So it's closer than we think.

57:30I don't know if it's going to be Neuralink with implants or if it's going to be like brainwave function, like mapping or whatever. But I think when we get rid of this mechanical interfaces, oh my God, we're going to grow. Yeah, and once, I mean, it's very primitive, but like you think about the way we communicate texting. WhatsApp where one step closer is I have a lot of friends. I do a lot of voice notes because just the text, I mean, obviously it's still like very primitive compared to that, but because I want to be able to think something and the thing is going to write it down for me or even better, even write, either write down, either communicate it.

58:17But just the fact of like having to take my phone, texting, making some mistake, having to, is already like, is, I feel like I'm 30 years ago, you know? So then I do these voice notes, but I still have so many friends who are like oh man like you're pissing me off with your voice note like but it's already it's just the next step of like convenience and then there is all this voice technology so for the moment is hey google hey uh Alexa blah blah blah but like people don't realize that this is if you think about it and I'm not I'm not the person who's always thinking about being more productive or whatever it's just like more convenient I want to just like talk to something and i want to think something and then like the thing happens like obviously but i think that if you look at the if you look at the really long term of it most people i think that most people cannot get this far uh as as this i'm gonna tell you like Like language itself is a limitation.

59:19The way we communicate. I'm thinking about a lot of things. I have a meaning in my head. But I have to translate into language. Language. And one word at a time to form sentences, to form my idea. What I'm trying to picture in your head is like with AI and this exponential growth in information processing capabilities and large language models and brain computer interfaces, we might witness, maybe not in our lifetime, unfortunately, but the rise of new forms of communication. we might one day not be interacting like this anymore with words and linear sentences we might find we may find more effective ways to put more meaning into into our interactions I think have you seen that movie I'm terrible with movies but I have that one movie terrible too i have that one movie that comes to my mind that like this alien spaceship comes into earth and there's like the humans are interacting with this alien spaceship with the aliens they whenever they try to interact with you they paint like a circle they keep trying to the humans struggle to to understand and interpret that what what that circles mean what that circle means there's a lot of meaning there and then every time they interact with humans they paint a circle there's different waves and the circle itself is in a different format.

1:01:04This is one way that express how can we put a lot of meaning into the shortest time frame of interaction. This is something that I think we're not chasing as humanity because we're kind of comfortable in the way we interact with communication. Are we really? Are we? Because if you think about it and it's kind of I have two thoughts that come from what you're just saying. The first one is and we're not going to develop it is is is there something else out there than humans on the planet on the planet or outside? Obviously there is because it's impossible probably stick either which is the only one existing even on this planet but we're just not because of our senses were unable to talk to them or see them.

1:01:55But anyway, the other thing more related to what you say is...

1:02:04When you say language is a problem because we need to take all these thoughts and put them into a language that someone else understands. You see it every day in every relationship, work relationship, romantic relationship. The problem is communication. Like we're not even able to like communicate to each other. The evenness and the worst is on texting. You have all these problems like from miscommunication or misunderstanding because we're constrained to, to explain quickly because we're in this world where everything goes like quickly. People don't, don't, don't have attention span. They don't read.

1:02:38And so it's a big problem. the communication and the fact that we need to use these languages to communicate because it's always there is all this misunderstanding that stem from this and if you think about it is a massive is a massive waste in the potential of every relationship or outcome to have to to use these languages i agree and i disagree and i tell you why i mean i agree that we have a big problem in the realm of communication but i do not think that the root root cause of the problems we face in communication is actually in in the way we communicate i think the root problem the root cause is an intention because in order for communication to happen in an effective way you need a speaker let's say and a listener a spectator yeah a listener and in order the only way for that interaction to be effective is to have both a speaker and listener with the same intention which is like to to understand each other right it's true as simple like it sounds very simple but yeah it's true it's very complex at the very end because the problem is most communications negotiations that we jump into you don't find someone with the same intention as you in the other side and there's like hidden agendas especially in the corporate world yeah everything's a negotiation and everybody's trying to get somewhere and most part of the time is not the same place so this is the big problem again this is and then we we go back to lies and whatever that that then we it gets very chaotic and confusing right but i think that we we as society we would grow a lot better and more efficient if everybody had the intention to understand the other before expressing opinions before expressing itself and this is a very big paradox this is a very big problem that we've been facing in the modern times we're living into because like most people think that what is important is to express their opinion.

