(upbeat electronic music) >> Narrator: Live from Nassau in the Bahamas, it's theCUBE! Covering Polygon '18, brought to you by Polyman. >> Welcome back everyone, we're live here at theCUBE in the Bahamas, this is the live coverage in the Bahamas for Polycon '18, I'm John Furrier, this is a wrap up of our day two. We're going to do show wrap up, brought in special analyst guest, Dave Vellante, they had to jump on a plane, head back to Boston, get out before the snow storm, to head to California. Al Burgio and I are going to wrap it up. Al, serial entrepreneur, founder of FuseChain, and CEO of FuseChain and DigitalBits, an open source project, had you on yesterday, we also were out scouring last night and getting all the data. You were the only Cube alumni at this event, now we add in another 20, good success, good to add more, thought leaders into the family, with Polycon, but big story here is the security token. I mean, I was talking to the founder of Polymath, and Genevieve with Grit Capital, and just my take is, looking at the ecosystem, it's been a sigh of relief on one hand, oh my god, finally, documents we understand accredited investors, no scams, a feel for a good, solid foundation to get funding, no rush to do a utility token, because although utility is super important, people were using utility tokens to get funding, using that money and running as fast as they can to build a product, sub-optimized kind of role there, so again, big news there. >> No, absolutely, it's been, it's the natural evolution and companies like Polymath and Secure Ties and others are helping with this natural progression and birth of the security token. There's clearly a lot of people here interested in that, lot of action, lot of new announcements at the event as well. >> John: What jumped out at you for news announcements? >> The news, I guess. >> John: Ecosystem news is big. >> If we go with the latest today, announcement with Barbados Stock Exchange, folks at Polymath, it's interesting. These emerging markets embracing new technology, it's the next wave and a lot of capital is going to be raised this way. >> What did you learn last night, I mean, first of all this event just for the folks watching, was a real interesting event, it was a 400 plus attendees, really an industry conference about, what the thought was, you had whales, billion dollars of whales here, called whales, which they have a net worth in billions and millions, hundreds of millions, then you have investors, variety of investor types and then entrepreneurs, all coming together. I heard a lot of different things last night, what did you hear? >> You know, it's interesting, I mean a lot of people were sharing their perspectives. Some are presenting different perspectives of the future, (laughing) >> Come on, spit it out! >> Others are, you know, really, in some cases, stating the obvious. But there's definitely a strong ecosystem that's coming together here, strong alignment on a number of things, irrespective of where everybody's sort of come from or the industry that they're in. A lot of people want to see this new ASA class, come and grow and be very successful. So, you had YouTuber influencers here, you had CEOs of well-established organizations, and up-and-coming CEOs of a lot of these blockchain emerging companies. There's definitely tremendous synergy amongst some of them as well, in terms of how they're sharing perspective, and how they're, in some cases, working together. >> Liquidity has been a big option, I heard people talk about liquidity. What's your take on that? What's your observation of how that's evolving? >> Well, I think there's a huge opportunity with areas where traditionally, they've lacked liquidity. Or there's been minimal liquidity, tremendous friction and challenges in terms of being able to leverage what one possesses. Blockchain really presents a huge opportunity to change the game there, as it relates to DigitalBits and what we're focused on, we see a huge opportunity in all things loyalty rewards. There's in a lot of cases, these centralized organizations, you can kind of think of them like a central bank, and people have had these difficulties in earning points, if it's a pair of golf clubs you want, you maybe have to earn points for maybe three years and you get tired after a year. >> That's your venture. >> Yeah. >> I mean FuseChain and DigitalBits specifically is solving a big problem. >> Big problem, there's tremendous lack of liquidity in all things loyalty rewards. >> What's your angle of attack there? Obviously disrupting the pre-existing and somewhat fragmented loyalty programs. I mean, I'm in so many, I don't even use the airlines things anymore. I get so many points, I never use them, I try to use the good ones that I use a lot, like Southwest or whatever, as an example, I use because my kids need to fly to an event or soccer or whatever. But other ones, I've lost all my points. I don't even know the number. I mean, where the hell is it? >> Well it's. >> What email address did I use? >> It's about perceived value, right, maybe you started off with some degree of enthusiasm and had a higher perceived value, but then towards the end it goes to nil. 