#1209 Dom Bei | Firefighters Are Buying Bitcoin!

Dom Bei is a Santa Monica firefighter, he is also the former president of the Firefighters Union, and a bitcoin author. In this conversation, we talk to him about the Santa Monica Firefighter Union being the first union in the country to not only buy bitcoin, but also hold it in self-custody. Dom describes how they did it, why they did it, what the risks were, and what the response has been. ======================= Pomp writes a daily letter to over 235,000+ investors about business, technology, and finance. He breaks down complex topics into easy-to-understand language while sharing opinions on various aspects of each industry. You can subscribe at https://pomp.substack.com/

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:02Anthony Pompliano?

  What's up everyone. This is Anthony Pompliano. Many of you know me as Pomp. You're listening to the Pomp Podcast, which is my effort to find the most interesting people in the world and sit with them for hours while I ask questions in an effort to learn. So it would mean the world to me if you would subscribe to the show on your favorite audio platform, watch episodes on YouTube, and tell your friends and family about the podcast. My goal is to help millions learn from the world's most interesting people. So let's get into today's episode. Dom Bae is a Santa Monica firefighter. He's the former president of the firefighters union and he's a Bitcoin author. In this conversation, we talked to him about the Santa Monica firefighter union being the first union in the country not only to buy Bitcoin

• 0:46Anthony Pompliano?

  on their balance sheet, but to hold it in self custody. There's many other pensions and unions around the country who have allocated to Bitcoin, but the Santa Monica firefighters union is the first to do it with self custody. Dom does a great job describing how they did it, why they did it, what the risks were, and what the response has been. I really enjoyed this conversation with Dom and I hope you guys enjoy it as well. Here's my conversation with Dom Bae.

• 1:15Speaker 01

  The action's on the court and as the official beer sponsor of the NBA, Michelob Ultra is getting fans closer to the game with a chance to win courtside seats, merch, and more. Visit michelobultra.com/courtside to enter. Michelob Ultra Courtside 26 to 27. No purchase necessary. Open to US residents 21+. Begins on October 1st, 2026 and ends on June 30th, 2027. Multiple entry periods. See official rules at michelobultra.com/courtside for free entry, entry deadlines, prizes, and details.

• 1:43Anthony Pompliano?

  Anthony Pompliano runs Pomp Investments. All views of him and the guests on his podcast are solely their opinions and do not reflect the opinions of Pomp Investments. You should not treat any opinion expressed by Pomp or his guests as a specific inducement to make a particular investment or follow a particular strategy, but only as an expression of his personal opinion. This podcast is for informational purposes only.

• 2:07Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, guys. Bang, bang. I've got Dom here with me. Dom, you guys just made news out in Santa Monica. The Santa Monica kind of fire union and kind of the entire region now is going and putting Bitcoin on its balance sheet. This is different than the fire department doing it. It's different than the pension fund doing it, but it's the union. Help us explain what is the union and why are the firefighters all coming together to make this decision?

• 2:32Speaker 02

  Yeah, so the firefighters' union, you know, each department or members of that department have a union. That's a chapter of a state union, national union. And in the case of Santa Monica, it's 113 members that make up this union. The step that occurred, and there was a long path to kind of get there, was basically a one-time assessment to explore Bitcoin, not just as an asset, but as a network, as a monetary instrument, as an innovation, and take a step to do that. And so what occurred was a very, very small allocation one time

• 3:14Speaker 02

  to self-custody Bitcoin. And that, as far as I know, is the first time that a union in the country has self-custodied Bitcoin. Others have purchased it, held it on their balance sheet, pension funds, etc., but not in this way.

• 3:30Anthony Pompliano?

  When you guys went to make the decision, walk me through, does it come up in a meeting? Somebody kind of makes a proposal? Is it just like a wild idea while you guys are out drinking one night? Like, how does the idea kind of first come up? And then what was the actual process when you described that you went and you actually underwrote? What is the asset? What are the monetary properties? And what is the innovation?

