Good Morning Everyone,
Strike CEO and Founder, Jack Mallers, recently presented to the IMF regarding Bitcoin, Strike and the implications for cross-border payments. He posted the presentation to his youtube - Linked here.
Firstly, you have gotta love seeing a young individual like Jack absolutely laying down to the IMF in his inimitable style running a hot pink hoodie and a baseball cap giving zero f***s. Phenomenal.
He begins his presentation by re-engineering the title, from:
Strike - Disrupting Cross Border Payments? (with a question mark)
to
Bitcoin - Disrupting Cross Border Payments (no questions mark)
as he highlights:
“Ofcourse, you all gave it that title. Not me. You didn’t consult me at all”
What a savage!
What stands out instantly here; Jack is well across the state of play within the industry of cross border payments. He has a deep knowledge of how these systems work, and how they have evolved. It’s this understanding that provides clarity around the need to update the old system, and at the same time makes the solution so clear.
As he mentions the Swift system, developed in 1973, by banks and for banks, is coming up to 50 years old, and while it still carries 80% of cross border transactional volume, it simply falls well short of being an acceptable standard in todays digitally connected world.
He does an excellent job of highlighting the flaws within the current system:
* Speed (too slow)
* Limited transparency and dependability
* High Cost thus high fees
* Lack of interoperability
* Limited coverage
* Limited accessibility
The bottom line here - Bitcoin solves this and Jack just orange pilled the IMF.
Bitcoin is Open, accessible globally by anyone. Anyone can send and receive and it achieves cash finality of a bearer instrument to anywhere in the world, almost at no cost and virtually instantaneously.
Bitcoin + the Lightning network is so far superior as a monetary system and network, compared with some 50 year old network, which predates the internet, that it makes it almost impossible for me to imagine that anyone could ignore this innovation and in my opinion, it is just a matter of time.
I highly recommend you watch the full clip to the end to hear jacks story about tortilla chips, trail mix and the peanut network as he presents to one of the most powerful monetary institutions on our planet. Absolutely inspirational stuff and I cannot get enough.
The world is changing. Closed systems with rulers cannot compete with an open and global standard where anyone can join without needing any credentials and the network effect that this innovation is and will continue to create. It’s is literally going to be a tsunami.
It gets me so fired up to see powerful young humans rising up in the world and working to make it better for others, regardless of what benefits the existing rent seeking incumbents.
Hope this finds you well, and i look forward to speaking with you tomorrow.
AK
