#898 Understanding Ape Coin & The Latest NFT Projects w/ Jason WIlliams

Jason Williams is an Entrepreneur and Investor. In this conversation, we discuss Jason's recent gains in Ape Coin and what exactly is this project. We also jump into various NFT projects that Jason is looking at and how to keep your investments secure. ======================= Choice is a new self-directed IRA product that I'm really excited about. If you are listening to this, you are likely part of the 7.1 million bitcoin owners who have retirement accounts with dollars in them, but not bitcoin. I was in that situation too. Now you can actually buy real Bitcoin in your retirement account. I'm talking about owning your private keys and using tax-advantaged dollars to do it too. Absolute game changer. https://www.retirewithchoice.com/pomp ======================= Imagine coinmarketcap - decentralized. 3X in valuation is 15 billion dollars from the current price. Cryptotoday.com starts at zero, at fair launch on 7th of March. No VC. No pre-sale. Team tokens locked. For the people, by the people. For decentralized crypto. Visit http://cryptotoday.com and read the whitepaper for the details.

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. Most of you know me as Pomp. You're listening to the Pomp Podcast, simply the best podcast out there. Now let's kick this thing off. Jason Williams is a highly successful entrepreneur and investor. In this conversation, we talk about Bitcoin, Bitcoin mining, talk about Bored Ape Yacht Club and the new Apecoin, and we also talk about self custody. I really enjoyed this conversation with Jason as always, and I hope that you enjoy it as well. Before we get into this episode though, I want to quickly talk about our sponsors. This episode is brought to you by OKCoin. They are my favorite place to buy, trade, and stake crypto. They're the fastest growing US-based exchange, serving over 190 countries globally, with the easy onboarding and low fees. If you haven't tried them out yet, you

• 0:45Anthony Pompliano?

  should. They're on a mission to make learning about and buying crypto easier than ever, and they're all about bringing more financial literacy to everyone, something we can always use more of. From being the only exchange to integrate Lightning, to contributing over $1 million for Bitcoin core developers, they're doing incredible work to further the Bitcoin ecosystem, and they offer lots of other vetted utility assets, from gaming to DeFi. With OKCoin, I feel confident that the future really will be OK. To get started, go to OKCoin.com/Pomp for some free Bitcoin when you sign up. Again, if you want free Bitcoin, go to OKCoin.com/Pomp today. Next up is Compass Mining. Compass Mining is the world's largest marketplace for mining

• 1:28Anthony Pompliano?

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• 2:10Anthony Pompliano?

  Join today by visiting compassmining.io again compassmining.io go check them out and let me know what you think. Today's episode is brought to you by Fundrise. You all know I believe that the best investors both understand and seek out extreme asymmetry. Fundrise is here to help you do just that. It's the largest direct to investor real estate investment platform out there, giving you the opportunity to achieve upside of an asset class previously reserved for institutions and high net worth individuals. That's right. Fundrise is making high end private market real estate investing accessible to everyone via an easy to use automated platform. Its 1 million users already know that the investment with Fundrise is capable of producing strong appreciation returns and income generation while helping to stabilize a diversified portfolio.

• 2:53Anthony Pompliano?

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• 3:24Speaker 01

  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.

• 3:47Anthony Pompliano?

  We have Jason Williams. Jason, what's going on?

• 3:51Speaker 02

  Hey, what's going on, fellas?

• 3:52Anthony Pompliano?

  Not much. How are you?

• 3:55Speaker 02

  Hanging in there, doing my thing. Not talking to you as frequently as I like to, but other than that, everything's good.

• 4:02Anthony Pompliano?

  We just need to bring you on the show once a week and let you explain what's going on in the world.

• 4:07Speaker 02

  Love that. I don't even understand what you guys are talking about. These inflation numbers are way too low.

• 4:13Anthony Pompliano?

  What do you think inflation is?

• 4:15Speaker 02

  No, it's definitely double digit. And when you put out that tweet initially, I said it's more like 15%. Maybe higher than that. Real inflation.

• 4:24Anthony Pompliano?

  We were just talking about the price of a new home in America now is $511,000. That's up 25% over the last year. And how much of that is a better indicator of inflation than CPI?

• 4:42Speaker 02

  No, I think it's a great point. I mean, if you follow the materials that need to go into building a home, you start to really get a sense of real inflation. I mean, if you're out here building things like I am, we already started getting contracts renegotiated from the subs to the GCs, they even trying to lease properties. Everything was being, if there was an escape valve in a contract, it was being hatched. And it sucks. Like we've seen solid core doors for our properties be unavailable, lead times of like four weeks, six weeks, 18 weeks, some electrical equipment unavailable.

