>> Announcer: From New York, it's theCUBE! Covering Blockchain Week. Now, here's John Furrier. Hello everyone this is theCUBE's exclusive coverage here in New York at Blockchain Week New York, #BlockchainNY this is theCUBE, I'm John Furrier your host. Our next guest is Madhu Kutty, who's a partner at Arcadia Crypto Ventures, thanks for joining me here in New York City. We're at the Block Party, a private event here, thanks for joining us during Blockchain Week. >> Yep. >> So you guys do a lot of deals, we had Richard on, who's the managing partner of the firm, early in the space, super early, so you're in the front wave, get all the best deals, now it's competitive, you got to read the white papers, you got to get down and dirty. Still got the pretenders, figure out what's the bad deals, the good deals, and then when you get a good deal make sure it's tailor fit, both the tech matches the economics. (laughing) which I find to be interesting, because, you can have a brilliant entrepreneur come in but their token model's off. Do you see this every day? >> Yeah, we see this a lot. Especially the last year things were much more easier, because most of the people who are coming were generally at least trying to do something good, but this year we see a lot of people who just want to make use of the bail that's happening, just get on the hype and get some quick buck, even on traditional firms that've failed are coming and trying to capture the blockchain hype. >> Yeah, so throw the hail Mary basically, let's do an ICO, and they're going, we're going under throw the hail Mary! >> Yes, that's what we see a lot happening, and then there was a lot of tech projects back in the past so it was a little more easy to evaluate, so, but this year you're seeing more real business applications coming onboard. >> I was talking with Richard about some of the growth things around crypto, and I want to get your take on it because, the internet infrastructure is changing. We see the web 1.0, I mean we hear in these, all the events I go to, similar kind of conversation, TCBIP created inter-networking and inter-operability, HTTP created a whole new way to do things: web 1.0. Now we're hearing token economics and blockchain as a new way, but yet, inter-operating with the old systems, so you have a whole seat change, and there's a real tech-enablement. What's your view on this, because some people get it wrong, they understand what the business logic means, but they want to know what the tech-enablement is. What's the tech that's driving all this new infrastructure? >> So the internet, you could think of it as a way to share information with a worldwide audience, so blockchain, for the first time ever, enables on blockchain, or the inter-crypto infrastructure, first time enables humans to transfer value over the wire. So you could represent one as one over the wire, rather than creating like a duplication of one. So you could have your own Bitcoin stored on the network, and you can access it yourself, and you can send that value across. This was never possible in the history of the human race, so that's what a blockchain enables, it's the solution to basically this general problem, and we always thought that it was not possible but for the first time ever we have a means to achieve that. >> I've also been saying at some of these cube events, that every company needs a chief economic officer, you used to have a CGO, now you need a chief economic officer. So I got to ask you, when you see a technology, you got to kind of make sure it marries the right model. So in the token world, putting security tokens aside, which I like by the way. They're very easy to deal with, utility tokens are different you have two types of utility tokens a work-like token, and a burn-mint equilibrium approach. What's your take on the two strategies there, when should some appoint a burn-mint--or a BME strategy versus say a work token which is much more of a utility classic. >> So a burn token is what has been the work, at least in the past, for building actual platforms, so that solution itself is not fully solved. So once we solve that completely, that's when we see much more utility tokens coming on board, but as this point we see more of the remittance problem that's being solved so that, we have a lot of exchanges, and transferring of currency that's being worked on. So you can think of it like the email in the internet era, though we had all these different .coms, only email worked well. So right now the transfer of value, the remittance on the exchange is the only thing that's working, but as we go forward we'll see much more business models coming out. >> So it's really going to evolve. >> Yep. I think this could be the year that's going to be-- Ethereum was moment when, there was the Ethereum moment when you really could start the next generation of the cryptocurrency movement, so I think this year we could see more business. >> And I've heard some of the conversations here at the consensus event around, a lot of people trying to force blockchain and decentralize, specifically with a centralized business