• 3:49Speaker 02

  So there's a, there's a really long story that I'll sum up quickly for the, for the show. Long story short, you know, I was first exposed to Bitcoin in, well, 2011. Everyone has that story where they, they weren't like listening and it's like, okay, so that's when, 2017. I actually worked at this conference and learned a ton about, that kind of like the door got opened. Learned about Bitcoin, always understood the, the value of Bitcoin and what it meant and that it was the first. Of course, the long road after that, and then had what I call like a re-orange pilling turn of events. And that's a long story, but basically I was working.

• 4:32Speaker 02

  And we had a rescue at work of an analyst and it was leading up to Pacific Bitcoin. And I was once I was working that. And so we had this rescue of an individual from the Bitcoin community and that kind of reopened my, my eyes and got me re, I say an up to a dose of the orange pill. From there.

• 4:55Anthony Pompliano?

  Wait, hold on, hold on. Describe when you say that you're rescuing a Bitcoiner. Describe kind of whatever detail you can in terms of like their house is on fire and you're like going into the house to actually pull them out of the house. And then you're sitting on the curb afterwards. They're like, hey, by the way, you know about Bitcoin? Or like, what, what happened?

• 5:12Speaker 02

  So I was working with my crew at the beach. At the time, it was the morning of like the FTX news had broke. So of course, being the Bitcoiner I already am, I'm coming in like, all right, what is going on in, in this? Like, all right, you know, Bitcoin is down. Where, where, it's not a question of like, if it's how and what's the, what's the move? And you know, how, how much are we talking here? So as that happens, a call goes off and it was for an individual who was hurt at the beach. And we go to the beach. There's an individual kind of holding their neck. They're just sitting there and they had dove in the water. And for those that don't know, that aren't from the West Coast or East Coast, you know, you have a sandbar that kind of goes like this, it dips down and then

• 5:56Speaker 02

  comes back up. So potentially this individual dove in what was deep water into a shallow area, hurt their neck.

• 6:03Speaker 02

  You know, that's one of those calls where it seems like it's not a big deal. We packaged the person up. We're going in route. I like to make conversation. My crew, like unbelievable crew that they, you know, they, we took the precautions and, and we're going in route, trying to make small talk. Turns out this person's an analyst for Swan. And we're talking and I'm like, dude, I'm working that you're an analyst. First of all, stop the ambulance, dude. Like, like what's happening, right? Like, where are we at, dude? And I'm like, I'm just kidding. We're laughing. Didn't stop the ambulance. But long story short, he ended up having a broken neck in two places. And when I ended up going to the conference.

• 6:42Speaker 02

  And I was like, I thought, you know, usually you go, hey, where's this guy at? But you know, he'll be like, thanks for sending me to the hospital, dude ruined my day and like, you know, what a, what a, what a fiasco. Turned out he had a broken neck. And so, um, that was just this crazy turn of events where I got a lot more, um, you know, uh, just involved in, uh, at Pacific Bitcoin. Swan was very supportive and showed me tons of love on the journey. And, and that was kind of like my start of exploration much deeper into Bitcoin. And then naturally having 10 years on the labor board and finishing that, that my two passions of Bitcoin and labor unions started coming together and I started exploring that intersection.

• 7:26Speaker 02

  So, and, and, and that, that led to this with the Santa Monica firefighters.

• 7:30Anthony Pompliano?

  Got it. And so when you guys start to actually look at this, uh, and the idea is proposed, do people think it's crazy? Or are they open to it? Like, I know the firefighter community tends to, uh, kind of think a little bit differently, um, given, uh, there's firefighter podcasts, uh, blue collar podcast. There's, uh, I think you guys have a podcast and, and just, they seem to be in and around these types of technologies or these types of movements. But what was the reaction when the idea first came up?