• 5:23Speaker 02

  Some things have gone to 52 weeks in terms of lead times and the prices are just exploding. Like everything's up 30%. So don't talk to me about inflation at 7.9% stupid.

• 5:35Anthony Pompliano?

  All right. What I do want to talk about is you woke up, was it last week? And you had a bunch of ape coins. What the hell is ape coin? And what is going on with this? This, this whole thing, it's like one of the things people have been asking the most about that I've seen on Twitter, et cetera. So I figured you could help explain it because are you like an ape coin whale now?

• 5:55Speaker 02

  I wouldn't call myself an ape coin whale, but you know, I did have four bored apes. So I've been holding those for a while and I had a few mutant apes and some of these mutant dogs as well. So.

• 6:10Speaker 02

  You, you, you, the labs created ape coin and I think it was, they distanced themselves from the project a bit and launched it under the ape coin Dow. And I think that happened around March 17th. The token launched at about 40 bucks, then dropped to like eight bucks and is sitting between 13 and 14 dollars right now. So the holders of ape, board apes, received this ape coin in their metamask wallets. And it's pretty significant to each board ape that you own, you were entitled to 10,000 ape coins. And, you know,

• 6:50Anthony Pompliano?

  And how much was it when it first, when, when the coins first got airdropped? How much were the coins?

• 6:55Speaker 02

  Well, it initially spiked on some of the, on some of the trackers to 200 bucks, but it pegged at 40 bucks, pegged at 40 bucks.

• 7:05Anthony Pompliano?

  So basically, you, so you got, what is that, $400,000?

• 7:09Speaker 02

  For every ape you owned.

• 7:11Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay, that's wild. But some people got like a million dollars if they sold it at the top?

• 7:17Speaker 02

  That's correct. Yeah. I mean, this, this thing was, again, when I, when I tweeted it, my, my, my, my bag was worth eight million bucks.

• 7:29Speaker 02

  So anyway, I didn't sell, I didn't sell because there was a lot of interesting things here. Again, I'm, I'm, I dove deep into play to earn strategies. I, I, I saw some of the, the things that even Gemini, if you guys, do you know Gemini has a credit card product?

• 7:46Anthony Pompliano?

  Yep.

• 7:47Speaker 02

  You can choose to earn your interest payments when you use that credit card and get paid in ape coin.

• 7:53Anthony Pompliano?

  I'm not going to do that, but that's interesting.

• 7:56Speaker 02

  It's interesting. Ape coin already has some built in functionality in the play to earn environment. There is a, a company called Anamoka Brands. It's backed by Ubisoft. And they've got a bunch of games coming out that you can use ape coin in. And there's a selective merchandise that you can only buy with ape coins. So again, there's all of these different gimmicks and, and, and, um, opportunities to, uh, to use ape coin and monetize it. I'm not a, you know, I, I'm not involved in the project. I got some ape coin for free and we're only talking about it because you asked me.

• 8:34Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 8:35Speaker 02

  I need, I need, uh, I need one of the Pompliano brothers to put on an HR hat whenever you and I talk so that, uh, I can stay in, uh, in, in, in, in the, uh, in the HR framework world, you know, I want to make sure.

• 8:48Anthony Pompliano?

  I'm there with your dog.

• 8:49Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah. As a fiduciary, I'm, I'm staying in bounds.

• 8:54Anthony Pompliano?

  I don't, I, I don't do anything without, uh, talking to HR. HR runs my life now.

• 8:59Speaker 02

  That's HR. Need to make sure that we stay in bounds.

• 9:03Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 9:04Speaker 03

  Jason.

• 9:04Speaker 02

  Those are my favorite, those are my favorite hand movements now. You know, you know, those are, whose hand movements are those?

• 9:11Speaker 03

  Jason, I got a question for you regarding, are you gonna, are you going to, are you going to stake any of your ape coin?

• 9:19Speaker 02

  You know, I, I'm planning on just holding it. I'm gonna hold it. I'm just gonna hold it and I'm gonna watch. I'm gonna watch and I'm gonna hold ape coin.

• 9:27Anthony Pompliano?

  So how much money did you lose from the top down in terms of?

• 9:34Anthony Pompliano?

  So it was at eight million and if it comes down, then it went from 200 to 40. So basically, uh, yeah. So you lost like a couple of million bucks in, in

• 9:44Speaker 02

  No.

• 9:44Anthony Pompliano?

  Theoretical value of what it was worth that you got for free.

• 9:48Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah. Like, look, I'm not a loser. You know, I think it's like, I, you know, I, I, and I, I wanted to come on here and actually, and say something very important today.

