John McAfee, Founder of McAfee Associates: Inside the Mind of Crypto’s Bad Boy

John McAfee is the Founder of McAfee Associates. For this conversation, Anthony Pompliano travelled to Exuma, Bahamas to record this interview in person, and to give John a platform to tell his own story. ----- Join the Off the Chain newsletter. Pomp's daily email analyzes the crypto market for institutional investors. Simply, it’s the best crypto newsletter delivered to your inbox every morning. No frills. No bullsh*t. Just everything you need to know in a 3-minute read. https://offthechain.substack.com/ ---- Totle is a rare blockchain investment opportunity, one that offers a live product, active customers, an established revenue model. Totle solves three significant problems with blockchain asset exchange: 1) Security 2) Complexity and 3) Pricing. Over $4 trillion of blockchain assets were exchanged in 2018 and growth is forecast for at least the next 10 years. Totle’s sophisticated platform powers the blockchain economy with safe, simple decentralized asset exchanges at the best price for traders, wallets, businesses and other financial apps. Totle’s B2C Web App and B2B API are live and serving customers today. Visit totle.com/pomp for more info. ----- If you enjoyed this conversation, share it with your colleagues & friends, rate, review, and subscribe. This podcast is presented by BlockWorks Group. For exclusive content and events that provide insights into the crypto and blockchain space, visit them at: https://www.blockworksgroup.io

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

• 0:01Anthony Pompliano?

  What's up everyone, this is Anthony Pompliano. Most of you know me as Pomp. You're listening to Off the Chain, simply the best podcast in crypto. Let's kick this thing off. The following interview is with John McAfee, who many of you will know as the founder of McAfee Software. I traveled from New York City to Exuma Bahamas to record this interview in person on John's boat. There was no money exchanged and I paid for everything myself. While John has plenty of interesting ideas, some are also controversial. There are aspects of what John says that I agree with, and there are many that I vehemently disagree with. With that said, nothing that John states in this recording should be taken as an endorsement

• 0:44Anthony Pompliano?

  by me, Morgan Creek, or any of our affiliates. I felt it was important to allow John to tell his story in his own words, so the only editing that was done to this recording was for audio quality. Additionally, as you will hear, John's voice is a bit raspy from a bout with laryngitis, so you will have to focus to hear him in a few situations. I really enjoyed this conversation and found John to be kind, intelligent, raw, blunt, and passionate. I'll let you listen and draw your own conclusions. I hope you enjoy it. I'm sure a lot of you have used Kayak to find the best flight. Total's kind of like Kayak, but it don't find you no flights. It helps you find liquidity on decentralized exchanges and it optimally routes your trades for execution.

• 1:29Anthony Pompliano?

  So Kayak, you find flights. Total, they help you find liquidity. We should get Kayak on for this spot that I'm providing them, but Total instead is our advertiser, and you should go visit totle.com/pomp. Again, that's totle.com/pomp, and let them know that I sent you. Tell them you love their product. Take a screenshot, tweet it at me, I'll drop you some fire emojis, and then we'll all be happy. So totle.com/pomp. Anthony Pompliano is a partner at Morgan Creek Digital. All opinions expressed by Pomp or his guests on this podcast are solely their opinions and do not reflect the opinions of Morgan Creek Digital or Morgan Creek Capital Management. You should not treat any opinion expressed by Pomp as a specific inducement to make

• 2:10Anthony Pompliano?

  a particular investment or follow a particular strategy, but only as an expression of his opinion. This podcast is for informational purposes only. Guys, I'm here with John McAfee, flew all the way down to Exuma to do an interview. Thank you very much for having me come.

• 2:28Speaker 01

  Oh, thanks guys for having me. What's in out there, guys?

• 2:36Anthony Pompliano?

  John is in rare form and ready to go. Alright, so first, let's just talk about your background. I don't think a lot of people know. You started out working with NASA.

• 2:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, first, let's talk about my laryngitis, which started yesterday. Half of my team is here to talk for me. I'll talk as much as I can. I started out... What?

• 2:56Anthony Pompliano?

  NASA. NASA.

• 2:57Speaker 01

  No.

• 2:58Anthony Pompliano?

  No, what did you do?

• 3:00Speaker 01

  I worked for...

• 3:02Speaker 01

  For Univac. Univac. The first computing company.

• 3:10Speaker 01

  Then IBM, and then NASA.

• 3:13Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 3:15Anthony Pompliano?

  And then what did you do after NASA?

• 3:18Speaker 01

  Just fucked around. I mean, I never really worked hard.

• 3:22Anthony Pompliano?

  Alright, well, you eventually ended up at Lockheed Martin.

• 3:24Speaker 01

  Yes, that was a lot later.

• 3:25Anthony Pompliano?

  Alright, and when you ended up at Lockheed Martin, the brain virus, right? They basically sent that to you and said, "Hey, figure out how to stop this?"

• 3:33Speaker 01

  Well, no. Actually, I was working on a black program. It's a program that doesn't exist. That's how crazy our fucking government is. Anyway, it's a great job. So...

• 3:46Speaker 01

  A top-secret security clearance.

• 3:50Speaker 01

  They asked me questions like, "Did you ever fuck a goat? Did you ever cheat on your wife? Did you ever deal drugs? Why is it yes to everything except the goat fucking?" So I thought, "I'm not gonna get this." Two weeks later, it came through. And I think because they asked questions like, "Did you ever take drugs?" "Yes." "What kind?" "Everything." "Did you ever sell drugs?" "Yes." "What kind?" "Everything." You can't blackmail me because I've got no fucking secrets.

• 4:18Anthony Pompliano?

  Alright, and so what was the genesis for the idea for McAfee? The antivirus software?

• 4:24Speaker 01

  It was an accident. My brother-in-law read about the Pakistani brain.

• 4:30Speaker 01

  I got a copy, looked at it and said, oh, fuck, this is easy. And I came up with a solution to stop it, put it up on my bulletin board system and forgot it. But then fires became real. Sold it to the company.

• 4:44Anthony Pompliano?

  And so when you first started the company, though, you started while you were at Lockheed, right? And then when you went full time, you were just selling it into corporations? They just didn't have any other solutions or what?

• 4:55Speaker 01

  Well, I got free at first. I didn't want to deal with it. But I kept getting hundreds of requests per day for help. So I just started a company, sold it to corporations. I made eleven million dollars my first month.

• 5:11Anthony Pompliano?

  You made eleven million dollars your first month?

• 5:13Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 5:14Anthony Pompliano?

  That's, you realize that's incredible, right? Especially what is this like late eighties? Eleven million dollars in the late eighties, a lot more than eleven million dollars today.

• 5:24Anthony Pompliano?

  All right. So you did that. And then you sold your stake in the company pretty early, right? Like before it became as big as it is today. Why did you do that?

• 5:33Speaker 01

  I was bored.

• 5:34Anthony Pompliano?

  You were bored?

• 5:34Speaker 01

  I was bored.

• 5:35Anthony Pompliano?

  All right.

• 5:36Speaker 01

  I mean, I enjoyed doing the technical stuff. I ended up doing staffing, board meetings, stockholders meetings. That's bored shit.

• 5:48Anthony Pompliano?

  Basically, you enjoyed the technical parts, but you didn't like the part of actually running the company?

