064 - The Bitcoin Insurance Revolution: Insights from Meanwhile's Co-Founder Zac Townsend

In this conversation, Zach Townsend, co-founder of Meanwhile, discusses the innovative approach of creating a Bitcoin-denominated life insurance company. He shares his background in fintech and public service, the vision behind Meanwhile, and the unique benefits of their insurance products. The discussion also covers regulatory challenges, the role of AI in operations, fundraising experiences, and advice for entrepreneurs in the Bitcoin space.

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⚡  Get personalized onboarding at River for Bitcoin-only financial services: https://partner.river.com/buildwithbitcoin
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Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Bitcoin-Based Insurance
02:09 Zach's Background and Journey to Bitcoin
06:58 Founding Meanwhile: The Vision Behind Bitcoin Insurance
13:42 Understanding Meanwhile's Product Offering
18:54 Mechanics of the Life Insurance Policy
26:20 Accounting and Regulatory Challenges in Bitcoin Insurance
33:47 Understanding Policy Ownership and Expansion Plans
36:20 The Vision for Global Insurance Accessibility
38:57 Innovative Loan Structures and Interest Mechanisms
40:45 Leveraging AI in Insurance Operations
43:13 Building a Diverse and Skilled Team
45:51 Navigating the Fundraising Landscape
52:29 The Role of Key Investors and Strategic Partnerships
58:39 Advice for Entrepreneurs in the Bitcoin Space
01:02:42 The Future of Bitcoin Funding and Investment Trends

References
https://meanwhile.bm/
https://x.com/ztownsend

https://www.buildwithbitcoin.xyz/
https://x.com/BuildwBitcoin
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❗ DISCLAIMER: This show is for entertainment purposes only. Before making any decisions, consult a professional.

Transcript

Zac: 0:00

We come to Bitcoin very much like our long term perspective is, it's a weird economy, right? It's global, it's decentralized, it's outside the control of any government. But, like, it sort of overlays, maybe in other economies. But we believe that, like bitcoins money, much like the actual white paper says, and thus there'll be capital markets, and there'll be Debt Capital Markets, and there'll be payment systems, and there'll be like real functioning economic activity, and 3% of global GDP is life insurance premiums, so 3% of that economy's GDP should be life insurance premiums.

Israel: 0:42

You How do you plan for life insurance in a weak or devaluing currency? Well, the answer is, you really can't, a problem that even some developed nations are starting to struggle with. How does Bitcoin flip this completely on its head? We speak today with Zach Townsend, co founder and CEO of meanwhile, the first fully Bitcoin denominated insurance company. We go through Zach's journey and how his previous entrepreneurship experiences got him to building meanwhile, we speak through a variety of topics, including how he set up a regulated entity, how the products work, his vision for the company, fundraising, learnings, as well as much more valuable advice, we hope you enjoy. And as a reminder, this podcast is for educational purposes only. If you enjoy the content, please remember to subscribe or share as This all helps us grow organically. Lynne and Israel are partners at basil air advisors, where they employ their strong network of Venture Capital Partners and startups to connect investors with unique opportunities within the Bitcoin innovation space. Alongside this, they support founders with their strategic growth and fundraising goals. Visit our website's advisory section to learn more. Welcome to build with Bitcoin. I'm co host Israel. Munoz joined with co host Lynne Bairstow. Today, we welcome Zach Townsend from meanwhile, CEO and co founder of the first to our knowledge, Bitcoin based insurance company, specifically life. So we'll get into all of that. But first of all, welcome Zach. We're excited to have you on yeah.

Zac: 2:14

Thanks so much. Very happy to be here first and still only is my understanding. So

Israel: 2:19

yeah. So we have quite a bit to get through very interesting business that you're building, and before we get into the business side of things, Zach, it'd be great to start with a little on your background, as I understand both you and your co founder, Max, come from Silicon Valley Tech, we'd love to hear a Little bit both on your you know, your your prior businesses, your background before, meanwhile, but also what you know, what particularly about Bitcoin caught your attention. Was it the, you know, hard money aspect? Was it the technology side? Yeah, if you could share what, what brought you to meanwhile? Yeah, yeah.