'Cause it's really. >> John: But I can't get (mumbles) with my points. This is the problem I want to ask you. >> Traditionally, what you see now, a few weeks ago we saw announcement by Singapore Airlines, announcing by August their existing loyalty programs and we place them into a blockchain. We're seeing examples of this almost every week now, companies are embracing blockchain technology and what this allows for now is a more frictionless transfer of points. So, for those companies that are embracing blockchain technology, if you have points, and yeah you could potentially, after you have X number of points, go and redeem them for something you like, but in the meantime, you get discouraged, maybe you love Southwest, but maybe some of these other programs, you could trade them and hand them over to someone that actually could take advantage of it and get an alternative asset that you have a higher perceived value for. >> Digital currencies and gaming has been around for a while. We've seen the young guns get that, that's like a fish to water. Obviously loyalty has different assets than old school techniques, old stacks, technology, if that. So anyway, I ask you the question, how is blockchain disrupting the loyalty program that is the massive billions of dollars being spent and earned in that market? >> A third of points never get redeemed. There's a huge problem with many corporations, they have, as they're issuing points, it's a liability on their balance sheet. More points get issued, it's a hemorrhaging issue. It could potentially create solvency issues for companies. There's actually been professors from some reputable organizations that have really done a tremendous research in this area, it really evolves nicely into what blockchain can do. >> Like, give me an example, I mean what is the disruptive nature of it? Is it storing of the value? Is it trading on that value? Is it, I mean what is the real one thing that blockchain does to the loyalty program? >> The fact that it allows for a more frictionless transfer of points, so for the programs that are tokenizing their points on a block chain, it empowers the user to be able to directly transfer those points. >> So you guys of FuseChain and DigitalBits, you're tokenizing loyalty. >> We're supporting organizations, our big mission is to support organizations that have either existing loyalty programs or wishing to create new loyalty programs to be able to tokenize those on chain, and the ability to then allow the consumers, the users of these points programs, to, in addition to the traditional uses, redeeming them perhaps in a rewards store or what have you, the ability to transfer them for other assets that they like. >> John: So if I understand this correctly. >> Other points that they like. >> The trend that you like, or would like to see continue or happen, is retailers or loyalty programs would tokenize themselves. So, there'd be, literally, thousands and thousands of loyalty tokens and you would be the platform to support that? >> That's correct, absolutely. So, I've used the sort of red hat analogy, we have FuseChain as well that's really focused on helping support enterprises that maybe are struggling to spell blockchain. But they see all the value. >> That's everybody. >> Well from a technology perspective. Similar to Linux being born, enterprises needed to go to companies like a red hat, to support them with the integration, maintenance, so on and so forth of such technology. We're focused on having an evolving ecosystem of other organizations that can support enterprises that have loyalty programs, consume blockchain technology. >> You're a tech entrepreneur, I'm a tech entrepreneur. I have a media business, you're building another business, you sold your last business, you're very successful. You and I always talk about this, but I want to ask you here live on theCUBE, as a tech entreprenur, what is the opportunity that this ecosystem of tokenizing your business, using blockchain, how do you look at it and how would a solid tech entrepreneur look at this opportunity to integrate it, a new enabling technology, what's the orientation, what's your view on how tech entrepreneurs should look at it, and how do you look at it? >> Well, so, if we just, as it relates to the liquidity issue, this is a very powerful thing. Right now, perceived value for many points programs is very low. So, if the perceived value, you solve the liquidity issue or you create technology that can help solve the liquidity issue, the opportunity for the perceived value to be perceived in a more optimal light, everybody kind of wins. The merchant, the business that is issuing these points, they now have a more desirable asset that they're issuing, and as a result of that, consumers have an ever-growing desire to want to be part of these programs and earn points. So this is, it's fascinating when you start to think of it, in terms of. >> Technology is applying, 'cause it's the application of societal impact, whether it's a retailer or a non-profit, tokenization is happening. >> Absolutely, and it's happening obviously, not just in loyalty rewards, we've seen it happen, starting to happen now in other spaces, and with different. >> John: Your big takeaway, obviously. >> ASA classes. >> You've done a lot of work, and I know you can't talk about it 'cause you're in start-up mode and you're doing some financing right now, but just generally speaking, and I'm totally, the landscape of this ecosystem, health-wise, feels like the security token has been a good thing, utility token is still evolving, under observation, obviously SEC and other regulatory challenges, good, bad, ugly, I mean still scams out there? We're hearing the community loud and clear, we're going to stamp out the scams and