• 5:51Speaker 01

  Oh, fuck no.

• 5:52Anthony Pompliano?

  No. All right. That's fair.

• 5:53Speaker 01

  I can't even run myself.

• 5:54Anthony Pompliano?

  All right. And then, and then as you were, after you sold the stake in the company, the internet bubble hit, right? What was that like? What do you remember about the internet bubble in the late nineties?

• 6:07Speaker 01

  Okay, I remember meeting with both the Yahoo people and the Google people.

• 6:13Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 6:13Speaker 01

  Well, they were still at home.

• 6:15Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay. The Yahoo and the Google people, while they're still at home.

• 6:18Speaker 01

  Who was it? The Chinese guy at Yahoo? I can't remember saying, um, I stupidly did not invest in either.

• 6:27Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay, you didn't invest in either Yahoo or Google? All right. And then how much of it is similar to what we saw in two thousand seventeen with the cryptocurrency boom? Versus differences in internet boom and the cryptocurrency?

• 6:40Speaker 01

  All booms are the same.

• 6:41Anthony Pompliano?

  They're all the same?

• 6:42Speaker 01

  The people who can see it go, god damn, this is gonna run. They invest.

• 6:49Speaker 01

  Others go, oh, that can't happen and they sell short. And then the real thing happens. Like Bitcoin, I don't care if it's a penny today, it's gonna be two million dollars right soon.

• 6:59Anthony Pompliano?

  So, so even if Bitcoin's a penny today, you think it'll

• 7:02Speaker 01

  Why should I care?

• 7:02Anthony Pompliano?

  Two million dollars.

• 7:03Speaker 01

  Why should I care?

• 7:04Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, yeah. Because you're looking, you're looking

• 7:08Speaker 01

  What's happening in the market has nothing to do with the reality of its value.

• 7:14Anthony Pompliano?

  I think that's fair. All right. And, and so as you're going through the internet boom, uh, you eventually start making a bunch of investments, uh, in real estate, right? In the housing crisis?

• 7:25Speaker 01

  Well, some of it.

• 7:26Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 7:27Speaker 01

  Don't believe everything you read.

• 7:29Anthony Pompliano?

  All right. Well, that's why I came all the way here to hear from you.

• 7:33Speaker 01

  I asked a few times to do that story.

• 7:35Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay, but, but what did you do?

• 7:37Speaker 01

  Everything I had, why? I had had sixty one lawsuits at that time.

• 7:43Anthony Pompliano?

  Sixty one.

• 7:43Speaker 01

  Because I named the company after my name. People, stupid thing you never fucking do.

• 7:49Anthony Pompliano?

  Don't, all right, so hold on. After the internet boom, you made a bunch of investments, right?

• 7:53Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 7:53Anthony Pompliano?

  Just talk about what, what were you investing in and why?

• 7:57Speaker 01

  Let's see. Some companies. My, my first one was Zone Labs.

• 8:02Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 8:04Speaker 01

  Which I co-founded, put in, I think a million dollars, we sold it. Eight months later for four hundred million to Checkpoint Software.

• 8:14Anthony Pompliano?

  That's incredible.

• 8:15Speaker 01

  It was my first investment. They're all the same.

• 8:18Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay. And then, but you also did non-tech investing?

• 8:22Speaker 01

  That was only this. I built a whole bunch of really super cool houses.

• 8:28Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay, a bunch of really cool houses.

• 8:30Speaker 01

  I built some. Like I stole Frank Lloyd Wright's MS block, which he had poured in concrete.

• 8:36Anthony Pompliano?

  Yep.

• 8:36Speaker 01

  I had it carved, hand carved out of sandstone and built a fifty thousand square foot mansion with it.

• 8:43Anthony Pompliano?

  Wow.

• 8:43Speaker 01

  It was a piece of art.

• 8:45Anthony Pompliano?

  All right.

• 8:45Speaker 01

  It was not investment.

• 8:46Anthony Pompliano?

  And then, and then that's what this story was talking about in terms of the housing crisis, basically.

• 8:50Speaker 01

  Well, basically, I wanted people to stop suing me. And the suing rate went down by fifty percent.

• 8:56Anthony Pompliano?

  So, at the time of the housing crisis, you had sixty one lawsuits. And then, once everyone realized, hey, he didn't have as much money as we thought he did, lawsuits disappeared.

• 9:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:04Anthony Pompliano?

  Makes sense.

• 9:05Speaker 01

  They're back, of course.

• 9:06Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, yeah. Well, so let's, let's talk about crypto. When did you first discover Bitcoin or crypto?

• 9:12Speaker 01

  Two thousand.

• 9:13Anthony Pompliano?

  Two thousand and eleven. And do you remember what that first like, did somebody send you some Bitcoin? Or what was going on?

• 9:19Speaker 01

  A guy named Jim Zaromski, who had worked for me, had two or three different companies worked for me.

• 9:24Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 9:25Speaker 01

  Brilliant, brilliant technician. Said, um, he called me, said, I'm mining, I'm mining. I go, well, good for you.

• 9:34Anthony Pompliano?

  So two thousand and eleven, somebody who worked for you basically said, hey, I'm mining cryptocurrency.

• 9:37Speaker 01

  He didn't work for me that time.

• 9:38Anthony Pompliano?

  Oh, yeah, yeah. But he had in the past.

• 9:39Speaker 01

  He said, I'm coming to Belize. I go, great. Says, I'm coming to make you do something. Like, go, go, go ahead. What he made me do was read some social white paper.

• 9:50Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay. So he makes you read the nine-page white paper. And what's your thoughts when you read it?

• 10:01Speaker 01

  I'm a mathematician. That's what my training is anyway.

• 10:03Anthony Pompliano?

  Yep. You went to what? Rono College and got a math degree, right?

• 10:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, I went to Rono, I think I went to a college, it was Rono.

• 10:11Speaker 01

  Louisiana State, New York University, the University of Munich, all studying math. Ah, and Virginia Politec.

• 10:17Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 10:18Speaker 01

  I have an honorary doctorate, that's all. No.

• 10:23Speaker 01

  When I read the paper, I saw a thousand years in the future, instantly.

• 10:30Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 10:30Speaker 01

  Which is why I don't give a shit what Bitcoin is.

• 10:35Speaker 01

  I know where cryptocurrency is going.

• 10:37Anthony Pompliano?

  And so when you read the white paper, what do you do first? You just, you know that, hey, this is the future. And then do you make investments? You start mining? What did you do first?

• 10:45Speaker 01

  Nothing.

• 10:46Anthony Pompliano?

  Nothing?

• 10:47Speaker 01

  I'm retired. I just saw where it was going.

• 10:50Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 10:50Speaker 01

  Jim was mining, making a fortune. That was before, that was before the A's that miners.

• 10:57Anthony Pompliano?

  Yep.

• 10:58Speaker 01

  Before Jihan Wu.

• 10:59Anthony Pompliano?

  Yep.

• 11:00Speaker 01

  Who, by the way, the most humble motherfucker on this planet. And when people throw stones at him, I want to gouge your fucking eyes out. I'm telling you the truth. He is one of my best friends. Humble, sweet, nice, brilliant. I don't think he's ever slept with a woman or left home, however. Nice guy.

• 11:22Anthony Pompliano?

  So you're talking about Jihan Wu is the CEO of Bitmain, right?