Zac: 2:59

As you say, both my co founder and I are, like, FinTech entrepreneurs, or FinTech, you know, Silicon Valley folks by background. So I actually started in public service. I was the sort of head of innovation in the city of Newark, New Jersey, when Cory Booker was mayor, and I got really interested in the financial inclusion and financial inclusion and financial empowerment, sort of asking questions like, why do people in West New York not have bank accounts? And why do they do check cashing? And somewhat naively, actually, I thought the marginal cost of database entries is free. So like, the marginal cost of checking accounts should be free. I think I didn't understand a lot about fraud and compliance costs at the time, but you know that that was sort of my mental model. So when Corey decided to run for Senate in like, 2013 early 2013 I decided I wanted to go, like, work on building financial infrastructure, and I just applied out of the blue to what seemed to be the coolest financial infrastructure company I could find, and I got hired as employee, I think 35 or 36 at stripe. And then in what is the like, best life decision, but worst financial decision of my life. I left pretty quickly, and an old buddy and I got into Y Combinator, and we built a sort of like bank account as a service company. We sort of invented that category. And we were went through yc. We were backed by Andrew Horowitz and Index Ventures and data collective and, you know, a bunch of great angels and built that company for three years, did a lot of crazy stuff, but, like, fundamentally, we were, like, too early that market. Now they're like 10 people in that market. We sort of created the market, but like, three years before it made any sense, so we sort of fell up. Into an acquisition by Silicon Valley Bank. But to answer your question, we had offers from a bunch of companies, and one of those companies was Coinbase, another opportunity they had to potentially have made a ton of money, and, you know, bastard buy, but Coinbase at the time was like 40 people, and they were really struggling with, like, basic financial infrastructure and KYC and compliance and the stuff. So they wanted to, like, absorb our company so we could work on that stuff. So I actually received my first Bitcoin from Brian, showing me how Coinbase worked, like in a meeting where he was trying to convince me to come work at Coinbase. Interesting. So I wasn't, I think, in that moment, like wowed, but I think I was interested in the technology and interested in the coins of story value. And I actually go off and do other things, like I led a chunk of products and another FinTech unicorn. I worked at McKinsey as a leader on the FinTech practice, and I did another stint in public service as the first chief data officer in California. But along that entire way, I was like, buying Bitcoin every week on Coinbase. But I sort of, I think, like a lot of people, I got a little churned off by, like the ICO boom, I don't know, you know, like 2015 to 2021 was like a sort of weird time in Bitcoin and crypto, you know, like, or that was sort of my impression. So it remains, sort of like an allocation for me. And then the way we founded the company, which I think is just, it's a mental model that I think more people should have, which is we sat down my co founder, Max and I, and we knew we wanted to start something. We're both ready to leave the things we were doing, and we said to ourselves, like, Okay, this is a new economy. It's not just an asset or, you know, even in piece of technology, like, we had the mental model of, like, it's an emerging economy, and we felt that we were really good at, like, financial stuff and regulatory bullshit. And we were like, Okay, we think that the companies that are going to accrue a lot of value are the ones that can, like, build regulated finance. Or a way to accrue value in this economy is to build regulated financial institutions. So we sat down and we wrote a list, and we're like, okay, what are the regulated financial institutions that exist in every economy in the world? And like, every economy has a bank, and every economy has a payment system, and every economy has exchanges, and every economy as asset managers. And we actually didn't have insurance unless we were sort of separately thinking about insurance stuff, just a long running interest of ours and mine, and then, like, two weeks late, and we're like, yeah, people are sure doing all these like, we weren't really sure, but what we were gonna do it. And then, like, two weeks later, I woke up in the middle of the night, like, 3am I was like, there should be a Bitcoin Life Insurance Company. And I, like, went to my office and I wrote the memo that we basically have executed, shockingly, but, but more you know, more importantly, at the time, it was the memo like we successfully raised the seed round on So anyway, we come to Bitcoin, very much, like our long term perspective is it's a weird economy, right? It's global, it's decentralized, it's outside the control of any government, but, like, it sort of overlays, maybe in other economies, but we believe that, like bitcoins money, much like the actual white paper says, and thus, there'll be capital markets and there'll be Debt Capital Markets, And there'll be payment systems, and there'll be like, real functioning economic activity, and 3% of global GDP is life insurance premiums. So 3% of that economy's GDP should be,