flush that through the system, as fast as possible. Your take on this ecosystem? >> I think those that are taking their time to build great technology and doing it at the right pace will build great products and ideally do it at such a rate and in such an order that they'll stay out of trouble. (laughs) We're seeing a lot of great entrepreneurs come together, surround themselves with their own ecosystems and building great platforms. I think where we see others that are moving a little too quickly, they might trip on their shoelaces. >> Yeah and people don't, I mean the general consensus is "You're going to move fast, but you don't want to be in jail." Literally, I heard that quote here on theCUBE. (laughs) Investors we've been meeting, we've had on theCUBE but also we've chatted, I know I've seen you chatting, sidebars, I've had a lot of sidebars, Dave has as well, conversation among investors, not necessarily with you, I know you can't talk about it, 'cause that's, it's a hot deal, but I mean, in general, generally speaking, what's the conversations in the investor landscape that you're seeing and hearing here? >> Its interesting, everyone is trying to find their own point of view or speculating in terms of what's going to happen next. I've heard comments in terms of arbitrage as a result of income tax, people realizing that transferring between alt coins is actually likely taxable, and accountants making new investors in the space aware of these things, and having to potentially sell to be able to pay that bill. Then there's others where a lot of us are seeing this as an emerging technology, the actual use of certain, let's say, utility coins, it has not yet been demonstrated. That doesn't necessarily suggest that a particular project is bad, things do take time, I mean, we saw in the 90's with the internet, I mean, remember starting in that space, I call it the dial-up modem era, (laughs) You know, but we had these big visions of video, and theCUBE could not be possible at that time. But the vision of a Cube could be, you know, a wonderful thing, people could've bought into that. You kind of ride the trend, evolve your technology, and then you disrupt and you help change the game. >> Final question, obviously your business is, you're doing some things here, how did the show go for you here? You feel good about it? >> Absolutely. Obviously this is not like an Amazon, some of the other events we've been at but. >> It's more intimate. >> But. >> John: But there's money here, there's billionaires here. >> Absolutely, and look at any of those type of events, I mean they start with thousands, and tens of thousands, and the next year it's twenty thousand, we're going to see that kind of growth in this space as well. It's great to be involved in it early, but there's definitely quality, high-profiled individuals here, high net worth individuals, and they're investing their money in this space and they're going to help drive it forward. >> I remember the first show we did with Amazon and meeting Andy Jassy for the first time, first of all, really like him a lot, sports fan like me, but he's also really smart, a great operator, he made a comment that some of the best companies are ones that are misunderstood in the beginning, obviously we run a different kind of media business, people don't really understand us, cryptocurrency and blockchain is funny because everyone understands it, but doesn't understand it. (laughing) They understand how big it's going to be, and there's money involved, so that's the key learning that I had this week, was, yeah, we see the big opportunity, we can see money being made, but people still don't truly understand what it is. If you talk to all the smartest people, whether it's Jeremy, that came on at 26 years old, to Bill Tie, they say, "We're learning, everyday." The women in tech, the CryptoChicks came on and said, "This is learning environment, "this is still not understood." >> Absolutely. >> "And this is the big opportunity." >> It is a huge opportunity. In the early 90's, people didn't understand the internet, and there's a classic program episode of The Today Show, and I think it was Bryant Gumbel trying to understand what is the internet, you know, and so forth. Fast forward, here we are. Fascinating things, there's smart individuals that can see and embrace the vision right away, others were scratching their head but eventually, we'll all get there. (laughs) >> Al, great to see you and great to see a Cube alumni here too, I'm glad you were here, 'cause I get to know at least one person that I know intimately of Cube alumni. We added 20 more new Cube alumnis, the sun is setting here in theCUBE, day two of wall-to-wall coverage, I'm John Furrier, really excited to have been part of this event, it begins, kicks off our 2018 cryptocurrency tokenizing the world, blockchain, top events, theCUBE will be there, theCUBE is there, it's relevant, we're going to be tracking all the signal, and extracting it from the noise and sharing it with you. It's a wrap up of the cryptocurrency token economics decentralized internet at Polycon 18, here in the Bahamas, thanks for watching. I want to thank all the crew here, great job, and you guys watching. More to come! Stay tuned, check out siliconangle.com, thecube.net, and wikibon.com, of course, CubeCoin coming soon, stay tuned for what we're doing love to tokenize that business, everyone's doing it, it's really relevant and thanks for watching. (upbeat electronic music)