• 11:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:25Anthony Pompliano?

  Um, and so what was the first thing eventually you did in crypto? Because you're known as a huge crypto bull. So you see the future early two thousand and eleven, two thousand and twelve. What was the investment you made?

• 11:36Anthony Pompliano?

  You bought a million dollars of Monero? Wow, why Monero first?

• 11:41Speaker 01

  Privacy.

• 11:42Anthony Pompliano?

  Privacy? Because you're a huge proponent of these privacy coins, right?

• 11:47Speaker 01

  Do you realize, well, let's say you don't. If you send me an Ethereum or a Bitcoin or millions of one forever after, I see everything in your wallet. What comes in, what goes out, when, how much, to whom? Is that rational?

• 12:06Anthony Pompliano?

  So what we're talking about is once somebody sends you a non-privacy-based coin, you know what their wallet is and you can watch everything forever.

• 12:13Speaker 01

  Every transaction forever.

• 12:16Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay, so I agree with you. I agree with you that there are certain downsides to that, right? Now-

• 12:21Speaker 01

  Certain downsides? Do you listen to this man? Certain downsides? Certain downsides to losing your dick, right?

• 12:32Anthony Pompliano?

  But so, but when you first started with the security software, right? Before the internet was really popular, there was a huge debate around encryption. And eventually, the proponents of encryption won. And now we have a more private internet today because of encryption. Do you think that every coin will adopt the privacy?

• 12:52Speaker 01

  No, no, no.

• 12:52Anthony Pompliano?

  Features?

• 12:53Speaker 01

  Because every coin doesn't need privacy.

• 12:56Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay, so you-

• 12:56Speaker 01

  Music coin, music coin. I don't want that to be private, especially if I'm successful.

• 13:02Anthony Pompliano?

  Wait, you don't want, so you think that some coins will have privacy, some coins don't need it? And so what about Bitcoin specifically? You think that Bitcoin will adopt the privacy aspects?

• 13:11Speaker 01

  No, no. However, Bitcoin will be our standard. It's going to be the gold standard.

• 13:15Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay, so you think that Bitcoin becomes the future gold standard of the global reserve currency, right? And then there are other coins that have very specific privacy features that are there for a reason.

• 13:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, you know, the best privacy coins. I'm sorry, what am I doing?

• 13:34Speaker 01

  Apollo, I think, but number one.

• 13:38Speaker 01

  Safex is a great coin.

• 13:40Anthony Pompliano?

  All right.

• 13:41Speaker 01

  It's not fucking that is.

• 13:42Anthony Pompliano?

  Apollo, Safex, Monero, Zcash.

• 13:45Speaker 01

  I didn't say Zcash.

• 13:46Anthony Pompliano?

  No Zcash, all right. All right, Monero.

• 13:51Speaker 01

  You must have a lot of Zcash, right?

• 13:52Anthony Pompliano?

  Huh?

• 13:53Speaker 01

  You must have a lot.

• 13:54Anthony Pompliano?

  I have no Zcash.

• 13:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. All right.

• 13:57Anthony Pompliano?

  What, what, people want to know, what, uh, where are your investments today? What, what, what do you hold?

• 14:01Speaker 01

  Nothing.

• 14:02Anthony Pompliano?

  The cryptocurrencies?

• 14:02Speaker 01

  First of all, I own nothing.

• 14:04Anthony Pompliano?

  You own nothing, all right.

• 14:05Speaker 01

  Nothing's about. This watch I have a piece of paper for is on loan from a jeweler in.

• 14:11Anthony Pompliano?

  Help us, show them, show them the watch. All right, nice.

• 14:13Speaker 01

  It's a, it's a balance.

• 14:15Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, basically, you, you, you own nothing. And, and so as you think of crypto, right? Bitcoin becomes the global reserve currency. What, what's, what do you think we have to do to get to the point where crypto is pervasive across the world? Right? What, what are the things that have to happen for mass adoption to occur?

• 14:33Speaker 01

  You have to have a better interface.

• 14:35Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 14:35Speaker 01

  So that grandmothers, plumbers, shoemakers, and people who don't even speak English can interact.

• 14:41Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, so basically, you, for the adoption to occur, you need better user experiences, user.

• 14:45Speaker 01

  Absolutely. Why should I look at zero string of X, Y, one, two, Q? Fuck me. No, I want to send something to mom.

• 14:54Anthony Pompliano?

  Yep.

• 14:55Speaker 01

  Give me mom.

• 14:56Anthony Pompliano?

  So basically, basically, every mass, mass adoption user is going to need that you, user interface that they're used to on the internet. Right? They're not going to actually understand all the cryptography and all that stuff. What, what do you think government's responses as this stuff becomes the standard? Right? If, if all of a sudden Bitcoin becomes, uh, the global reserve.

• 15:13Speaker 01

  Bitcoin becomes standard, I don't give a shit.

• 15:16Anthony Pompliano?

  You don't think the governments care?

• 15:17Speaker 01

  No, because they can trace it.

• 15:19Anthony Pompliano?

  They can trace it, but, but do you think it threatens anything that they're doing? Like, do you think that governments feel threatened by it?

• 15:24Speaker 01

  Absolutely, of course. But they're far more threatened by what I've been saying for five fucking years.

• 15:30Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay, what's that?

• 15:31Speaker 01

  Privacy and distributed exchanges.

• 15:34Anthony Pompliano?

  You think that privacy and distributed exchanges are more of a threat than Bitcoin is to.

• 15:39Speaker 01

  Oh, fuck, yes. Because if we have a true distributed exchange, and by the way, I think that SwitchDex is the first one that actually has one.

• 15:49Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 15:49Speaker 01

  All right. And the privacy coin, how did they shut you down?

• 15:53Anthony Pompliano?

  They can't. They can't shut you down from exchanging because the distributed exchange or decentralized exchange. And in the privacy, they can't track you.

• 16:00Speaker 01

  They don't track it.

• 16:00Anthony Pompliano?

  Got it. And you think those are the two biggest threats to governments?

• 16:03Speaker 01

  Oh, fuck yes. That's why they're after it.

• 16:05Anthony Pompliano?

  So.

• 16:06Speaker 01

  So I promote it. I tell people, listen, this is how you avoid paying taxes. This is how you avoid the burden of government.

• 16:14Anthony Pompliano?

  All right. And so one of the things that is possible is that these decentralized exchanges become the dominant way that people exchange privacy coins. What's a government's response to that? Or do they just not have one?

• 16:26Speaker 01

  Well, if there's one, it's legislation, make it illegal. But then, what are you smoking?

• 16:33Speaker 01

  You're smoking something illegal.

• 16:37Speaker 01

  Is the government stopping you? They can't. It's the same fucking thing. You can't legislate some things, like, you know, your brother shooting up heroin.

• 16:52Speaker 01

  So you can do what you want to do.

• 16:54Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah. So governments just can't stop some things. You talked about the fact that, that the governments are upset that you're promoting some of this, right? I think a lot of people in crypto know that you're doing coin of the day, all the promotional tweets and stuff.

• 17:05Speaker 01

  I've been doing that for years.

• 17:06Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah. So, so talk about like, what was the genesis of the idea of doing that? And, and how does that all work, right? Did you just get a bunch of inbound requests and then you picked the ones that you like or what?