Lynne Bairstow: 9:14

should be life insurance premiums. That's fascinating. Zach and I want to drill down on a couple of different things. I mean, a lot of the founders that Israel and I talked to are hardcore Bitcoiners that end up solving problems that they run into themselves. And I love the fact. I mean, Israel and I both have come out of the traditional early stage tech world, and we don't see enough founders like yourself who are successful entrepreneurs. And the entrepreneurial mindset really takes a look at, you know, what problems need to be solved, and how can I create a business around it? And so love that you took that approach and saw that opportunity. And but I want to, I want to ask you, you mentioned that 2015 to 21 was kind of a complicated time. I mean, we had the ICO craze. You. Also you got into Bitcoin, I'm assuming when it was when Coinbase was pretty much Bitcoin only, and Bitcoin there wasn't as much noise. And similar to me, and I know also that time, unless you were spending full time on it, it felt like a lot of noise. I mean, there were a lot of great opportunities, and there were a lot of great ideas and decentra and the tokenization and the different business models, but it was also quite confusing too. How did you end up you and Max distilling down in a pretty early point, I think it's more advanced now, but why all of the rest was noise and Bitcoin was a signal that you needed to focus on as the kind of the foundational financial system. I mean, how did you two come to that conclusion?

Zac: 10:47

Yeah, let me just actually respond to something you said at the beginning, which is, I was the first user of the policy product, and we can talk about what the product is, but I think it, it, it, it did end up solving a problem I have, you know, before that, we were taping and we were talking about, like, I have two kids, and it did resonate with us right from the beginning, is that, like, this is a core, like, financial product, and it's a core financial product for others. It is like, also for us. And like, also for us and like, why hasn't someone thought of it? And I think we're fortunate that a lot of our users, our policyholders, end up having that response to, like, Oh, this is obvious. Like, once you've thought of it. Um, to your question about Bitcoin, I think, uh, there is a real natural synergy between like, hodling and life insurance. Like life insurance, I don't know it was like the original huddle, right? It's like saving for intergenerational wealth transfer, or, like retiring your bloodline or whatever. So there was that, like, cultural alignment, I think it ended up being a little practical in the beginning, which is like life insurance is about, from the perspective of the insurer, is about making really long term promises and really long term promises in the context of what's supposed to be like storing value for your users. And I'm not one of these Bitcoiners who, I guess is like all other, you know, eats a shit coin, like, I mean, that's fine if you believe that I'm more, I think that those, it's actually maybe more epistemological. And I'm like, wow, I think that's really interesting, this idea of a global computation platform. But I'll have, like, absolutely zero opinion on the noise of, like, whether that's going to be eth or Solana or Avalanche or 10 things that haven't been created yet. So it's not that I don't see any utility in those things. It's that to me, like Bitcoin is a store of value, and I don't necessarily understand why. Solana, the store of value, it may be a you, it may actually have utility, which I think where I just I'm different from some bitcoin earns, I don't know, actually, I've sort of like, tuned it out, um, but I think that if I had to answer ask, if I asked myself the question of all the tokens or whatever in the world? Which 1am I comfortable making a promise? A 50 Year promise in Bitcoin, is the only answer that question.

Israel: 13:32

You know, it reminds me. I'm not sure if you ever read a paper by John Pfeffer a few years back, it called in the investment case for Bitcoin, and he touches precisely on the points you you're you're alluding to Zach that, you know, maybe some of these other tokens, they'll perhaps have some utility. But from the investment lens, from the long term, actual preservation of capital, there's just no, you know, there's no close comparison to Bitcoin well, but you know, maybe we can transition to the product itself. Zach, so life insurance, I mean, of the banking and insurance world is, to your point, probably the most long term thinking of the group, just by nature of the industry and the product. So what, what is, meanwhile offering? I mean, we alluded to it earlier, that it's Bitcoin denominated, fully Bitcoin based insurance, which makes it unique in several ways. And we can get into some of those points. But let's start with what the product offering actually is filled with Bitcoin. As a proud affiliate partner of river, a Bitcoin only financial services company that I've personally been using for years, I really enjoy the strong focus they have on security and reliability, which ultimately leads to peace of mind. I know you. You're a big fan as well.