• 9:59Anthony Pompliano?

  All right. Can't wait.

• 10:02Speaker 02

  Yeah. I have not been a Drake fan and I've constantly kind of bagged on Drake and I, I just wasn't into it, but I never really listened to Drake.

• 10:12Anthony Pompliano?

  All right.

• 10:13Speaker 02

  So over the last day, I've been listening to continuous Drake on, um, on Pandora and I have to say, I relate to most of his lyrics. And, um, I'm a big fan now. Like I'm pretty much. I, I am, I am Drake's muse.

• 10:33Anthony Pompliano?

  I want to know that, uh, did you like, when you woke up and you realized it, did you like message anybody and you're like, yo, I just made millions off mutant dogs today?

• 10:43Speaker 02

  No, I, I hit you up immediately. I was like, bro, this is crazy.

• 10:47Anthony Pompliano?

  I literally was like, wait, what?

• 10:49Speaker 02

  Yeah, like it's just crazy, but I've been around a while. We've, we've had like the EOS, uh, drops. You know, I've got a wallet that's packed full of garbage and I've experienced the Bitcoin drops. You know, we've gone through that, uh, by being holders from Bitcoin Cash to Bitcoin Gold, Bitcoin Black. I mean, I can go, I can go on and on about, um, you know, airdrops associated with Bitcoin. We may even experience another airdrop if, uh, if the Ripple Galaxy brains are, are successful in getting someone to soft fork Bitcoin.

• 11:20Anthony Pompliano?

  Let's talk about that. If they, yeah, I, I talked to Chris Larson. I'd say, why don't you just fork the code and let the free market decide? Now I really would like them to fork the code, but most people would think, oh, that's because you want the free market to decide. That's not why, because when the fork happens, as you're alluding to here, you basically get the Bitcoin that you own. You just get a duplication of it on their new, uh, chain. And I think now, most people have seen this play out a couple of times. They would not just say, screw it. Let's see what happens with my new coins. They would sell it as fast as possible to buy more Bitcoin. And so it would be a, a new injection of, uh, capital into the Bitcoin market. So increased demand, fixed supply asset, Bitcoin's price probably goes up.

• 12:05Anthony Pompliano?

  Two, anyone holding Bitcoin would just have more Bitcoin, which would be cool. And three is it would settle the free market discussion on like, hey, what does the market think about these two ideas? But like, it is interesting when you start thinking about the forks, right? There's not like true airdrops in the sense of, uh, like this ape coin, et cetera. But it acts the same way of somebody does something and you get more value in your wallet.

• 12:29Speaker 02

  Totally agree. We hadn't talked at all about this, but that's my perspective as well. You know, Bitcoin Cash worthless, Bitcoin Satoshi Vision lost. You know, it solved a lot of things around Bitcoin and here we go again with another attack on Bitcoin. Proof of work. Let the free market decide. Do a soft work, whatever. And, uh, and issue the tokens. I'll dump them as fast as, uh, as I can and buy more Bitcoin.

• 12:57Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, I think that that's one of the big lessons from 2017, 2018. Uh, is that's probably the right strategy. When you think about, uh, playing in, uh, in this whole NFT land, do you try to buy things where you think there's going to be a token? Or is that just like a gravy on top? Like, what's your strategy, I guess, when you start looking at NFTs?

• 13:17Speaker 02

  You know, at first it was if I, if I could buy an NFT that had a physical component associated with it. I thought that was really interesting. So like, if I could get a real piece of physical art and an NFT and somehow create some arbitrage, sell the physical piece, keep the physical piece, sell the digital piece. You know, I'm an art collector, so that was, that was really interesting. And a lot of the, the big artists, uh, people included, had physical components, uh, to their art. Fowos did the same thing and you're seeing it over and over again in the rare Pepe. And even in the, uh, in the, um, uh, real Pepe movement, um, where artists are making, uh, physical,

• 13:59Speaker 02

  physical pieces associated with the, uh, the digital pieces. So I like that a lot. I'm really interested in rights associated with these NFTs as well. So, um, you know, you and I have talked about board apes, um, and I've, uh, I've been really interested in them because I think it's an additional, um, branding opportunity for businesses. And I sent you some information on Black Rifle Coffee and how they took a board ape. They bought one and then they did some merch associated with it that I think is really cool. I like Black Rifle Coffee anyway, and I thought it was really interesting that they were using an ape to do some marketing. And I've done the same thing. I have a fund and we own an ape in the Fund and we use that ape as our representative as almost anonymous fund managers.