• 7:56Speaker 02

  So having 10 years, you know, I've navigated, I was the president of our union. So I know the system pretty well. I've navigated some challenging times and done everything that we can imagine in the books, right? So of course, when it comes to approaching a union, like I have a good background. What I saw in working through, talking to other unions and figuring out how do you onboard unions and get them to learn about Bitcoin was there's a lot of barriers. Many we talk about, you talk about on your show that we know, uh, fear, uncertainty, doubt, right? You know, the things that have been publicized heavily is the drop from all time highs to lows that gets publicized. Uh, Luna F T X publicized all this like fear type things. So I started looking like,

• 8:41Speaker 02

  how do you get folks onboard the correct way, right? And Bitcoin was originally intended to be held in self custody, right? It wasn't, it wasn't made, that was part of the beauty of the innovation is you can. Hold it yourself in your own wallet. You don't need a third party custodian. That's very tough to do for a union to to kind of go, oh, here's this thing I don't understand. Let's put a bunch of money in that. So the key that I kind of started seeing was, hey, I don't think any union has ever self custody Bitcoin. And what an amazing way to start the journey of learning by learning about the fundamentals of Bitcoin as a as a asset and a network. And so, oh, you know, I just approached the board and there had been conversation, discussion on it.

• 9:25Speaker 02

  And and that that, you know, commitment was small enough to be like, let's just explore this thing in a very exploratory fashion. And and then it kind of went to the membership and the membership supported it. And that's how it happened.

• 9:40Anthony Pompliano?

  So when you talk about self custody, you bought it on a platform, you put it in self custody. How did you guys get comfortable with that? Right? You know, I I run asset management firms, I run businesses that have Bitcoin in their balance sheet. And whenever there is more than just me as the owner or me as the kind of participant, there's always the question of like, hey, do these other people involved want me walking around with a hardware wallet in my pocket with basically our Bitcoin, right? Same thing here is that, yes, you plus 100 plus other people have some sort of interest in this Bitcoin. How do you get comfortable with self custody? And how do you kind of deal with the the dynamics there?

• 10:19Speaker 02

  Yeah, so a few ways. One, you know, the treasurer happened to be someone that has been in the space themselves, so they had comfort comfort with it. So that was a great thing. The treasurer of any union board is kind of like the the manager and overseer of the funds, that financial, you know, that union's finances. The second thing, again, was making it small enough of a dollar amount to where the cost of mistakes, failures, learning is extremely low. And when I say a small dollar amount, like, we're talking like something that I believe most people would be, it'd be laughable, right? You're like, oh, is this is this like a joke? But the thing is, is there are a lot of reasons why I think.

• 11:02Speaker 02

  This route is beneficial for groups, unions, organizations. And and we've seen some already just now. We did this prior to, you know, the SEC pursuing Binance and and Coinbase. And can you imagine if a union put a thousand dollars a person into, you know, something they don't quite grasp and you're seeing these headlines of the SEC, the the United States is is now pursuing these exchanges and saying what you're doing is not right. You're breaking the law. Wait, what? So it has to be an amount to overcome a lot of these hurdles, price drops, you know? I mean, you you know, right? Like,

• 11:43Speaker 02

  hey, when you zoom out, Bitcoin is heading in this direction. When you zoom in, it's a roller coaster. How do you overcome those drops? It has to be small enough to learn. You cannot put in more than your level of education on it because it then it will not become a thing that lasts. It will become something that ends fairly quick. So that's how we were at a comfort level is that the amount is so inconsequential that folks can be like, sure, let's let's do self custody. Let's learn it that way. And you can start that learning.

• 12:15Anthony Pompliano?

  Have you guys publicized what the number is? Or you know what I'm saying?