model, so a lot of people are poopooing that. Which is, we just call that blockchain washing, white washing, trying to save themselves. So I got to ask you, I mean first of all, I remember having conversations back when the web started, oh my God, AOL and this 14.4 dial up is so slow, so much slower than a mini computer, technically right, mini computer was much faster than dial up modems to web, but web wasn't replacing the mini computers, replacing direct mail, direct response, analog things. So the question I want to ask you is: what is the analog displacement, what apples-to-apples comparison should we be making when people throw out these idiotic comments like, oh my God blockchain's so slow, because it is kind of slow, the web was slow too, but it replaced something old. Is it right, is blockchain replacing something old, and what is the right comparison? >> So the right comparison is that it is, it has solved, theoretically, the problems, the theoretical solution for these problems we are going to solve the decentralization and decentralizing business, theoretically we have solved it, and we have proved it practically, it's possible, but it is not really there for that-- the mass option for real business to onboard, it has not reached that scale yet. As we all know, if Netflix was in business in 1999, it could never succeed. But then a lot of infrastructure was built up on top of it, and Netflix worked, so the same thing is going to happen here. >> So you're not worried about the complains when people say it's slow? >> No, because there's more in IC, each time I go to these conferences, as you have seen, more and more smart people are jumping in, more and more money is flowing in-- >> The web grew too, more people were using the web, so growth was the key. >> Yeah, growth is the key, and more smart people coming, and they're going to figure it out. >> When you look under the hood of a company they come in and say hey I want to get funding, or I have this great business model, or I take an existing business and tokenize it. What are the things you look for in a good ICO candidate, or just someone who's tryna do token economics, with a technology trying to transition, not pivot, transform into token economics? >> So a lot of it, something people call it is conviction-based investing, so that's a lot, they have a lot in this cryptocurrency space. So we look at the technology, underlying technology, how we can solve some of the issues. We look at the broader aspect of the space, how big the space is so it can solve that, and we also look at the team, and if these three things are in good combination we believe in it can be a rival business. And also the partners, or the founders, have to be a little less greedy, like look for smaller raises that's good enough for the next two years, roughly. >> Well I think entrepreneurs can get liquid faster off token economics, I think it's actually better for the entrepreneur, in my opinion. I want to take change gears a second talk about you personally how did you get here, did you just wake up one day and say I'm going to work for Arcadia Crypto Ventures, were you scratching an itch, did you come from finance, what's your background? >> My background has been in technology and finance, worked with a bunch of Wall Street banks, then private equity firms, then I was running a technology firm when I met Richard, who's very early in the space. So we talked about it and he had a lot of interesting questions about the space so myself and one of my partners we went back and researched on it. So we came back with these answers, he had a little more insight, back in the day, more access to the detail during that time, so we worked with him, and loosely, we worked as some kind of analyst for him and we started working together and then it formalized in a bigger way, now we are working. >> When did you have that moment saying damn this is going to be good? >> I think, so it was once we totally understood the Santoshi Paper, at that point we knew that this is going to change the world. But even I didn't expect that this would be this fast. So what we are seeing today, at that time I thought maybe we'll see that in 2020, 2021, but the space exploded. Ethereum hitting a thousand, which it hit sometime this year I was thinking might happen sometime 2021 or 2022, by then. >> What sector surprised you the most, was it the trading side, the entrepreneur side, what area of the market has surprised you the most? >> What's surprising is the world wide ERD option, and how especially the new generation has kind of lost a bit of interest, not even like they are disillusioned with this other investment model, they are jumping in a big way. And I think this is even ruggedly, everyone has to look for that, these people have come in, so let's get it right for these folks so that they have a belief in the system and they can go forward. >> Madhu I want to get your thoughts on something I think is important for folks to understand, and that is there's a lot of liquidity, Richard mentioned that liquidity is an important part. >> Absolutely. >> So there's