• 14:44Speaker 02

  When you get communications from our fund, they come from this ape who we've. Uh, we've taken some creative license with because we own the rights of the image. And people get a kick out of it. You know, we put some glasses on and put a suit on it, a Mark Yousko suit, you know. The little tie and the cuff links and stuff, you know, how Mark Yousko dresses.

• 15:04Anthony Pompliano?

  To the nines.

• 15:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, to the nines and the cuff. He's a banker, you know, he's got the, got all the stuff. And, um, you know, so does our board ape.

• 15:13Anthony Pompliano?

  So when you think about this, what exactly is the like long-term goal? You build up a brand around it and then eventually that becomes kind of like the IP or the mascot of whether it's a fund, a business, whatever.

• 15:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's, it's just an opportunity to create some brand differentiation and some talk. If you, you know, I, I, we're building a surf shop and a coffee shop in a community I'm in. And we have a board ape associated with that as well. You know, to, to make some hoodies and T-shirts with this board ape or, you know, call it. Make a surf club with this board ape on it. I just think it's interesting. It's not the whole thing. It's just part of the thing, but it connects to, um, a space that I love. You know, I love Bitcoin, um, and I, I love this kind of technology that we're, we're, we're playing around with. And, uh, to be able to create brands and connect crypto Bitcoin, board ape to whatever I'm trying to, uh.

• 16:09Speaker 02

  Uh, market is, is just really interesting to me. So I'm suggesting it to people. There are 10,000 of these apes, 6,000 something holders of these apes. And you own the rights and privileges to monetize that image and protect it. I think that's really cool. You know, they're really defensible. You're gonna have to spend some money to do it.

• 16:28Anthony Pompliano?

  Do you think that they'll be the winner over the long term? Like, is it just a, is it, uh, maybe not winner take all, but winner take the most in one of these, uh, kind of PFP type communities? Or do you think that, uh, there could be 10 different winners? And it's kind of like, maybe like video games. Oh, I like playing Madden. My brother who's not good at Madden likes playing, you know, something else.

• 16:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think there's. There's not good at Madden.

• 16:49Anthony Pompliano?

  He's not.

• 16:50Speaker 02

  There's gonna be, there's gonna be OG, like, long-term winners in the space, and then there's gonna be fads.

• 17:00Speaker 02

  But, you know, when I look at V1 punks, V2 punks, Bored Apes, Rare Pepe's, I think the market, as it matures, they're gonna wanna collect these or have a position in them. And as the wallets and the opportunities to display your pieces of art improve, like, I've seen some super cool digital frames. I've got another place I'm furnishing now, and I'm putting up some of these digital frames to display digital art in it. I think it's really, really cool. So, yeah, I don't think this is going away. I said to you guys many, many months ago that this is the fourth greatest innovation I've seen in my lifetime.

• 17:43Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, I think it's interesting. Joe, what do you got? What are the other three greatest innovations that you've seen?

• 17:48Speaker 02

  Well, it was FastMed, you know, the business I started, the internet, Bitcoin, and NFTs. And I took a lot of heat for putting NFTs on that list. But on the back of saying that, you know, my concept was co-opted by Gary Vee, and he makes $70 million on V Friends. And then Web3's come around. So I don't think NFTs are going away.

• 18:12Speaker 03

  Jason, what other NFT projects are you looking at currently? Whether you own them already or you're looking at purchasing one, maybe?

• 18:19Speaker 02

  Man, there's so, so many different projects in the play-to-earn space that I couldn't even list them. So, you know, play-to-earn is big, and NFTs are an integral part of owning kind of assets in a game that are tradable, valuable, collectible, transferable, and you can prove ownership. So it's just not going away. I love play-to-earn and making a lot of investments in that space.

• 18:44Anthony Pompliano?

  Gotcha. Have you looked at, there's a person on Twitter, Frank DeGod, who keeps hitting me up and telling me, "DeGods on Solana." A lot of the things you're talking about are on Ethereum. How much of this is Ethereum-based versus? Solana based and like, does that matter?

• 19:02Speaker 02

  No, it does. The, and I think you and I have talked a little bit about this, you know, everything other than Bitcoin in the Bitcoin space or in crypto right now, it's a massive part of the market share, the overall market share of crypto. And the diversification of real projects on top of these other chains have created a bit of a cornerstone moment that's taken some of the volatility out of, out of, out of the space. So, you know, Solana, there are so many projects and NFTs built on that. You know, I'm an investor in a company called Star Atlas or a project called Star Atlas and, you know, in full disclosure, and I'm a holder of Solana.

• 19:47Anthony Pompliano?

  Inside the, inside the, the HR framework there, you go, good job.