• 17:17Speaker 01

  No, no. Well, I get thousands a day. You won't believe it. People ask me to promote or look at, I can't even pronounce them in a day.

• 17:28Anthony Pompliano?

  So just so many requests for the promotion.

• 17:31Speaker 01

  And some of them are so fucking good, like Safe Axe.

• 17:35Anthony Pompliano?

  Yep.

• 17:35Speaker 01

  And it's just simply, hey, guys, take a look at this. If we're all using this, we'd be in Fat City.

• 17:41Anthony Pompliano?

  Got it.

• 17:41Speaker 01

  That's all.

• 17:42Anthony Pompliano?

  And then.

• 17:43Speaker 01

  But then the problem, every time I did that, the price of the coin would triple.

• 17:47Anthony Pompliano?

  Would triple and the people get mad at you.

• 17:48Speaker 01

  They get mad at me.

• 17:49Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah. And so, but when you did these promotional tweets, people were paying you for them, right? How did you come up with how much they should pay you?

• 17:57Speaker 01

  What the market would bear.

• 17:58Anthony Pompliano?

  Which is whatever people would want to pay.

• 18:00Speaker 01

  I started a million dollars for a tweet. If they said no, I'd say, yes, a million.

• 18:05Anthony Pompliano?

  Alright, so you started a million, half a million, and then most people, what do they pay you? Like a hundred grand?

• 18:08Speaker 01

  Hundred and fifty.

• 18:09Anthony Pompliano?

  Hundred and fifty grand?

• 18:10Speaker 01

  That's what I charge for all.

• 18:10Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, that's not bad.

• 18:11Speaker 01

  They stood in line.

• 18:12Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, they stood in line and you got paid a hundred fifty thousand dollars to send out a two hundred and eighty character tweet.

• 18:17Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 18:17Anthony Pompliano?

  You, you realize that's crazy, right?

• 18:19Speaker 01

  No.

• 18:20Anthony Pompliano?

  No? He's Don Buckner, isn't he?

• 18:22Speaker 01

  I've been sued a hundred times.

• 18:23Anthony Pompliano?

  How many times?

• 18:24Speaker 01

  A lot, two hundred.

• 18:25Anthony Pompliano?

  Two hundred?

• 18:25Speaker 01

  Oh, for two hundred. Lawyers are crazy.

• 18:29Anthony Pompliano?

  That's, that's probably true. In many cases, that's definitely true. Yes.

• 18:32Speaker 01

  So, no, I'm not crazy.

• 18:34Anthony Pompliano?

  No, no, no, you're not, but the fact that people are, the fact that people are willing to pay that much money, right, means they have a lot of influence.

• 18:40Speaker 01

  Okay, my most expensive lawsuit was a wrongful death involving my nephew.

• 18:46Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 18:47Speaker 01

  He was flying an airplane that took off from a piece of property allegedly owned by me.

• 18:52Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 18:53Speaker 01

  In an airplane allegedly owned by me.

• 18:57Speaker 01

  Crashed, killed himself and his passenger. I was sued by the same people who got fifty billion dollars from the Libyan suit. Quindler. Quindler. Eight years, eleven million dollars in legal fees I had to pay.

• 19:15Anthony Pompliano?

  And what did they want from you? Why, why are they suing you?

• 19:18Speaker 01

  For the wrongful death. My, my nephew took off in an airplane from a hang of a runway allegedly owned by me in an airplane allegedly owned by me. Wrongful death, just like this last thing with the fall. They were twenty five million dollars.

• 19:35Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. So they're just coming after you.

• 19:37Speaker 01

  They're coming after you.

• 19:38Anthony Pompliano?

  It's crazy. Yeah. Do, do, what was the response for, to, to the promotional tweets? Do you think people liked it, didn't like it?

• 19:44Speaker 01

  They loved it.

• 19:44Anthony Pompliano?

  They loved it?

• 19:45Speaker 01

  Well, people who were in other coins didn't.

• 19:48Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, yeah, people, basically if you talked about their coin, they liked it, but people who were in other coins didn't like it.

• 19:52Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 19:53Anthony Pompliano?

  Got it. Do, do you feel like, uh, you would keep doing it? Or do you think that, hey, there's a point in time where the promotional tweets were important? And then now they're just not, not as important?

• 20:01Speaker 01

  I stopped a year ago.

• 20:02Anthony Pompliano?

  You stopped a year ago? Why'd you stop?

• 20:03Speaker 01

  But I got too much fucking flack.

• 20:05Anthony Pompliano?

  Oh, people were too upset?

• 20:06Speaker 01

  Oh, they were seriously upset.

• 20:07Anthony Pompliano?

  Do you regret that you did it?

• 20:09Speaker 01

  No.

• 20:10Anthony Pompliano?

  No?

• 20:11Speaker 01

  I told people what I thought.

• 20:12Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, so you just felt like, hey?

• 20:14Speaker 01

  These are good things. Because I still do it. You know, people go, oh, he's getting paid for this. Well, maybe, maybe not. I promise you, I'm not promoting them, unless I fully believe that this is a thing. And I'll frequently go, hey, that contact me, he said, goddamn, you've got a great, and a great concept. If you need me. I'll charge you half price.

• 20:34Anthony Pompliano?

  Got it. So ba- basically, you're only promoting things that you fully believe in. And then, and then you say to them, hey, I'll charge you only if I believe in it.

• 20:41Speaker 01

  I get, I'll show you after this. I get ten to twenty requests per day. For people begging me to promote the coins.

• 20:48Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 20:49Speaker 01

  I take one out of maybe two hundred.

• 20:51Anthony Pompliano?

  Alright, that's good. Let's talk about politics. You're running for president.

• 20:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 20:55Anthony Pompliano?

  That's what you said? Are you? Are, are you shutting the campaign down?

• 20:59Speaker 01

  No, I'm not really running for president. I mean, I've got signs everywhere. Oh, is my mask?

• 21:05Anthony Pompliano?

  Oh, yeah. Alright, so, so, but you're, you've got this platform, right? You're able to push a campaign. Let's say that, uh, if you were to actually run, what's the playbook to beat John Donald Trump? What does a candidate need to do to, to win to be president today?

• 21:21Speaker 01

  I don't care. And neither should you. Neither should anybody.

• 21:24Anthony Pompliano?

  Why?

• 21:25Speaker 01

  Do you think that Donald Trump, or Hillary Clinton, or JFK resurrected from the dead is gonna matter? No, fuck you people. It has nothing to do with the personality. It has, oh, you scared me.

• 21:40Speaker 01

  It has to do with the structure.

• 21:43Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 21:43Speaker 01

  And the existing state of our government. Number one, we don't know what the truth is. We get lied to while they spy on us, do they not? Do you think, if I'm on your podcast, you'd better turn your phone, get in it one, because you're gonna be tapped by the feds, by the FBI, the NSA, the CIA, I don't know them all.

• 22:07Anthony Pompliano?

  Do you think that everyone, do you think that every American is just operating under the assumption that we're all being spied on?

• 22:13Speaker 01

  God, I hope so, because it's the truth.

• 22:15Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 22:15Speaker 01

  There is no privacy. I mean.

• 22:18Anthony Pompliano?

  Do you think that's true in every country, though?

• 22:20Speaker 01

  No.

• 22:20Anthony Pompliano?

  No, you think there's some countries where they're not actually spying on all the citizens?