a lot of new dynamics and art and science that goes into the trading side of it, much accelerated than a classic IPO or say a hedge-fund kind of deal, where there's always kind of some stuff going on, but here you can get much earlier in on the process. Talk about, for the folks who like now know what a wallet is and might have an account on Coinbase, to the extent that that's their knowledge base. You're so much deeper on some of the trading side, what are the dynamics, how would you break down the trading situation on crypto, give us the crypto trading 101. >> So the idea is that, first of all, there are some huge exchanges, so every cryptocurrency out there wants to be on these exchanges, so these exchanges have much more trading volume, have much more liquidity, that's where you want to be. If you are doing some investment and you want to protect it, you want to be in these highly liquidized ones. And so I would stick to top 10-20 coins for the majority of the portfolio if you want to protect your investment, so that has a lot more liquidity. And then, around I would say 10-20% you would do in sectors that you are interested in, where you really have some kind of idea, that's what I call a conviction-based investment. >> So if I want to convert my crypto to Fiat currency, you're saying stay with the top trading forms, or stay with the sector, what's the advice? >> If you're a regular investor, who's not following the market 24/7 I would say, at least, put like 80% on the top 20 coins where there is much more liquidity and which, you know won't go bust tomorrow. Then you would focus maybe 10-20% of your-- this is, I'm just talking with a crypto portfolio, on something you are going to have some kind of conviction, if you, let's say you are in an automobile space, that's what you understand a lot so any crypto on that, which you think is interesting, you could put your money there. And I'm a tech person, so I would put more money on technology platforms. >> What's your favorite tech coins right now, what're the investments you're putting money into? >> Oh, we've always been long on Bitcoin, Ethereum, so there are a lot of new, exciting stuff coming, like EOS, like we are big on Tezos, it's a very community-driven project, we are very excited about that, what Bloq is bringing, Metronome, I think that's going to be huge. These are very unique in their own ways, you're also offering something as a challenger to Ethereum, Tezos, also in some form, where they're very community-focused. And Metronome, for the first time, offers the ability to do cross-platform transactions. >> Madhu, this space is attracting a lot of young kids, I say kids, coming out of business school, or from a firm like Goldman Sachs, one of these classic firms, kind of bored. They want to do something new. What's your advice to the next generation coming in, jump on the wave, fall down, learn it, get off my wave, get off my beach, I mean what's your advice for the young people? >> If I was in that spot right now, I would just jump in and go with the flow, and you'll figure out what you need to do. At least rather than stick with the traditional companies, this is something new and exciting, and at least the next two-three years, spend on-- >> Get's your hands dirty, don't lose a lot of money. Try not to lose a lot of money. (both laughing) Madhu, thanks for coming on-- >> Thank you! >> Appreciate the commentary. We're here, exclusive coverage, we're at the Block Party, here at the Blockchain Week New York, exclusive continued coverage with theCUBE, we're here in New York City to breakdown all the action inside the ropes of the industry, I'm John Furrier, thanks for watching. (bubbly music)

>> Announcer: Live from Nassau in the Bahamas, it's theCUBE, covering Polygon 18, brought to you by Polymax. >> Hello, welcome back to our live coverage of this exclusive Cube coverage in the Bahamas for PolyCon 18. It's cryptocurrency, it's token economics, its de-centralized world, it's all about the future of the Internet, Dave. I'm with Dave Vellante here, our next guest is Margaux Avedisian, EVP of Transform Group, and partner and co-founder of Cool Pool Fund. Great to have you on. Thanks for joining us. >> Yeah, thanks for having me. >> So you're on the Women's Panel. I saw you up there: Women in Crypto one of our big focus areas this year, as well as Crypto for Good. So super excited to have a conversation with you, but first take a step back. Introduce yourself, what are you workin' on? What's cool? What's gettin' you excited in the space, in life? What is the crypto thing? What does it mean to you? >> Sure, so I lived in San Francisco in 2011, so I had a bunch of nerd friends, and you know, I heard about this crazy crypto currency called Bitcoin. I had free office space for my startup, so that meant free electricity, so I was like, oh, let's start mining, 'cause we have free electricity. You know, we're not really raisin' money with this thing. (laughter) And I ended up not doing that. I thought that'd be a jerk thing, but I'd be retired by now, so kind of regretting that decision. So 2012, I met