• 12:19Speaker 02

  We've sent it out. It will come out, but but, you know, let's say, not to, let's say for sake of conversation, something like, you know, a dollar per member, right? Something something that is like

• 12:34Speaker 02

  so minimal that, again, you're you're not, why would you do that? Not as an asset to make money. It's not going to change your balance sheet and do that. But if you can learn about it for the long run and set something up that's more promising in the future and explore, make mistakes. And then the value of that becomes massive, right? Because show me someone that puts a few bucks into Bitcoin early, learns it, doesn't get afraid, and they go in more and more versus someone who puts 10 million in but doesn't understand it and they kind of freak out, panic, sell it, move funds, then zoom out 20 years and show me who the who the winner is of that. I would argue that it's the person that came in light.

• 13:18Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, it's like a crawl before you walk before you run type strategy. What is the conversation like kind of in the firehouse? Right? So obviously, this is happening at the union level. I'm assuming some people agree with it. Some people don't. Some people don't care. Like, what has the conversation been like, though?

• 13:36Speaker 01

  The action's on the court. And as the official beer sponsor of the NBA, Michelob Ultra is getting fans closer to the game with a chance to win courtside seats, merch, and more. Visit michelobultra.com/courtside to enter. Michelob Ultra Courtside, 26 to 27. No purchase necessary. Open to U.S. residents 21+. Begins on October 1st, 2026 and ends on June 30th, 2027. Multiple entry periods. See official rules at michelobultra.com/courtside for free entry, entry deadlines, prizes, and details.

• 14:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, you know, that's another benefit with the inconsequential amount is you get overwhelming support, which it was. Also, remember, for any organization, you're never going to get 100% support. So if you do this massive step and there's, you know, 20% of the people are not into it, they're going to dig in deeper if it really like impacts them. And they're like, oh, my gosh, I have to now give this money for this thing we're doing. So by doing that small step, another benefit is those people that were opposed to it are still in a learning environment. They're still learning. They still have an open mind. And so just again, recently, you know, conversation is good. It's like, hey, the way we hold it, it's not on one of these exchanges, right?

• 14:49Speaker 02

  I saw on the news, the SEC, yeah, exactly. Oh, wow, okay, I get that. Understanding it like, hey, I noticed there's all this negative media, but the price of Bitcoin went down a little bit and then up. Yeah, you know, why is that? What are some of the other aspects of it? And so I think conversation is really good, which I think at the start of any person or organization's journey, you want that that good conversation.

• 15:17Anthony Pompliano?

  It's so interesting to hear you kind of talk about this because you all are basically the epitome of this concept. A couple of years ago, I started going around saying, "Get off zero," right? Just get off 0% allocation. And the reason why I was doing it from kind of institutional world was, once they had some skin in the game, they would pay attention. And that's basically what you're saying here, right? Is that like, it doesn't matter if it's a dollar, $100, $1,000, or literally $100 million. If there's any amount of money into it, people will pay attention. And now, all of a sudden, you feel like, there's academic studies that show, when you go to give a thing to somebody, if you give them $100, or you give them a physical item that's worth, like, let's say, $20, usually, they will put more value on the item, rather than the actual economic value. And so, you could literally

• 16:02Anthony Pompliano?

  say to someone, "Hey, do you want this? Or you want the $100?" And so, it's counterintuitive. Same thing here, though, right? Is the amount almost doesn't matter. It's the fact that now, they all feel, "Hey, we, as a union, are invested in this," and therefore, they pay attention. And you're really using it, it sounds like a learning exercise. And so, how do you take it from, like, the entry point of learning, to like, where do you want to go now, right? Is it, "Hey, we want to keep, like, dollar-cost averaging in. We want everyone to become individual Bitcoiners?" Like, how are you thinking about it?