Lynne Bairstow: 14:57

Lynne, I am, I am. I feel so. Confident referring people to River. In addition to what you mentioned, also, they've got us based phone support, which I think for somebody who's less familiar with the space or used to personal service, is really helpful. In addition, they have a private client services division, so if you're looking to invest 100,000 or more, they have a special suite of services designed for you, whether you're a high net worth individual a family office or trust. I also really appreciate the continued improvements they make in the back end, so that that reliability and security continues to be really

Israel: 15:29

apparent. They additionally also have US dollar cash deposits paid out in Bitcoin. They have a yield product for that, which is an interesting alternative way of accumulating Bitcoin. Overall, fantastic suite of services. If you're interested in onboarding and opening up an account at River use partner.river.com/build, with Bitcoin for personalized onboarding.

Zac: 15:51

Yeah, our core product offering, you know, it may be useful to take a step back and sort of say, I think, like, what are we? And what we are is we're a life insurance company, but we are entirely denominated in Bitcoin, so we're not $1 company backed with Bitcoin. We are regulated and licensed in Bermuda. Bermuda is like a legit place to have an insurance company. It's like the insurance capital of the world. Like every insurance company you've ever heard of has ever heard of has an affiliate or reinsurance there, reinsurer there. And what we do is we accept all premiums in Bitcoin, and we pay all claims in Bitcoin, and then we do everything in between all the like insurance mumbo jumbo and operations entirely in Bitcoin. So we like do the actuarial math in Bitcoin. We do our reserving in Bitcoin. We do our audited financials in Bitcoin, like so it's like we're running a life insurance company and your yen or dollars or Swiss francs or whatever, but it's bitcoin is the currency, and you might have questions on that, but then to answer your question, our ultimate aspiration is that we're going to sell every insurance product that you could sort of imagine you might have ever heard of, like deferred annuity or, you know, company owned life insurance or whatever, in Bitcoin. Now what our our first product is in for individuals that may be, you know, they may have a trust or whatever, but like, fundamentally, it's like for an individual. It's called Whole life because it lasts your whole life and because you, like our policyholders, will eventually die. It is much more of like an investment. You know, there is protection if you get hit by a bus, but also, like you're going to die eventually. So your beneficiaries, your kids, your husband, your wife, your niece and nephews, they will eventually going to pay out. So there's that, like guaranteed aspect of you're sort of like saving for your loved ones. So the core idea is something like you pay us. I'm just gonna pick round numbers. These might be small to some people, big to others, like you pay us one Bitcoin a year for 10 years. So it's a 10 pay, and then we promise you some amount when you die, like 14 or 16 or 30, it sort of depends on your age and the mortality. Lynne will be happy to know that you get a higher payout if you're a woman, because you're expected to live longer. So yeah, and then what you get from that is mostly true across all countries, but I'm gonna sort of describe it what's like, true, usually true. But you know, if you are a taxpayer in Mexico or a taxpayer somewhere else, that it may be different, but what you sort of get from the policy is one, you get protection, as I mentioned, right? So like, whenever you die, you get that 15 and like, maybe you die soon, even though you're not supposed to, that would be terrible for all of us. We don't want you to die, but then you would, you'd get the 15 Bitcoin I mentioned. The second is, we're turning 10 into 15, and we can sort of talk about how we do that, but even if you were doing what we're doing in most jurisdictions, you would pay interest income every year, and that doesn't happen. So we get further than you would on your own, because it's compounding, like in this tax free structure. The third thing is, again, in most places, you can borrow value back out of the policy, tax free. So that's like really amazing in Bitcoin, because I think many of us expect that Bitcoin will be worth more in the future than it is now, and even for you as an individual, while you're alive. You know. So if bitcoin becomes, like, worth a million dollars a coin, you can borrow one of those Bitcoin back out, but you don't owe any, like, intermediate capital gains tax on it. So it's a way to, sort of, like, get liquidity from your Bitcoin without, you know, incurring capital gains tax. And then the last thing is, you know, it's passed on. It's like, pass on to your, your loved ones. That's both a tax thing, and then it's like, income tax free, pass on to your loved ones. But also, you know, there's, we have some users, you know, just like, there's some real horror stories about people dying and their loved ones can't get their Bitcoin, you know, like we're under a legal obligation to make sure that, you know, your beneficiaries get the Bitcoin, okay, like basic legacy management,

Israel: 20:53

okay, well, you know, maybe it's helpful to just go through a concrete example, just to make sure we, you know, we kind of land this so using just kind of rounded hypothetical numbers, this, this policy is for, so I'm, I'm conscious of the fact that I'm gonna die, just like we all are. And I want, yeah,

Zac: 21:13

I have to talk to people all day, every day about them dying.