• 22:23Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 22:24Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah? What, what country would you say is the best when it comes to privacy and non-surveillance?

• 22:28Speaker 01

  Poland.

• 22:29Anthony Pompliano?

  Poland.

• 22:31Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, it's pretty, it's pretty

• 22:32Speaker 01

  I don't have to do any public jokes to explain why, but yes, France.

• 22:36Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah. So you think that there's a bunch of European countries for the most part?

• 22:39Speaker 01

  I didn't say European, I just gave you two examples from Europe.

• 22:44Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, pull it up, France.

• 22:45Speaker 01

  France, India.

• 22:48Anthony Pompliano?

  India?

• 22:49Speaker 01

  Pakistan.

• 22:50Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 22:51Speaker 01

  Those are four.

• 22:52Anthony Pompliano?

  So when I told people I was coming to interview you, I asked for questions and a lot of people want to know your thoughts on issues around politics and around being the president. So I'm going to read all

• 23:03Speaker 01

  Go ahead.

• 23:03Anthony Pompliano?

  A couple of topics and you tell us your thoughts, all right?

• 23:05Speaker 01

  You bet.

• 23:05Anthony Pompliano?

  Uh, on the wall and immigration.

• 23:08Speaker 01

  I have no clue, neither do you, neither does Trump probably. Seriously, we don't know the exact numbers. We don't know statistics, we don't know what the truth of anything. We are fed a bunch of lies that are correlated and polished by the CIA, checked off by the NSA, and every Monday when Trump is deciding who to murder in the Middle East, checked off by him.

• 23:31Anthony Pompliano?

  Wha- wha- what is, forget all the numbers and forget all of that stuff, just if you think about immigration in general, should the US have open borders, closed borders? What should we, what should the approach be if you're, what would you, uh, set the standard at?

• 23:46Speaker 01

  Well, I'm fully in line with John, who goes, imagine there's no country, fuck me. Why should an imaginary line prevent someone from taking a step from one part to another part of the desert or the mountain or the fucking river? Please.

• 24:06Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah. So you think that the, the borders being, uh, these imaginary lines on a map actually are huge problems and if we just get rid of them, yeah.

• 24:12Speaker 01

  Yes. I'm sorry, what am I doing?

• 24:15Speaker 02

  Nothing. For your throat, Brian. For your throat, Brian.

• 24:18Speaker 01

  Why?

• 24:18Speaker 02

  For your throat. I'll take it first, come here. No, I.

• 24:22Speaker 01

  Okay, here's something.

• 24:23Anthony Pompliano?

  All right.

• 24:23Speaker 01

  For the first four years of our marriage, and even now,

• 24:29Speaker 01

  if someone hands me a drink, I never drink it.

• 24:32Anthony Pompliano?

  Why?

• 24:32Speaker 01

  Someone cooks me a meal, I never, explain, please.

• 24:35Speaker 02

  Oh, because, because I'm,

• 24:38Speaker 02

  because we have to make sure that no one's trying to slip him a Mickey, you know, and take his body.

• 24:43Speaker 01

  Now, Jen, this is for a fact, people have been trying to speak for me, speaking of Mickey, right?

• 24:48Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 24:48Speaker 01

  Why?

• 24:50Speaker 02

  Do we have to tell the story?

• 24:51Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 24:52Speaker 02

  All right, all right. Well, because I was once one of those that was hired to do the same to John. So that's why. Yes, so I was hired to, well, I was persuaded. It's honey and whiskey for your throat. To, under the threat of my children being harmed, I had to do certain things to help those that wanted to collect John, collect him.

• 25:20Speaker 01

  Now, not being the idiot, I knew all of this while it was happening. However, the joke is, he goes, I'll drink it first. For three years, if she touched anything, I ain't touching it. Put that shit in my body. Come in. Even before she getting clean, yes?

• 25:35Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 25:36Speaker 01

  I'm not stupid, I'm seventy-three for a reason. The entire world's been trying to kill me for forty-eight years.

• 25:42Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, let's go back to the political stuff. What about, what do you think about the financial regulation on Wall Street?

• 25:51Speaker 01

  Here's the issue, people. You are living in a soup bowl of shit. You know nothing about the truth because the government has misled you. You're living the lives of slaves, getting up in the morning, commuting an hour to work, working in some airless, joyless fucking office, nine hours a day, five days a week, the rest of your fucking life, and you compete for that? You want it. You want to be a higher level slave. No, fuck me. This is your life. And instead of looking at your life, you want to ask me about financial regulations on Wall Street?

• 26:35Speaker 01

  What the fuck does that have to do with your life? Nothing. Wake the fuck up. And you too.

• 26:42Anthony Pompliano?

  I'm awake, I came all the way here to talk to you. All right, let's talk about the war on drugs, because I know that you've got a bunch of ideas here.

• 26:52Speaker 01

  I'll talk about that.

• 26:53Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, all right, we're on drugs. So, first of all, decriminalization of marijuana, all in, right? You fully believe that we should decriminalize marijuana?

• 27:01Speaker 01

  Let me answer all questions as well.

• 27:03Anthony Pompliano?

  All right.

• 27:05Speaker 01

  Our bodies and our minds belong to us, not the government. What possible cause could anybody have to say, John, don't smoke that weed? Don't drink that booze. Do not shoot up that heroin. And for God's sake, whatever that lab in China just sent you, and you're the first person in the world to take it, don't do it. It's my body, it's my mind. What I put into both is mine. Nothing can ever change that. Think about it. All the laws in the world. When America passed the abolition, made alcohol illegal, did it stop? Fuck no.

• 27:48Speaker 01

  We consumed more, more alcohol during that period than in every period in our history. You can't stop people from smoking weed, from fucking at the age of seventeen, from taking whatever they want to fucking do, because that is people. Governments do not understand. You cannot legislate actions which involve any other relationship between you and yourself.

• 28:16Anthony Pompliano?

  And so your whole thing here is the personal freedom should trump everything else, correct?

• 28:22Speaker 01

  Without, what is it? You're not alive. Without personal freedom, who are we?

• 28:26Anthony Pompliano?

  So, so let me ask this then. So, so I generally agree that personal freedom should be the standard. But what do you think to the people who say the things that you do don't just affect you, they affect other people, right? If you go and you take a bunch of drugs and then all of a sudden you're driving and you run into somebody or you do something crazy and somebody gets hurt, right? Where's the line in terms of what affects you versus affecting other people?

• 28:49Speaker 01

  Would you please analyze what you just said?

• 28:52Anthony Pompliano?

  I told you I was gonna ask the question, but you answered what you want.

• 28:54Speaker 01

  What this man said was, if I shoot up heroin, I'm gonna kill somebody? No. What he should say is, what might be just influenced what is. Please God, what might be, what happens if I don't take heroin? And I'm not, not calm and I'm angry and I shoot somebody? Christ Almighty, you can't let what might happen influence any fucking decision you ever make. Please God, people, know what might be.

• 29:28Speaker 01

  Could be anything. What is, is the fact that you have control of your body. If you choose to use that body to shoot somebody, or to love somebody, or to sleep, or to take drugs, we cannot control the entire fucking world. We can't make our lives safe. Life is not safe, I promise you. This guy is a spy.

• 29:55Anthony Pompliano?

  Spy, come here.