• 16:30Speaker 02

  Well, it's an excellent way you were saying, spot on with having skin in the game. You know, I remember when I first learned about stocks. You know, everyone starts with just a watcher thing, and you're like, "Well, what if I invested in this?" And you're like, "I don't care. I forgot about it." But if you put a couple bucks, you start checking that thing, and you go, you know. So, from here, you know, I think another important thing about getting in at a light level like this, we're going to have a committee built, which is going to consist of internal folks that understand Bitcoin, you know, the treasurer will be a member, and external folks who, you know, can help guide and give good input. And from that committee, we can bring recommendations, different ideas. But what you want is the

• 17:14Speaker 02

  membership to drive the next step. And if that membership step is none, and all we did was learn, there's value to that, too, right? Because in 10 years, 20 years, whatever Bitcoin becomes... We can at least say we took a look, we learned, we understood it. But I'll tell you one thing about this small allocation. The most common comment as this thing was being voted on and supported was, why are we not doing more? Great, let's have that conversation, but let's understand, you know, the initial answer is because it, we don't understand what we can't put more into something we don't yet grasp. Um, but that the next steps, you know, unions have all kinds of missions and goals and things they want to do across the world.

• 17:59Speaker 02

  Maybe someone to buy a union hall one day and they can't afford a piece of property. So they start a trust to one day put into it bit by bit, using it as a hybrid of a savings account. But also the fact that it's an asymmetrical asset and they eventually get a piece of property. Who knows? Maybe it's just a trust for a health fund and they want to be able to pay for medical insurance. So they set up a Bitcoin, you know, medical trust. There's all kinds of options, but now as you're learning about it, as a committee is kind of providing information, you're having these healthy conversations. The next step, if the membership decides, they decide. It will be, what is a model and goal that looks good for us?

• 18:42Speaker 02

  How are we going to move into this? It could just be more allocation. It could be something separate that that's its own trust. Um, it could be advocating for pension fund that we're a part of, um, to kind of like explore this and in five years, look what it did for us. And so there's so many options, but it will come from the membership. Whereas previous examples of unions or, you know, I'm sure you saw the headlines. There was a pension in Texas that went in on, you know, years ago. Some of the comments when our news thing came out was like, they're not the first to do it. Um, you know, there's a pension fund in Texas that did it. Well, that was the fund managers. And that was a third party custodian and I'm sure, you know, I don't know what the level of understanding was at the time.

• 19:25Speaker 02

  This is much more bottom up and that's where you want sustained law. The most successful long-term pursuits are bottom up grassroots where everyone is on board. And they can weather the storm of things like negative media attention, price drop. Um, you know, all kinds of stuff like that.

• 19:45Anthony Pompliano?

  What has the response been from other unions or other types of organizations where kind of people collectively come together and they're trying to advocate for certain interests? Has there been inbound and what are those conversations have they been like?

• 19:58Speaker 02

  They're just tipping off, got a lot of good response. You know, one of the things I'm working on and almost done with that I'll probably put out on like a sub stack for anyone who's a union member, organization person that wants to see this is like almost like a blueprint template of how to navigate this, but also you can customize it for your union. And the response has been good though, because again, the response has been a hunger for more information. Right? Like we're talking about like, how'd you guys do it? What, what, what did you guys get in exactly?

• 20:32Speaker 02

  And, and that's the another benefit of the small allocation is like, wait, wait, what did you guys do? Like you guys were the first to do this, but it's this small amount and like, and then, and then do you turn to your, your ride and go, hey, hey, hey, Joe, why are we not doing this? This seems like really non, non, non or inconsequential, low risk. Like what's the harm? Where's the harm? Great. Let's spur that conversation because I've always been a believer like, don't, don't get involved in Bitcoin after you learn about it, that's fine. But to just, you know, read a headline or two and miss it. I mean, you know, we know this and you have all kinds of people on your show. How many things have we missed in the world by just reading the headline and not digging in?

• 21:18Speaker 02

  You know, endless stuff where you just look at it and then five years you hear this great story. You're like, oh my God, what was that like? I wish I would have looked at that at the time. So that I think, I think there's good conversation going around and sure, there's going to be people who are like, what you guys are doing, that's stupid. Okay. You know, that's fine. Uh, we'll, you know, let's see how things play out.

• 21:42Anthony Pompliano?