the people who were re-launching the first American bitcoin exchange, Trade Hill. I ended up joining that, and at that time, I used to say, oh, I'm the leading woman in bitcoin, but I was also the only woman in bitcoin. (laughter) And then after that, I ended up co-founding another bitcoin exchange called Alpha Coin, which pivoted still around, and then I co-founded another exchange called Magnetico, pivoted also still around, and then I joined Transform Group as EVP, and we're the leading PR firm in the bitcoin and blockchain ICO space. So we've done most of the big ICOs. We did Ethereum, Auger, Made Safe, Gollum, Nosis, Quantum, Unicoin, Wax, Bancor, et cetera. We've done over 70, 60 at this point, so I have a lot of experience seeing ICOs, how they've kind of changed and evolved. Then I started a pre-ICO syndicate, so getting in before the public sale, getting a super discount, which then turned into a fund, because people were like, can I just give you money? This is really complicated, like I don't know what I'm doing, so I was like forced. My hand was forced. (chuckling) >> Yeah, I'll take your cash. Just send it to me. No contract. >> Well no no no, actually the space, you really have to have a team of lawyers. It, you know, they're not too big to fail. >> Just take the cash and say you were hacked, and then disappear, right? >> Yeah you know, that's getting a little more difficult to do that. It looks like they're tracking now. >> Margaux wouldn't steal electricity. (laughter) She's not going to do that. >> That's actually true. >> Of course, I'm being facetious. I'm a comedian, for crying out loud. I'm trying to get her on a roll, here. Okay, funniest story in crypto for you right now that you've seen, could be back in history in time. >> Yeah. >> What's the funniest thing you've seen? Or the most outrageous thing? >> Is this PG? Or like, what can I? >> It's Internet, it's unrated. It's NC-17 or unrated. >> Alright, you mean the time when one of the crypto, hedge fund people took a ton of liquid acid and then I had to take care of him, and he ended up eating all of my birth control pills, and I had to take him to the hospital because I thought he was going to die. (laughter) So that was pretty crazy. >> Anchor: OD'd on birth control pills. That's a first. >> That would be a first. >> 'Cause the only person that was awake at the time that I could ask who was a chemist and who was an EMT said his body temperature, but when I took him to the hospital, the nurses, I thought he was going to die, and then the nurses are all like, well, he's not going to get his period. (laughter) >> That's for sure. >> I'm like, is he going to die? They're like, bring him back if he's spotting. (laughter) I'm like, so he's okay? He's alright? And so, yeah, it was fun, they were like, we're more worried about the acid. So, yeah that's I guess maybe up there in the top five. >> So you've seen 60, 70, you've seen a lot. You've got a good observation space. Tell us what that's like, I mean, public relations for me is hard, like messaging, I don't have that gene, as you know, John. So, how have you been able to shape it. Do you get a lot of 'em and just go oh no, these guys really need tons of help, or take us through some of the examples, maybe not specifically but just generally how you would approach that problem. >> Sure, so first of all, we don't just take anyone. We do vetting and it has to have a story we can sell. Luckily at our firm, we have a lot of people, including the founder Michael Turpin and myself, who have a background in this space, so we understand really what they're saying. And our job, really, is to break it down so regular people understand what the heck we're talking about and why it's important. So I think a lot of, part of the problem with people not getting into crypto currency is that they get too hung up on the technical details. You know, I don't know how my television turns on. I don't know how my debit card works. There's so many things we do without knowing the technical backgrounds of it, and we don't get hung up on that. And for some reason, this industry, people get really hung up on the technology instead of understanding the uses and the purpose of it, and so that's what we really do. We talk about what is the purpose of this? How is this important? How is this changing an industry? And relating it, maybe, to news that's going on right then. So it's really just making it understandable to regular people. >> Yeah, some of the women in crypto conversation, women in tech >> Sure. >> Dave and I have a passion for this because we have a lot of women friends that are either executives and or in good positions, and we interview them, like they were a guy. So we never really got into that whole thing. Turns out we got a big library of women in tech, and it's been so politicized and it's so important. And certainly we agree that, you got to do all that, but if we're even having the conversation, that makes it a problem. So at what point, then, do we need to do kind of keep the vibe going to saying, okay, let's focus on positive, and what's your just view