• 29:56Speaker 01

  Please.

• 29:58Anthony Pompliano?

  So, John, part of John's, part of John's security team, Spy is here. Spy, introduce yourself.

• 30:09Speaker 01

  Tell him why you're called Spy.

• 30:12Anthony Pompliano?

  Been stabbed in the eye.

• 30:14Speaker 01

  He's been stabbed in the eye. How many times have you been shot?

• 30:18Anthony Pompliano?

  Three times.

• 30:19Speaker 01

  Three times.

• 30:20Anthony Pompliano?

  So Spy's been stabbed in the eye and shot three times.

• 30:22Speaker 01

  So Spy can promise you, for him, life is not safe. And I can promise you, for me, my life is far less safe than Spy's, and I think he will agree. Life is not safe. If you try to make it safe, you kill it. You kill that energy which invigorates and creates joy and bliss and mystery. What mystery is there in knowing that, ah, I'm safe. No one's gonna shoot me, fuck me in the ass without Vaseline. No, life is fine. That's no life.

• 31:01Anthony Pompliano?

  Let me ask you this question. I, I would say that you've lived life to the fullest more than 99% of other people, right? Do you have any regrets in life?

• 31:10Speaker 01

  None.

• 31:11Anthony Pompliano?

  None?

• 31:11Speaker 01

  None. Not even this woman here.

• 31:16Anthony Pompliano?

  All right. What do you, if you're president, what do you do with space travel? Should we go?

• 31:22Speaker 01

  First and foremost.

• 31:25Speaker 01

  If I'm president, we're in an alternate universe.

• 31:31Speaker 01

  And I can't tell you.

• 31:34Speaker 01

  No, I'm not here to be president. I'm here... Listen, who cares who's president if we're still slaves? If we're still lied to? If we have no truth? How do I make fucking decisions without facts? No, I'm here just to say one thing. Look at yourself now. Look at yourself now, are you happy in this commuting existence with your job? With your spouse? Paying taxes? Having the bank own your car, your house? Does this make you happy? If so, God bless you, please, enlighten me and tell me how you did it. But if you're not, then stop trying to fix it

• 32:19Speaker 01

  by going off on some tangent that has nothing to do with it. Because politics has got nothing to do with your current suffering or situation or discomfort. It's your lack of understanding of you. As applied to politics, please God, see that you don't understand anything about the people you got elected. Might have one suggestion. Vote them all out. Get derelicts from the fucking street, it'll be better. There'll be no power structure that we have to worry about. Please God, just see the truth. We have a hundred years of corruption growing

• 32:59Speaker 01

  inside a government designed to serve us. When is the last time the government served you? Seriously, served you? They look like they are our masters. They are our servants. Please God, will you get that through their heads? You served me as a congressman. You served me as a president. Which is why I don't want to be fucking president. I like working for people.

• 33:30Anthony Pompliano?

  What do you think about uh different mind altering drugs? What is uh the things that you use on a daily basis to go to the places that you want?

• 33:41Speaker 01

  All right, I get this question a lot, obviously. People say, what's the best drug? For what? For self-analysis? For sleep? For sex? For introspection? For loving your neighbor? Fuck me, I don't tell me what for. But I have a favorite. I've taken every drug known to man. I don't advise it by the way, which is why I'm so crazy. But still, um, drugs. What are drugs? I mean, they are substances that influence either the body or the mind in one way or the other. This is a fucking drug.

• 34:23Speaker 01

  You try not drinking water for a week and you drink water. You'll see what the drug is.

• 34:28Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 34:29Speaker 01

  No, we do it confidently. So do all animals. All animals do this. They go to those things which alter their perceptions of their surroundings and more importantly, of themselves. So I can't answer that question. Give me specific.

• 34:48Anthony Pompliano?

  What? Bath salts.

• 34:52Speaker 01

  You know what?

• 34:53Anthony Pompliano?

  Here's why I'm asking, ready? I think that a lot of people hear about bath salts. They read about these crazy stories, etc. They've got no clue what a bath salt is. They don't know how it works, what it does to your mind, etc.

• 35:03Speaker 01

  Okay. Because a bath salt is not a class of drug.

• 35:07Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 35:08Speaker 01

  Or an experience. Bath salts is the name given to every new research chemical which is mind altering.

• 35:19Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 35:19Speaker 01

  Period. Why bath salts? Because you used to be able to buy them legally in head shops, packaged as bath salts. People in the know go, hey, have you tried NDD? Yeah, there's got to be a salt smell. Good. So you go buy the NDD bath salts, which will say, put one tenth of one milligram in the bath water, right? Stir and sit in it. Well, that we adults are like, tenth of a milligram, that's the standard dose.

• 35:45Anthony Pompliano?

  What does it do when you take them in terms of the mental impact?

• 35:51Speaker 01

  What if it's a dope package, it's a bath salts. It wouldn't change dope.

• 35:56Speaker 01

  Bath salts is a way of selling a legal drug. You can't sell, even though it's legal and say snort it or shove it up your ass or inject it. No, put it in the bath and sit in the bath. You can tell them to do that. That's how it got a snatch. That's all.

• 36:14Anthony Pompliano?

  It's crazy.

• 36:14Speaker 01

  You could sell it up. See, it's a bath salt. I take one hundred, a hundred mics, dissolve it in your tub and sit in it. No means to go a hundred mics, put it on your tongue.

• 36:26Speaker 01

  That's all I mean. This is a way of coding.

• 36:27Anthony Pompliano?

  It's just a, it's different vernacular for certain drugs.

• 36:31Speaker 01

  All drugs.

• 36:32Anthony Pompliano?

  So, all right. So, so let's switch from drugs to just more general questions in terms of when you think of your life, are you happy?

• 36:39Speaker 01

  As happy as anybody.

• 36:41Anthony Pompliano?

  You seem happy.

• 36:42Speaker 01

  I am very happy. I was so, what was happening? It was a horrific day for everybody else. I was having a fucking blast. What were we doing?

• 36:51Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. Yeah. I tore my tendon after that. It was a bad day for the tendon, but still, as John talks about, tore my Achilles tendon. It was a bad day for everybody except me.

• 37:01Anthony Pompliano?

  So.

• 37:01Speaker 01

  I had a wonderful fucking time.

• 37:02Anthony Pompliano?

  What, what John's describing is we're having to do the interview on the boat because as he was jumping off the boat the other night, uh, he tore his Achilles tendon, but still had a good day?

• 37:10Speaker 01

  Yep. Fucking is awesome.

• 37:12Anthony Pompliano?

  Right? What, what is the average day? Like, what do you do every day? Cause you're, you're enjoying life. You're living your life. What, what do you spend your day?

• 37:19Speaker 01

  I just don't have an average day.

• 37:21Anthony Pompliano?

  You don't have an average day?

• 37:22Speaker 01

  Wake up in the morning, people go, what are we doing today? I don't know yet. I haven't had coffee.

• 37:28Speaker 01

  Seriously, that's my day.

• 37:29Anthony Pompliano?

  The, every person that I've met loves you and says similar things around how much fun you're having.

• 37:35Speaker 01

  The really ones I paid money to.

• 37:39Anthony Pompliano?

  That's fair. What would you say to the people online specifically that say negative things or the haters? What do they not understand about you that you wish that they understood?