  What is kind of your vision for the next, you know, 12 months here? Is it, let's just see kind of what happens with Bitcoin and it's just continue educating and it's kind of almost hand to hand. Right? It sounds like, like literally conversations in the firehouse where you guys are going to each other and you're saying, hey, you know, somebody asked a question and you or somebody else who's familiar with Bitcoin is there to answer and kind of guide them in the right direction. Is there anything else that you're planning on doing over that 12 month period?

• 22:07Speaker 02

  No, I would say, you know, providing information, educating, working at a committee level to provide different options. And again, truly going from a place of protecting the membership. That's another thing that's really important. You know, I care a lot about all these folks that I work with very much, and I want to make sure they're always in a good spot. So, so being, you know, responsible, educating them and letting them kind of decide what their next step is, that's a good place to be. And I think we're in a good spot. Additionally, simultaneously, this, you know, I'm not on the board anymore. So I have to give all credit to the board and the firefighters. This is not like a me thing. This is something

• 22:50Speaker 02

  that through my work and seeing how kind of Bitcoin and unions and the workforce intersects, you know, was able to pit stop and stop at my own home union and go, look, I see this thing that's like very unique and can be done by any union as like a very low risk way to just learn. It'd be great to work with other unions and get them, you know, to a level of comfort where they can take that step as well. And so I think, I think within my union, they're going to be fine. They're, they're, they're sharp. They're, they're committed. They're going to learn. And probably in the next 12 months, you know, or as soon as the next meeting, there'll be more conversation like, what's next? What's the game plan? Let's

• 23:31Speaker 02

  learn. Reading lists, info convo, all the good stuff.

• 23:36Anthony Pompliano?

  Tom, this is awesome. Congratulations to you and the rest of the members. This is pretty cool to see. Again, I love this, this strategy of like, let's get off zero. Let's do a small amount, make it so that if we make mistakes, it's not going to matter. But also now people got to see in the game, they're going to pay attention, they're going to get educated. And I think that driving the education obviously is the most important thing. So congrats to you and everyone else. Where can we send people to find you on the internet? If they want to learn more, if they want to reach out in terms of they have a union or another organization that they'd like to kind of follow in your guys' footsteps?

• 24:08Speaker 01

  The action's on the court and as the official beer sponsor of the NBA, Michelob Ultra is getting fans closer to the game with a chance to win courtside seats, merch and more. Visit michelobultra.com/courtside to enter. Michelob Ultra Courtside 26 to 27. No purchase necessary. Open to U.S. residents 21+ Begins on October 1st, 2026 and ends on June 30th, 2027. Multiple entry periods. See official rules at michelobultra.com/courtside for free entry, entry deadlines, prizes and details.

• 24:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, so Twitter, you know, obviously Twitter's an active spot. So my, my handle is Baywatch1. Again, that has nothing to do with the show. My last name is Bay. I wasn't the best student in high school. My basketball coach was my Spanish teacher and he was like, "Bay, you're messing up. The teachers are watching you. They're on Baywatch." So that kind of stuck. But yeah, Twitter, Substack, I might have an article coming out in Bitcoin Mag, which really dives into CalPERS and the pension and how Bitcoin can, can serve as a stabilizer for pensions without much risk as well.

• 25:15Anthony Pompliano?

  Explain that. Explain what's going on there.

• 25:19Speaker 02

  Yeah, so, so CalPERS, largest, you know, defined benefit public pension in the United States. They got roughly 440 billion on the books.