1:04:59Yeah. And this is like a consequence of like social media and everything. Now that a lot of people say that like the problem with social media is that it gave voice to a bunch of stupid people, right? To a bunch of ignorant. Gave voice to everyone. Yeah. And because like it's important, like, and there is like this, say this dictatorship of like relevance. You have to be relevant. You have to be someone expressing your opinions. You have to have an opinion. You have to take sides. There's a lot of pressure in people to take sides. Who do you like? Like Republicans or Democrats? What would you want?

1:05:48I don't know. I think that maybe we should just take one step back We can remind ourselves that in the very beginning, we don't know. One of the biggest proof of intelligence is actually, I don't know. Yeah. Yeah, just acknowledging most of the things. I don't know. Like, even if I'm constantly learning and interested by everything, and I don't know most of the things, and I will never know them. And it's fine. The kind of people that I trust the most are the people who actually do not hesitate to say, I don't know. Right? And also, I respect a lot of people that actually take, that they're not anxious to reply or to express their opinions, that they can come to you and say, would you give me some time?

1:06:33I'm going to do some research and I'll get back to it. Yes. You know, or even like... You're not looking stupid if you need some time to like think or research something to like formulate a better answer. Yeah, obviously. Also, the most intelligent people I know, whenever I ask them a question or they ask me a question which is yeah they take time to formulate it did you watch the other day there was this Elon interview like he literally does like a 15 or 16 seconds silence before answering and the interviewer is good because he's just not saying anything he's just like they're waiting waiting waiting and I mean it's a super interesting one because he talks about power and he's just, he's just, I don't remember the exact question, but the interviewer is just saying like, you know, like you're, you tweet something and then like everybody loses so much money and you lose that much money and, and he's just like doing a 15, 15 or 13 seconds break like that thinking.

1:07:38And then he just says, he mentions a film where, where he just says like in the film, the guy says, give me the money, give me the power. i don't care and then then basically the interview is just saying so you so you don't care about like losing a lot of money as long as you can speak the truth and say whatever you feel and he's just saying yeah i don't care all related to like this and he takes 15 seconds and it's really it's awesome to watch because he was really right absolutely he has a lot to lose right i mean and it's not money like for most people think that the bottom line is always money but I mean people like Elon Musk I think he knows what he wants to do with his life and that has a lot to do with change and I identify with that I'm very empathetic with that idea and I think that in his case it's even more than just formulating the idea better he has to take care about what he says because he influences a lot of people.

1:08:49And a lot of people not only judge what he says, but there may be consequences, like severe consequences to what he says. That's why there are two layers of abstraction that actually makes him probably take longer than normal people, let's say, to formulate. You're saying severe consequences, but is there not also a point at which almost no one is, but at which he is? where you don't really, I don't want to say you don't care anymore, but like you're kind of unfazed and whatever you say or do is not, obviously if you do too many mistakes in a row, it can like lead the thing to a bad place. But like, I think it's almost untouchable, like more than the US president, you know, because he's like so influential, powerful and everything.

1:09:43Not in the bad way, but he's just like almost untouchable. He's just there and like he can do a lot of things that other people could never do in terms of he can afford to do a lot of things, you know, and kind of mistakes because at the end of the day, we know that the guy has good intentions and he's trying to, if you're trying to, you know, to bring people to Mars because you think that the planet is not sustainable and you either are hyper megalomaniac and want the entire world to look at you or you really have intentions that are greater than wealth and power. It's just like good, you know, overall good.