• 37:50Speaker 01

  Number one, I love you all, no matter what you feel about me. I don't care how much you trash me, you're my species. You're no different than me. You love, you have dreams and hopes, generous, compassionate, gentle, loving. You are also hateful, lying, fearful, greedy.

• 38:18Speaker 01

  We are a mixed fucking bag and we're all the same bag. So if you're operating from one part of your bag, which is I hate you, I understand fully. I've been there. I love you. So let's get that straight. I don't give a shit what you think of me because you can't touch me. What you say about me can't touch me. Even shooting at me generally doesn't touch me.

• 38:43Speaker 01

  You have to be you. And if you are a troll, well, I love you dude, it's a very good one. I love you even more.

• 38:52Speaker 01

  In this way.

• 38:53Anthony Pompliano?

  I love that you love the trolls.

• 38:56Anthony Pompliano?

  They all come around eventually.

• 38:59Anthony Pompliano?

  Alright, so you run into a bunch of legal trouble. What's the whole situation? You've got everything from taxes to this Netflix documentary. What's your thoughts on all the legal stuff?

• 39:09Speaker 01

  I ignore everything legal now.

• 39:10Anthony Pompliano?

  You ignore everything legal, lawsuits, legal, everything?

• 39:14Speaker 01

  If the government's coming after me, I move like I did. Lawsuits, I throw in the trash can.

• 39:21Speaker 01

  It makes no difference.

• 39:22Anthony Pompliano?

  So this Netflix documentary exploded. Everyone was talking about it for a while. Did you watch it?

• 39:27Speaker 01

  No.

• 39:28Anthony Pompliano?

  No, you didn't watch it?

• 39:29Speaker 01

  Watched it, I watched it. I live in these fucking shoes. I found it. Well, no, it was a waste of time.

• 39:35Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 39:36Speaker 01

  I've never watched anything like that.

• 39:38Anthony Pompliano?

  Got it. Alright, so you didn't watch it. And then you've consistently over the last, what, maybe ten years? You've moved between Belize, Guatemala, the US, now in the Bahamas, etc. How much of it is you just don't want to deal with all the legal issues? To just you're living your life and these are places that you want to move to?

• 39:54Speaker 01

  Well, number one, the law. Do you want to answer this?

• 39:56Speaker 02

  Well, no, none of it was that.

• 39:59Anthony Pompliano?

  Janice, you answer.

• 40:00Speaker 02

  Since he's been back from Guatemala, all of the moving around has been because of

• 40:08Speaker 01

  The Sinaloa cartel.

• 40:09Speaker 02

  The Sinaloa cartel after him.

• 40:12Speaker 01

  And she was your friend.

• 40:13Speaker 02

  And I'm with him, yes. And so I had a handler that was actually working close with the cartel. That was introduced to me through my pimp. And so that's how I got involved in trying to do harm to John. And so, you know, over time, eventually, he was able to get me out of that situation. But the moving that we had to do was because people found out where we lived. And so there were teams there, so we had to move to safer places.

• 40:42Anthony Pompliano?

  What's the most dangerous situation you've been in?

• 40:46Speaker 01

  Uh, sorry, the most, seriously, the most dangerous happened on December thirteenth, two thousand and twelve.

• 40:55Anthony Pompliano?

  December thirteenth, two thousand and twelve.

• 40:56Speaker 01

  I was sitting, I was in a coffee shop, just got out of prison in Guatemala. Got back to Miami, having a cup of coffee.

• 41:05Speaker 01

  Last thing in the world I was thinking about was women. Why? Because I was in the Guatemalan jail with money. I had more pussy than God. I mean, and I couldn't, I didn't speak Spanish well enough to understand the television station. So all I could do was fuck. I was happy to be without a woman. By the way, all the pimps in Brazil are gross. This is how it works in other countries. Very reasonable. You go to jail, you get, you want women, you get women. You want drugs, you get drugs. Why not? You got money. So in any case, I'm sitting in a coffee shop, two o'clock in the morning, just got out of prison. Going, god damn, the thing I did not have is good coffee. Instant coffee in the country that produces the best coffee in the world. Why couldn't the guards make me real coffee? They had to buy a machine, there's nowhere to put the fucking machine, anyway, it doesn't matter.

• 41:50Speaker 01

  So this woman comes up and wonders if I want sex, I go, please God. First I said, what did I say, tell them.

• 41:58Speaker 02

  I asked for cigarettes.

• 41:59Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 41:59Speaker 02

  And as you were lighting my cigarette, you said, what are you girls doing out here, drugging and rolling old men? To which I responded, we don't use drugs.

• 42:08Speaker 01

  She told me she was, I told her I was, that was it. We've been, we've been to every day sits. I forgot the fucking question.

• 42:16Anthony Pompliano?

  So the most dangerous day of your life was the day, was the day you met her?

• 42:22Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, uh, you made a, at the time, very popular Bitcoin price prediction. That it's going to half a million, then you went to a million dollars.

• 42:33Speaker 01

  I'm considering going to two.

• 42:34Anthony Pompliano?

  You're considering going to two million, but you said a million dollars by twenty twenty, or you'd eat your dick.

• 42:38Speaker 01

  For twenty, right?

• 42:39Anthony Pompliano?

  Yes. All right, sticking by it?

• 42:41Speaker 01

  Fuck yes.

• 42:42Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, here, two questions for you that everyone really wants to know. One, are you gonna do it on national television?

• 42:47Speaker 01

  Well, it depends, I mean, because when I'm gonna have my, listen, I don't do work myself. Okay, everybody knows that. I subcontracted out.

• 42:57Anthony Pompliano?

  You don't do work yourself, all right?

• 42:58Speaker 01

  No, I'm too lazy, so that, just in case I'm wrong, I already have that subcontracted out. There is a place in Bangkok, the most beautiful prostitutes in the world. They can suck dick for hours, sometimes days. So I contracted with thirty of them on a relay chain with the instructions to keep trying till I die, all right?

• 43:19Anthony Pompliano?

  Really?

• 43:20Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 43:22Anthony Pompliano?

  Why would you, why, why would you go up to two million dollars?

• 43:25Speaker 01

  It doesn't fucking matter, guys, I'll get my dick sucked forever.

• 43:31Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, that's fair. What, what, what do you think is gonna happen to Bitcoin's price? Do you really think it's gonna go to a million, two million in the next couple of years?

• 43:38Speaker 01

  Oh, a million, yeah.

• 43:40Anthony Pompliano?

  Million.

• 43:40Speaker 01

  Maybe a million or two.

• 43:42Anthony Pompliano?

  But a million.

• 43:43Speaker 01

  Please God, run the fucking numbers. Do you realize that while Bitcoin is going up in value, its price has been going down? What's gonna happen when the reality kicks in? And everybody's fucking using it, and it's really worth a billion dollars a fucking coin? Because really, if it's the universal currency, that's its goddamn value. There's only 21 million of them. Four million of them are seriously lost forever. Please God, run those numbers.

• 44:10Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah. So your whole argument here is that-

• 44:11Speaker 01

  Do they teach math in school anymore?

• 44:13Anthony Pompliano?

  Your argument is the fundamental value continues to increase regardless of where the price goes, and the price has to catch up to the value.

• 44:20Speaker 01

  Yes, yes, yes. Please God.