• 19:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I want to make sure that we all are okay. Yeah. So I, I think that this is, this isn't all about Ethereum anymore. And I think there's a maturation that's going on both in everything other than Bitcoin and in Bitcoin. I'm watching Bitcoiners not go hungry and not live without shares, but actually think about buying homes and how do I custody this stuff? And can I borrow against my Bitcoin? Do I need insurance to back Bitcoin? You know, so if God forbid, something happens to it, I'm protected. You know, how does my wife and, and family deal with my estate?

• 20:33Speaker 02

  If my estate holds Bitcoin, can I transfer and donate Bitcoin to universities? You know, all of these things are happening now because Bitcoiners are getting older, they're maturing. And it's not just about like, you know, buying drugs or video game stuff.

• 20:47Anthony Pompliano?

  What do you think about majority of Bitcoiners actually hold other coins or hold equity in companies that support other coins? There's even, without saying any names, companies that hold themselves out there as Bitcoin companies, but they either support the buying and selling of other coins or have helped their customers buy other coins. How do you think about that stuff?

• 21:10Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, there's probably three flavors of participants, market participants right now. There's the anon, like toxic Bitcoin maximalist that I killed in 2021, and I continue to slaughter them in 2022. Then there's the fake Bitcoin maximalist that holds shitcoins, all kinds of other projects, and is trying to capitalize on what they missed in 2017. So a lot of them saw the issuance of ICOs, which were unregistered securities. They recognized it, they avoided it, but a lot of people made a lot of money. And that left them with dyspepsia. And so they don't want dyspepsia.

• 21:54Speaker 02

  So now they're participating in NFTs and these other projects in a very discreet way, and stacking more Bitcoin. And then you have, you know, these third parties, like you said, that are out there raising capital and buying up lots of Bitcoin. So there's probably three flavors of it.

• 22:15Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, last question is, I saw you posted on Twitter that you were taking Bitcoin off of exchanges. What's your general feel about self custody versus the exchanges and all that? And like, what's your strategy there?

• 22:28Speaker 02

  Yeah, look, you know, I think it's really important that if you're not actively trading Bitcoin, so if you're not buying and selling Bitcoin, that you don't leave it on exchanges. It needs to be custodied. And it's a good practice to learn how to do that and to maintain whatever cold storage devices or system you have. Make it redundant, think about it, and protect it. This asset is an extraordinary one. It's a pristine one, and it needs to be treated elegantly and with intention. You know, beyond that, whenever the price gets a little toppy, I like to take Bitcoin off of exchanges and participate in like, not your keys, not your coins. I think, I think...

• 23:13Speaker 02

  Bitcoiners need to get their coins off of exchanges. It's a good signal to the market that, you know, there if there's demand and there's no supply, price goes up, right?

• 23:26Anthony Pompliano?

  That is very, very true, which I think is what we're seeing here now as Do Kwon does this $3 billion bid. I mean, it feels like some Bitcoiners may not like it, but it's no different than other companies or organizations or individuals doing it.

• 23:40Speaker 02

  I totally agree, Paul.

• 23:42Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, that's all right. Where should we send people to find you on the internet or go check out anything you're doing?

• 23:49Speaker 02

  Man, I'm just out there. You can find me at GoingParabolic. I've written a pretty good book that people continue to like, number one bestseller in macroeconomics and international finance.

• 24:01Anthony Pompliano?

  Very good.

• 24:03Speaker 02

  You know, 700, five-star ratings. I take my book out, other books run. I bring it around, Saf Dean, off he goes. Where did Saf Dean go? I hear his little feet just.

• 24:13Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, my friend, thank you so much for joining us. Should have sold the top. You didn't. Hopefully you get back.

• 24:22Speaker 02

  Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, market. Ape coins, 14 bucks. I'm gonna come back and we'll talk about that later.

• 24:32Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, when it comes back, we're definitely gonna have you come back on and you can come on and say that you sold $10 million for the ape coin that you got from your mutant dogs and now everyone else who was yelling and screaming at you is an idiot.

• 24:43Speaker 02

  Yeah, sorry, Drake, trophies.

• 24:46Anthony Pompliano?

  Later, buddy.

• 24:49Speaker 03

  See you, Jason.

• 24:50Anthony Pompliano?

  Thanks so much for listening to today's episode. I really hope you guys enjoyed this one. Make sure you subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite podcast player. And if you're looking to try to transition to get a new job in the Bitcoin or crypto industry, we've got you covered. Head over to pompscryptocourse.com. We've developed a curriculum with the top teams across the industry. It's a three-week intensive training program with over 50 events packed into that three-week time period. Go to pompscryptocourse.com to learn more and I'll meet you guys for the next episode.