Israel: 21:16

So, so this is for, you know, of course, the long term thinker, this whole, you know, generational wealth, of course, you know, most people like the thought of leaving something behind for for their loved ones. So I want to take out a life insurance policy. And of course, I understand bitcoin is probably, in my view, the best money that we'll have decades from right? Okay, so that's kind of the starting point. And then you you mentioned some of the mechanics, which I just want to kind of go through to make sure the listeners understand what what you just mentioned. So let's use the 10 Bitcoin policy as an example. So I'd be, I'd be paying my premiums for the next 10 years, one bitcoin each year. Is that correct? Correct? Correct, and

Zac: 21:59

the 10 equal payments, whatever you

Israel: 22:03

one, okay, so one, even Bitcoin for the next 10 years, yeah,

Zac: 22:07

or Yeah. So anywhere between. We do policies right now anywhere between a 10th of a Bitcoin a year for 10 years, so adds up to one. Or our maximum is maybe like 30 Bitcoin, so like three Bitcoin a year for 10

Israel: 22:22

years, yep. So we have a 10 year window, basically, with even payouts. So let's use pay ins, yeah, excuse me, as the example. Okay, so then I'm contributing one Bitcoin for the next 10 years. And you again an example, because I know this takes into account various actuarial tables and life expectancy, et cetera. But let's just say, in this hypothetical case, I'm have an expected payout of 15 so basically I'm contributing one Bitcoin a year for the next 10 years, and when I die, my beneficiaries will receive 15 Bitcoin. And you mentioned this borrowing component, Zach, which you know,

Lynne Bairstow: 23:05

can I I just want to jump in and ask one question, if we, if we believe that Bitcoin is going to increase in value, could we front load it? Could we pay? Could we elect to pay all 10 Bitcoin early on? Or, yeah, so does that work? Let me

Zac: 23:19

answer that in two different ways. One is it, we usually do a tempeh because in a lot of countries there are, like, rules about how much you can front load. So we are complying with these rules to make sure you get the tax benefits. So it sort of without getting into the weeds, like, depends on where you're, like, a tax resident and stuff. But resident, and stuff about, like, whether you should have you should do a single pay or 10 pay. Having said that, we allow people the option of prepayment, which is like, we you can pay us, and it sort of sits in an account, and then we, like, pay our own premiums over time. And interestingly, a bunch of people like to do that. Also, like, the biggest policyholders send me like to do that, I think mostly for, like, logistical reasons. They're just like, I never want to think about this again. Like, here's 30 Bitcoin. One thing I will say is whether you pay us upfront or you pay over 10 years, we really don't recommend that people like, are short Bitcoin. That is, like, we don't think you should buy a policy bigger than the amount of bitcoin you have there. We actually have some people who've done that, but like, Oh, I'm going to use this as a forcing mechanism, the dollar cost average in the Bitcoin, not my recommendation anyway, if that answers your question.

Lynne Bairstow: 24:43

Lynne, yeah, thank you. Sorry, Israel, go ahead with the lending

Israel: 24:47

question. No, yeah. Thanks. Thanks for clarifying that and then the borrowing component that you mentioned. How does that work? Zach, after, so how much can I borrow? Yeah, again,

Zac: 24:58

it sort of depends on. Age, there's this, like, you almost think that inside the account there's, like a savings account. And when you buy the policy, or we make the offer for you to buy the policy, there's actually just a giant table, and you can see, like, every year, how much you can borrow out of the policy. But it starts low and it gets higher. It's like amortizing over time how much you can borrow. And the way you should think about the borrow is, as I said, it's tax free, and we don't really expect you to pay it back. We expect you to eventually die, and then we net the loan out of the the payout that was supposed to go to your kids, right? So let's say you put this 10 in. It's now year 15 or 20. You borrow one bitcoin out, you live another 30 years. You know, maybe that one, we charging you interest. Maybe that one turns into 1.5 or something. And then instead of your kids getting 15, they get 13 and a half, right? So what's nice about it is, if you do need liquidity from your Bitcoin, this is tax free. But unlike other like dollar based loans, there's no margin calling. There's no margining. There's no like, chance of getting blown out. It just like, it's a policy loan. It's just like