• 44:22Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah. I think that's fair. All right. Before I wrap up, I always ask rapid-fire questions. Listen, by the way, your voice is held up great. You're doing a great job. What's the most important company in crypto?

• 44:36Speaker 01

  Bitmain.

• 44:37Anthony Pompliano?

  Bitmain. Wait, why Bitmain? Because of Jihan?

• 44:42Speaker 01

  Okay. So I start off by saying the Jihan. Number one, he's the most humble man I've ever fucking met. He's also the smartest. Do you realize that Bitcoin is nothing more than a stepping stone? It was a hobby for him. That the S9 and everything that he has done, really a hobby. His true interest is artificial intelligence, and that son of a bitch has built an ASIC processor, an AI ASIC processor, that when I looked at it, I go, I'm in the presence of God. So I don't give a shit what people think about him. Why they say he's controlling, he's got too much power. Well, fuck me. Who cares? It's in the hands of a humble motherfucker.

• 45:27Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 45:28Speaker 01

  You know, thank you like you're stars.

• 45:30Anthony Pompliano?

  What's the most controversial thought you have in crypto? What's the one thing you believe that everyone else would disagree with you on?

• 45:37Speaker 02

  Do you have a Bitcoin prediction, boys?

• 45:38Speaker 01

  No, fuck no.

• 45:43Speaker 01

  That crypto-

• 45:47Speaker 01

  Will bring change and turbulence into our economy, our society, our beliefs, into our personal relationships, and certainly into our awareness of ourselves and what power really is, that will make the industrial revolution look like a kindergarten sandbox game. I cannot put into words what's coming down this pipe. I see it, there are no fucking words for it, just like there's no word for meme before meme appeared. So I can't tell

• 46:25Speaker 01

  you. I see it, and I promise you it is coming. It is coming. And be strong, and survive, and bring that joy and freedom into your life which comes along with this.

• 46:40Anthony Pompliano?

  What's the one regulation you would change or improve?

• 46:48Speaker 01

  I think that the prime one, the regulation that says other people can regulate.

• 46:56Anthony Pompliano?

  You would just get rid of regulation in general?

• 46:58Speaker 01

  I wouldn't for it.

• 47:00Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, that's fair. What uh, what's the most important book you've ever read?

• 47:03Speaker 01

  Charles Darwin's Origins Species, hands down.

• 47:06Anthony Pompliano?

  Why?

• 47:07Speaker 01

  Fuck me. I'm gonna tell you why. Number one, I am the only person, my field of acquaintances in my entire fucking life, who's read it. Why did I read it? Well, I was living then in Mexico for a year. I was desperate to read. I mean, try camping on these fucking backwards Mexican trailer parks. Fuck me, it's boring. I wanted a book. The only English language book I could fucking find was in Guadalajara, Charles Darwin's Origins Species, and by means of natural selection. Fuck me, at least it's English. I read it cover to cover three times. It's been an entire year.

• 47:50Anthony Pompliano?

  Wow.

• 47:51Speaker 01

  That book.

• 47:54Speaker 01

  I promise you, the people I'm talking to, how many people I'm talking to today? Two, four, six, doesn't matter. If anything, if you've read it, cover to cover, email me. [email protected]. [email protected].

• 48:11Anthony Pompliano?

  So your email is-

• 48:11Speaker 01

  And I will fly to you and spend the week talking to you.

• 48:15Speaker 02

  Unless you're in America.

• 48:16Speaker 01

  Unless you're in America, okay, I can't go there.

• 48:18Anthony Pompliano?

  So, people who have read Charles Darwin's-

• 48:21Speaker 01

  Origin of Species, cover to cover.

• 48:23Anthony Pompliano?

  Should email you at [email protected].

• 48:26Speaker 01

  And if I can't come to you, I'll bring you to me, because I've never met a single human.

• 48:31Anthony Pompliano?

  Who's read the book?

• 48:32Speaker 01

  Who's read the book?

• 48:32Anthony Pompliano?

  Oh, that's a-

• 48:33Speaker 01

  Ever. We all talk about, oh, yeah, I know, I, yeah, evolution, I know all about it. Bull fucking shit, you don't know anything. You know nothing. Read the beauty. I mean, I had tears in my eyes. And I was a young man with beautiful women. Shouldn't have had tears in my eyes, should I? But I did. Reading this fucking book, the beauty, the insights, the depth, god damn. If he was here today, I would give everything that I own, which is nothing anyway, and just to say hi to him.

• 49:02Anthony Pompliano?

  Before I finish and let you ask me a question, my last question's always about aliens.

• 49:07Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 49:08Anthony Pompliano?

  You believe in aliens?

• 49:11Speaker 01

  I am one.

• 49:14Anthony Pompliano?

  You are one. Are you the only alien, or you think there's other aliens?

• 49:19Speaker 01

  We are all aliens in this book. Why? Because I don't care who you are, what you look like, what your sex is, what your age is. You are unique. There's nobody like you. There's never been anybody like you, and there never will be anyone like you. You are one of the unique creatures. Things, sparks of life, created for you.

• 49:55Speaker 01

  For you.

• 49:56Anthony Pompliano?

  Would you rather go to the depths of the ocean or go to space? Which one are you more scared of?

• 50:01Speaker 01

  I don't want to go to either one.

• 50:02Anthony Pompliano?

  You don't want to go to either one? You're the first person who didn't pick.

• 50:06Speaker 01

  People, people go, where would you like to go most? I'd like to go back to some Bangkok whorehouse. That's why they don't have a party in those places.

• 50:14Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, before we end, what one question do you have for me?

• 50:18Speaker 01

  Why the fuck did you come all the way down here just to talk to me?

• 50:22Anthony Pompliano?

  Because I wanted you to tell your story in your words.

• 50:25Speaker 01

  Fair enough.

• 50:25Anthony Pompliano?

  I, I think there's a lot of people who are, who are super interested in what you got to say, but no one gives you a platform to just say what you believe.

• 50:32Speaker 01

  I don't have a platform. I take the bar up here and force people to listen to my goddamn platform.

• 50:38Anthony Pompliano?

  You, you do. So, so for those listening, we are in Exuma Bahamas and, and we walked up to the bar.

• 50:45Speaker 01

  And I saw your fishes me turn the bar, right?

• 50:47Anthony Pompliano?

  And you actually are a bartender in your, in your spare time these days.

• 50:51Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 50:52Anthony Pompliano?

  All right.

• 50:53Speaker 01

  So I, I always have somebody listen.

• 50:56Anthony Pompliano?

  Another word from our sponsors at Total. They're kind of like Kayak, which helps you find the best flights. But Total helps you find liquidity by aggregating decentralized exchanges and optimally routing trades for execution. Remember, that's totle.com/pomp. T O T L E dot com slash pomp. Go check it out. Let me know what you think. Tweet at me. I'll drop you some fire emojis. totle.com/pomp. Hey, everyone, Pop here. If you liked this episode of Off the Chain and want to help us take crypto to the top of the apple, Spotify and other podcast charts, please do us a favor and rate, review and subscribe. To review, simply go to the Off the Chain homepage, scroll down until you see the five blank stars.

• 51:38Anthony Pompliano?

  Taking 15 seconds to fill those stars in and leave a quick review goes a long way in helping us take the entire crypto ecosystem to the top of the charts. I appreciate you listening and see you next time on Off the Chain.