1:10:25Yeah, I agree. I mean, some of us can, but also we can be fooled very easily. And I don't think anyone is untouchable because, well, think of it as if tomorrow Elon Musk abuses a woman, then he's in deep trouble, right? If Elon Musk, if people learn that Elon Musk is financing child trafficking or human trafficking, he's going to lose everything he's got. And you don't have to go as far as that. I mean, if people learn that he's lying, if people if people learn that he's aggressive or whatever reputation is always he's got always gonna make up for the good people and for the bad people like in in different ways like I mean he has a lot to lose like he his employees might start leaving the company he might not be able to get like big contracts because like big businessmen and like like people dealing with high level and big interests that they they're very picky right they're very picky they care a lot right because there's a lot to lose so I don't know so 2021 I think so there's this crypto bull run and then there's Elon with these tweets about Dogecoin and Bitcoin I mean all these to basically make a transition to web 3 where you are super involved I'm super involved and we still need to talk a bit about that um how big is this web3 thing i think not big enough yet that's the first thing i would say that especially to my dj and friends out there maybe listening to this and a lot of people in the web3 space think that we are great and we're fantastic and dude we're we're like the entire industry is smaller than apple yeah absolutely and in the industry on its own it's not only market cap if you look that uh we we have something around like uh 30 40 000 active developers working in web 3 right now that's also very little that's nothing that's nothing and most of them are like beginners right they're learning because the industry is so young so there's no experts there's no specialists there's always like the best people i know they're dealing with the industry for like 10 years now and they'll tell you that they don't know much about it because it's there's a lot to learn there's a lot of research to be done and i think web3 can become a huge thing but we have to look at the at a wider horizon and that means like bridging the gap between TreadFi and DeFi.

1:13:21That means talking to regulators. That means education, a lot of education. A lot of education. And that means like education not only regarding Web3, how to set up a wallet or everything, but I think the very at the very end of the day with Web3, it's about self-sovereignty. And I don't, I do not think that society, individuals, even our generational peers are ready for self-custody. I can have all of my assets in a digitized form and hold them in my ledger, but people do not do it. Why is that? They're still doing it a bit more this year than last year with what happened? Actually, it was terrible, but it was a great reminder for this kind of not your keys, not your coin thing.

1:14:22And I mean, talking about last year,

1:14:27why was it so bad? Like what happened? How do you explain it? Well, I think what happened, whatever happened last year was necessary to happen. Let's take two examples, right? Let's take Luna collapse, right? But Luna's collapse was very interesting for me to watch because what was happening in the Luna ecosystem had a lot to do with all this laziness, right, that we were talking about, about these, like, shortcuts that not only our generation but society as a whole have been growing accustomed to. That means Anchor Protocol, right? A lot of fund managers, they were just, like, borrowing money, all this carry trade, right?

1:15:12Everybody knew that a lot of fund managers and heavy people in the industry, not only in DeFi, but in TradFi, they were borrowing cheap money here and putting into USDT and deploying it, staking in an anchor protocol for 18, 20 % API a year. That's easy. They're doing their job. The spreads were gigantic. Another feature of this laziness that you would see in the Luna case is how many people you know invested in Luna, were invested or like had position open positions exposure to luna or to ust and didn't really read the white paper because if you read the white paper you would know that there was a risk for that spiral this spiral yep and if you really want to manage your risk you would be constantly monitoring liquidity in the ecosystem and it could have predicted it because as we now know it like four five transactions in the span of like two three hours I think not even that broke the whole ecosystem yeah and and I I laugh at my friends that lost money with Luna you can laugh at me I lost a lot of money a lot I mean I was in the echo chamber had Dokun on the podcast saying oh yeah we do things differently we build an entire ecosystem around the stable coin so you have actual some usage and everything but if you think about it what was the only usage and core and what was it based on shortcuts 100 % so I still think that I still think that people like Duke on they they were unfortunate I don't think he trying to do something that was really hard.

1:17:05I don't think he had bad intentions. I think like people like the FTX case is a lot worse. I mean, SBF has done a lot worse than Do Kwon on being like an industry leader. Yet Do Kwon seems almost more hated with all what happened. That's something that I completely disagree. I mean, I may disagree with the way Duquan, like, led some of the interactions with the audience, like some of his tweets. Yeah, he was, yeah, very cocky and... Yeah, arrogant. Basically, yeah. Be arrogant sometimes. You don't say things like have fun staying poor and all that stuff. It's terrible. You're an industry leader.