Israel: 26:30

thing. It's netted out of the final payout to the beneficiaries. Yeah, if it's not paid,

Zac: 26:36

look, we do have, I'm not, you know, with some crazy policyholders who are like, I'm gonna, like, redeem when it's high, I'm gonna pay back when it's low. And, like, I can do all this crazy mechanics. And we're, like, the real intention here is, like, you want to buy whatever a house I want to 15 years in, you borrow a Bitcoin out, and then, like, you know, it's a long term loan.

Lynne Bairstow: 26:59

But I love this because it's really operating on a Bitcoin standard. So the problem with loans comes into play when the dollar price of Bitcoin fluctuates and goes down in value, and then you get margin called, but in the case of meanwhile, you're borrowing a percentage of your Bitcoin assets that are in there, so the price, the dollar price doesn't matter. Nearly as much doesn't matter. Doesn't know. I'm borrowing a quarter of a Bitcoin to do this thing that I want to do, and I can pay it back. But from your accounting standpoint, which I love the you know, love to even dive deeper into that, it's just that everything that you're doing is priced in Bitcoin. I love

Zac: 27:37

that. Yeah, for us, I like to say that, to my knowledge, we're one of the few companies for whom one bitcoin truly is one Bitcoin.

Israel: 27:45

Yeah, no, it, I mean, it's, it's great disease to see Zach. And I think as more companies take the path that you, that you've chosen, um, well, well of course, soon enough, normalize it, and then, you know, people will think about it down the line a little more in simple terms. Just like I can, I don't know, run a business in the US based on US dollars, or in Switzerland based on francs. Well, I can run a business out of anywhere based on Bitcoin, right? That's, that's kind of how I look at it. But I mean, to the to that point, Lynne of of the accounting side, I agree. You know, let's, let's get into that aspect a little more, because it is so interesting and, you know, okay, once you conceptually understand that it's, you know, it's just another form of money, another currency, let's say, to do the accounting books by, okay, maybe you, as a founder a company like you're there, you know, you get it, and you Want to execute on that strategy. But in the reality is that many regulators, accountants, jurisdictions, are still not too comfortable with that. So I'd love to hear also a little bit of your story with the Bermudan authority, you know, the regulators, how did they? How did you get them to be comfortable with this?