of how to make it engaging, 'cause women make up 50% of the population. >> Yeah. >> And so, what do we do? >> First, I want to say, there are actually some badass women in crypto. Two of the biggest ICOs had female founders. They're Bancor and Tezos. I would say more than you would expect, but they're not as loud and brash as I am, so it might be harder for you to see them. Conferences definitely need to be putting more women on these panels. >> This conference here has a lot of representation, by far, really strong. >> Yeah, well, to be honest, like putting me on a Women in Blockchain panel. I love talking to women, and it's inspiring them, and telling them you can do it, 'cause part of the thing is, nobody's a blockchain expert, alright? There's no such thing because it's just changing so fast. There's too much information out there. And I think sometimes women get hung up on needing to know everything before they do something, and I like to say, you know, probably 80% of the men here have no idea what they're talking about. So, you don't have to >> John: I mean, always be learning in this space. This is an evolution. >> Yeah, and in doing, when I first got into this space and started the first American bitcoin exchange, I didn't even know what an exchange was, you know? But I met one of the co-founders of YouTube, who was into bitcoin, who had a fund, and I ended up leveraging that to get into this, and I learned as I went, and what's so exciting right now about blockchain is that it's really integrated in pretty much every industry you can imagine. I mean, people are doing ICOs in health care, in fashion, in anything you can think of. So if you have experience and skills in one industry, you can then leverage that in another. So if you're a woman in finance, guess what? If you join someone's ICO, and they have someone from a traditional finance world, you're lending credibility, and that's valuable. And that kind of experience, and we need to bring more mature industries into blockchain. >> This is what I think, I mean, you've heard me say this, like never before, you could see, because it's digital, because it's data, as blockchain is, people can traverse industries like never before. >> Yeah. >> It used to be, if you're in health care, you're in health care for life, that's it. >> Yeah. >> But some of the digital skills that people are learning are applicable to other industries. Do you feel like, I think you just said it, that that will promote more woman involvement. You're saying it's disproportionately high here. I don't know. >> I thought it was a little interesting that they put me on a Women in Blockchain panel instead of putting me on a panel that I could talk about my experience, since I have a lot. >> Dave: That's my point. >> Instead of that. >> Winning Women, or whatever, I mean. >> Well, I wouldn't segregate all the women into one panel. I would want to put them on other panels, I mean. >> Yeah, I mean you want to put them on panels where there are pros, and they can do the job independently. >> Exactly. >> Just being a player. >> Alright, Margaux. >> A lot of women say that though. They say, let's not make this about women in tech or you know Lara Logan, and that crew, Naomi Tutu. It all depends >> And so their social justice gene >> but I'm curious how do you feel about that? It was shining a light on whether it's women in tech or women in crypto, does that, is that offensive to you? Do you welcome that? Some welcome it, others? >> I think it's weird because I've been in this industry for so long, and now I think it's good that it's becoming a topic, but it was never anything that I even paid attention to. In fact, I'd rather focus on the positives, 'cause being a woman in this industry is great because, guess what, I can just say whatever I want. I can get away with saying things and calling out the elephant in the room where most men can't. But it's, I think part of the problem is these guys here want to hire women, but how do they find them? And I just had someone come up to me from Zedd saying, we want to hire a female CMO, like how do we find that? And the jobs are out there, it's about being able to get these women who want to do this and connecting them to opportunities. bUt on the other hand, women really need to be more assertive and be like hey, I don't know anything about blockchain, but I want to learn. So I'm going to go to a conference instead of being like I don't know anything, and I'm scared, so I don't want to go to a conference, you know? Like I said, most men don't know what they're talking about here. >> Well I mean, everyone's learning. We're trying to figure it out. Margaux, thanks for coming on, appreciate it. >> Yeah, thank you so much. I really appreciate it. >> We're looking for the stand-up comedian act. We'll get that on our next episode Thanks for comin' on. >> Yeah! And check out my videos, too, if you want. >> Alright, what's your YouTube address? >> It's youtube.com/margauxwithanx. Thank you. >> Alright, we'll put it on the blog. We'll be back with more live coverage after this short break. (electronic music)