1:17:47The industry need leaders that are willing to educate and be, like, a reference, not dicks. Like SBF was. I drive a cheap car. I go to the US Congress and I educate people and then I fuck everyone over. Yes. But then again, that's crazy. You rather have like a leader that is a bit arrogant, but it's trying to do something right. Because he's being attacked from everywhere. Or you rather have like a leader that is trying to fake and like convince everyone that he's a good guy. But all that he's doing actually is like giving privilege to his little girlfriend, to his friends, front-running trades of customers, managing very poorly, if managing at all, like a company like he was doing.

1:18:39As far as I know from people that were very close to him, he wasn't an executive at all. He spent most of his time playing League of Legends, not really caring about his own development. was a bit he was the real arrogant man yeah so Duquan was a little bit of a dick but he was too arrogant and his arrogance made a lot of damage a lot of people lost a lot of money life savings in FTX and I think I I'm very curious to see FTA SBF's trial in October it's in October it's in October what do you think is going to happen do you think it feels like with all the connections all the donations he made to all these politicians that yeah maybe they're gonna do like i mean let's see but probably a bit of jail but same as the guy from bitmex like oh you end up um you end up doing like kind of just stay at home for some time and then he's gonna probably especially in america these kind of personalities are more admired for what they've been able to pull so quickly and end up being another CEO or advisors or consultants or doing like these big talks where they paid a lot rather than being like treated as an example and say, hey, like Madoff, for example, hey, you're going to spend like the next 150 years in jail.

1:20:08I'll be honest to you. I hope to see SBF in prison. I really do hope to see SBF in prison. That would be a big example. That would be a big example. What's the message it would send if it was not sent to jail? Or like just like, oh, she's going to do one or two years in jail or at home. Like what's the message that would be sent? Like that you can trust institutions. Not only that. You can just trust. That you can get away with real bad things. And that's something that is really bad in Brazil. Because in Brazil, you've got a sense that justice doesn't really work. and if you know the right people or if you sometimes pay the right people, you can get away with pretty much whatever you do.

1:20:54But there is still the excuse that it's Brazil, it's Indonesia or it's the Philippines, a developing country, where we think that in developed countries, Switzerland, USA, Singapore, we think or hope things are different. You can't get away, but it's probably not the case. Like if you're, if we think the corruption is happening everywhere at different levels. It is. So that's going to be a very interesting case actually to see like how, how corruption in a developed country can be also very public and maybe, maybe he'll get away with it. Well, I think that again, I, I. That would be crazy actually.

1:21:40I'm hoping to see SBF go to jail for many years. I'm not like, I mean, I wouldn't mind that. I wouldn't feel pity of him. You know what I mean? I think he deserves that. I think you cannot do what he's done. You just cannot do like you've, you have a lot of responsibility under your umbrella. You have to step up to your game and, well, deserve, right? What you're getting. And I think the Arthur Hayes case is very different, right? Because I've read all the prosecution case against him, all the way that the prosecutors really, let's say, reverse engineered the market manipulation cases that they were trading against their own users and everything.

1:22:35He got away with it. we know that he made a deal with the authorities. He paid a fine. He probably had to name a few people that the authorities wanted to know about more than they cared about the few. I think they also used the racism card, basically, saying, oh, the racism card against, like, one of the few, you know, kind of influential black person in a new industry and that from what I hear that worked really well but again this is this is the law game right the lawyer's game is a dirty game yeah this is this is something that is like outside the boundaries of my understanding to be honest for me in the perfect world we I'm sorry my lawyer friends but in the perfect world because we're just good people with good intentions yes and common sense we shouldn't need lawyers we shouldn't need like complicated contracts with this like dialect that normal people don't understand.