• 25:31Speaker 02

  In June of 2022, they had a funded status of 72% and this is something for us that are in, you know, the labor world, we've seen many times, but the funded status of labor of pensions comes up frequently. And so how do these pensions that are chasing workers living longer years, retiring later, all these actuaries that get factored in, they don't have much appetite for risk? How can they, you know, stabilize their portfolio without a bailout? Which is kind of like what happens if it drops too low, right? And they have to liquidate assets and all that stuff. So this concept of a pre-funding, a lot of pensions have these pre-funding trusts,

• 26:16Speaker 02

  um, which is basically almost like a side fund to help fund what's called unfunded liabilities. Uh, and by involving injecting Bitcoin at that level, uh, they can keep all their assets in their main portfolio, not switch anything over to Bitcoin and, and pursue things that way. You also have this, look what's happening in California, right? You have the state senate just passed, um, a measures, uh, advising they want to divest from fossil fuels uh, and big oil, fossil fuels and big oil are 10% of the portfolio, 42 billion for CalPERS. Where are they going to go? It's one of their best performing assets. Well, what are they going to move into? Commercial real estate, we got some issues coming up, right? Like it's, it's, we got some challenges.

• 27:00Speaker 02

  So, um, Bitcoin is this asymmetrical asset that if they explore it outside of the pension, it can be used as a stabilizer for the pension without taking much risk. You know, of all the funds that are involved.

• 27:13Anthony Pompliano?

  Do you think there's headline risk with them doing it? That the big risk is that they just don't want to be the ones to do it?

• 27:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, headline risk, regulatory risk, all kinds of risk, you know? But again, there's also risk in a, in a fund, in dropping to a funded status of, of 64% or sub 60% and, and kinda, and kinda thinking like, all right, like, so they got risk everywhere, I'll tell you, you know, but it gets to the point where when you're looking at it, if there's no better options to stabilize and catch up and get to a funding status of over 80%, 90%, 100%, okay, we might have to start taking some headline risks. Um, as long as the headline in 10 years is, you know, pension funds stabilized through X, Y, and Z, and we're in a good spot, then, you know, but absolutely, there's definitely headline risk and fears

• 28:04Speaker 02

  for the same reasons, even at the, at that micro level at the union, why there's fears to kinda like take that step.

• 28:10Anthony Pompliano?

  My last question for you is how many of the firefighters do you think are counting on their pensions? Like, are they still saying, hey, that's the thing I'm going to retire on? Or have they now said, look, maybe it's there, maybe it's not, but I gotta go kinda learn, you know, financial education in general and, and go invest?

• 28:26Speaker 02

  I would say all of them, you know, some of them are much more active in building things outside of that, but we're all, you know, when we all signed up, there was a defined benefit pension and firefighting, you know, like any jobs, there's trade offs. And one of the things in this proof of workforce like concept I've, I've been exploring is, and you know, we trade time for money and, and this concept of trading time for money, we trade a lifetime. We got firefighters that get sick, they die, they, they maybe don't live that long after retirement. It's a sacrifice for sure. Don't get me wrong. It's an incredible career, amazing life, amazing mission, but there are trade offs.

• 29:08Speaker 02

  And so, you know, it's with this concept that you have a pension that for those years after you do your 30 years riding the fire engine, waking up every night, you know, doing CPR, running into fires, you know, on the freeway at accidents. That's, that's where, that's where you're going to be afterwards. So I would say all of them are depending on it in some way. Of course there always are some that kind of pursue things outside and get like, you know, they're building wealth like that, but, but definitely, you know, dependent.

• 29:38Anthony Pompliano?

  Dom, your pleasure to talk to you, man. I, I love the fact that you have a specific expertise and knowledge and obviously all of the jobs that you do on a daily basis with firefighter, you understand Bitcoin very well and have been able to kind of take your knowledge there and integrate it with the firefighting union, but also you're understanding the pension funds and not just for the firefighters, but also, you know, asset allocation, the underfunded status and kind of how Bitcoin could potentially be helpful there is, is pretty incredible. So it's obvious to me that you spent a lot of time learning and reading and stuff. So I appreciate you coming on here and share that knowledge with us and we'll definitely do it in the future.

• 30:17Speaker 02

  Absolutely. Thanks, Pom. I appreciate it. And yeah, man, just we get after it relentlessly, brother.