1:23:44That's bad. But that's it. I think that last year was important. I mean, every bull bear cycle or every single like big event, failure event that we've seen in the Web3 space is making the industry, is building a more mature industry. And that's necessary because it's like, it's the thing about decentralization. Like decentralization sometimes works against our own principles in this industry because I'm a very strong advocate to cooperation in the industry. I think the things we need the most in Web3 right now are standards and broader cooperation. Because we're just losing way too much time, resources, and spending a lot more effort and energy on things that we could be doing in a more cooperative way between all these market participants for us to move faster and move forward with the industry.

1:24:55Like digital identity, I don't really like the competition that is out there to build like digital identity protocols. I really think that is something that should come out of a broader cooperation scheme between market participants. You know, everybody sit together. Let's build this digital identity protocol that everybody uses. There shouldn't be one entity, I mean, benefiting or profiting from it. It's a standard that is necessary, right? Same thing, you can go as far as like ZK roll-ups, right? Why aren't we cooperating to build one ZK roll-up standard and we're watching all these companies trying to do different ZK roll-up solutions when only one or two of them are going to survive?

1:25:45Where is all of this money funding ZK roll-up companies going to go? It's going to go anywhere, right? And what's going to happen with all these developers that are spending so very many hours and a lot of effort into developing these solutions that are not going to be used. So I'm a very strong advocate of broader cooperation in the industry and standardization. And that's something that unfortunately the idea, the very idea of decentralization actually operates against. Because when we are too decentralized, then that means that it's harder to promote broader cooperation. Yeah, absolutely. So this is something that we should be as a group, right?

1:26:38As an industry, we're looking at addressing more actively. What's your relationship with money? Money for me is fuel, right? Fuel. Yeah, it's resource, right? It's a mean. I need money to burn in my journey, to get where I want to, right? Which is basically in a state where I can be more impactful, where I can be more relevant to address the topics that I would like to address, which are basically social, economic, environmental issues and what keeps me alive and what keeps me here instead of being like in my sailboat somewhere offshore, writing books, watching movies, and not caring about anyone is the fact that I think that I can promote change.

1:27:36And I think that I can help. I can be with people like you. I can be working with interesting people throughout the globe to make things better. So it's an instrument for change, basically. Yeah, basically. Yeah. Do you think that money changed you as a person? Because you said you come from an upbringing that are kind of normal and not with a lot of money. For the better? Did you change for the better? Or did you also see some sides that you don't like? Or actually at some point that you didn't like? You know, because we always say like money doesn't change you that much. It more like kind of exposes you more or kind of like demultiplies your personality.

1:28:21So if you're a good person, it's going to show like more good thing. If you're not necessarily, I mean, the good aspects will show more. The bad aspects will also show more. Yes. Money has changed me for sure. I think money is the most powerful thing that is out there in the materialistic realm. Money is power, especially in days like this that we're living into. and as everything else in life I believe that life is not a 2d graph like like let's say a trading kind of technical analysis kind of graph is not up or down everything that happens is in life actually belongs to a treaty kind of that's a module of for understanding which means that whenever you're exposed to something very good that means that you're also capable of reaching the very far side of it right the very opposite side of it that that means that in order for you to be successful with money you have to experience for losses right and the more you win the more you expose it for of course and as what i'm saying that is like i've i've been in a position where i had a lot of money to invest and i invested it all basically in like equity in my companies in my family and everything i was never the guy i was never a conservative guy so i don't like i i'm i don't like to i don't really like to put the money to work for me because that means like i mean that that means that i'm cooperating with a whole broader scheme of like concentrating wealth and yeah making things even more goes against your principle of like changing things because you're just making money work for yourself and for your own safety like I mean passive income is one thing but I mean just yeah this just putting the money to work for you in a financial world and not generating any value do not generating value it's something that I feel I don't really feel comfortable with right but I again I come from a not from from a very like let's say middle class family and we never had much money so my family never really paid for an international trip of myself right so this is like i had to earn my own money and the more i took risks the more i made money but at one point or maybe more than one time i actually pretty much lost everything i had or or or found myself in a very illiquid position yeah right so i had to go through very How many times did this happen?

1:31:11For me, it happened twice already. I'm talking about life-changing wealth that either you lose, either you kind of stuck for a while, either you kind of get back to like, how the fuck did I manage to get back into this, I don't want to say precarious position because you still have an amazing life, but you need to be careful again, you know? And you're like, how the fuck did I manage to go from like, the Luna thing was a very interesting one. like$6 million US disappeared in two days and stuff. So, I mean, it became five bucks. So that's a change in lifestyle and in like everything, you know, because from this$6 million, like what can you generate?

1:31:53You invest in Bali real estate, let's say you have 20%. That's 1.2 mil per year in rental income. You invest in, I mean, whatever, you know, like if I had 5%, like that's a 300K a year. like that's it's huge doing nothing you know or you can reinvest a lot of different things or that could be at 100k a year that could be 60 60 years worth of life or that could be at 100k per villa in bali that would be 60 villas obviously you see everything on the screen you're like oh this is not real that's it but like so one of my points my point was basically i mean yeah getting back to like a couple of times to like, I mean, I see kind of wealth has like higher lows.

1:32:39So as long as the next low is like higher than the previous one, like you're improving. But yeah, sometimes as risk takers, like it's good because you don't get to like these big highs and everything without taking risks. But like also, you can easily put yourself like into like some shit situation where like, man, like really? Like really? where then you are less able to give more to everyone else because you just like fucked up the whole thing. I think answering your question, I've been in positions like that maybe two or three times too. Either very illiquid or actually losing what I had before.

1:33:27And I mean, to a point where you actually have to like either borrow from friends or like okay or really adapt your lifestyle drastically to to go basically to your eating habits you know yeah skipping meals ah okay that's that's next level okay when is the last time this happened uh I think a few years ago a few years ago a few years ago before COVID at COVID I was lucky enough to be to have a cushion You know, like, and I took the, I think, I look back and I feel like I took the right decisions, like sell the companies even for like, not as much money as I could have made. I had some savings and I could work myself through it.

1:34:22But before that, I had made mistakes as to like, not be liquid enough. and you don't want to borrow money, so you have to endure. It may have been for a limited amount of time that you know that it's going to be over. It was never like this kind of, oh, frick, I'm adrift. I never experienced that kind of despair, desperation, but I had experiences where I knew that I would have to endure. There's this window where you need to kind of survive because things will pick up later, but you need to be patient basically. Exactly. And accept the change in lifestyle. That teaches you a lot too, especially teaches you the value of money.

1:35:07Yeah. Big time. Big time. What's something that you believe in and your belief gets stronger every day? Something I believe and my belief gets stronger every day? Yeah.

1:35:27I believe very fondly in the value of building relationships. And every time I find a good new relationship, I try to work on that. You know, I try to, I always find, sometimes you don't know why. Sometimes it's like a very risky venture, right? Like, I don't know why I have an empathetic feeling or I don't know why I like, I feel like I'm connected to that person I feel like there's something can come out of this relationship or maybe you don't even know what, but it always pays off. It always pays off. Sometimes in the most unexpected ways. Karma. Yeah, I mean, I always tell my friends, like, give chance a chance.

1:36:12That's what I tell them. Give chance a chance because it always pays off. If you, being alive, like the existential human experience is a probabilistic adventure. If you don't expose yourself to the probabilities, you don't get them. So like be out there, expose yourself, keep yourself hungry, right? For new experiences, for learning, and you will pay off, I'm pretty sure. Awesome. Thank you so much for doing this, Rodrigo. My pleasure. My pleasure indeed. Muito obrigado. Where can people connect with you? I think I'm not a really social person in social media, I mean, but LinkedIn is a good way.

1:37:04I get a lot of people that reach out to me on LinkedIn. And I mean, I travel a lot and I'm always there into Web3 space. Like if you go through like Web3 events. Catch me if you can. Basically catch me. Playing the catch me if you can live. I'm not very easy to access and I like to keep things like that but I think LinkedIn is the professional environment so if you want to reach out to me hit me up on LinkedIn awesome thank you so much man thank you keep doing that man I like that this is very important absolutely

1:37:51Thank you.