Zac: 29:01

Yeah, yeah. It's a great question. I mean, I think we were really fortunate, right? So the BMA is like a globally the Bermuda monetary authority, sorry, they're the regulator in Bermuda. The BMA is like a globally recognized regulator of insurance companies, and in doing more and more life insurance, and the island is such an interesting or the islands are such an interesting place that it's not, it's not like a tourist destination. It's like 40,000 Bermudians and then like 40,000 actuaries, lawyers and accountants. So a you know, it's not a big party scene, but you know, if insurance is your jam, it's like, really amazing. So they are, you know, have all these equivalency with the EU and with the the US regulatory regimes, or state by state and, you know, but they try to do innovative things. Things. And then they've also tried to become a hub on the Bitcoin and crypto side. So like, coin basis, offshore operations are in Bermuda circles. Offshore operations are in Bermuda blocks. Offshore operations are in Bermuda so they were before we even got there trying to think about like, how do we merge this expertise we've developed in digital assets and this expertise we have in insurance? And so they were starting to like, like, I put out like, you know, a guidance paper, and I think they were surprised at what we wanted to do, which is to entirely be in Bitcoin. What they were expecting is for people to, like, use Bitcoin as capital. And I'm like, go write normal dollar business. And we're like, no, no, that's going to be really risky actually, like, we want to do everything in Bitcoin. And they were open to that, like, right from the beginning, and it made a ton of sense to them, because in some ways, like, insurance is the business of like ratios. Like I said, like, you know, we pay you, you pay us 10, and we pay you 15. There's, like, there's a lot of math. And those ratios, as Israel said, they can be in euros or Swiss francs, or, they could be in Bitcoin, right? And then there's just tons and tons of mechanical issues, right? Like when you're doing the balance sheet of an insurance company, a lot of what you're doing is taking the present value of future assets and liabilities. What is the natural discount rate in Bitcoin? Yeah. Nobody like, doesn't, yeah. So we had to write, you know, like, a 50 page memo. We, like, were like, Okay, here's like, four different theories. You can, like, use options pricing, you can use this, you can use that, you know, like, so we had to do all the things of an insurance company. And those things are very normal, but then they were just like, we're the first ever to do them. And then I'll give an example on actually financial like, You're right on some level, they're super simple, like, there is just to be in the corner and send up $1 sign. Now we actually state all our financials down to the Satoshi, because we want, like, sort of just be like, we know where every single Satoshi is. There's a lot of decimal points, but fundamentally it looks like the balance sheet and the income statement of any other life insurer. But sort of to your point, like, we have an audit opinion from an external auditor, and the audit opinions like these are the financial statements are good in the sense that they are following all the regulatory rules. They are statutory. There's like, statutorily correct, like, we've, you know, checked all this stuff, right? So, like, stamp of approval. But then, because it's not gap, this gap doesn't contemplate being stated in Bitcoin, or IFRS, which is the like, outside the US county standard, then there's a qualification in the audit. So it's like the statements are perfect to statutory financials, but you know, we have to note that they're not gap compliant. So just like, even that, like it, yeah, the last thing I'll say, just because on the external auditor, is it took us less time. I think the BMA, the Bermuda monetary authority, was on board. It took us actually longer to get service providers like we have to get into we have to have an outside actuary. You have to have an external auditor, like those people that it was in some ways tougher for them, because you have to think we were doing this like, basically FTX blew up and then we were trying to operationalize our business.

Lynne Bairstow: 34:05

But I guess I you know, and I can see the way you compare it, like, if you're if you're writing a policy and doing the business in Swiss francs, it's like, no one would think another thing about it. So by replacing Bitcoin as the model, as this as a standard for everything. It made the mental exercise easier than doing the conversion back and forth between dollars and Bitcoin.

Zac: 34:26

So funny actually, to talk to actuaries about it, because at first they think we're crazy, and then we explain how we're doing it, and they're like, Oh, I mean, like, if you were to do it, like, that's the way you would do it. And yeah, this was just sort of intuitive for us, because we unders, I don't know Max, and I, like, right from the beginning, we were like, well, if it's in Bitcoin, like, then the entity doesn't care about the price of Bitcoin, all right, like, we've been running this company, and the price of Bitcoin was like, 30, then it was 15, then it was 70, then it was 30. 30, then it was 105 so like, but you should think that our financial statements, stated every quarter are just like growing over time because they're in Bitcoin.

Lynne Bairstow: 35:10

Just just touch on or clarify so your policies are available globally. Are there any and just how, I mean just drilling down a little bit more in regulatory not being as familiar with what the global regulatory environment is for insurance. But how did you I mean, I don't know. Bermuda is so set up that they have, like all the country's representatives are based there.

Zac: 35:33

No no. So I guess what I'll say is, okay, there's two questions there. One is, who are Apollo sellers right now? Apollo sailors right now are people in the US. We've just started to accept people from Canada and the UK. This is not a I mean, there are regulatory challenges that will explain but this is primarily like we have to be able to do KYC, I know your customer and your money laundering, and we have to be able to underrate you. So our like rollout to accepting people from other countries is like, on us building operations like something we're gonna do with our Series A money the way we work in general is like offshore life insurance is a thing. I'm not inventing that space, and we operate on like a reverse solicitation basis. So I we do not run ads in the United States, whether it's word of mouth, whether and I was hearing about us because someone writes about us, or hearing about us because you're listening to this podcast like we are fortunate that you know, 1000s of people have come to our website and expressed an interest in buying the policy, and that that is a sort of common way to be an offshore life insurer. I think one thing that is really important, just in general, is our current product is designed for a sophisticated, high net worth individual. Like, even if you're someone who's buying the smallest policy, which is one Bitcoin, like, that's $100,000 right now. Like, that's a pretty big commitment. And so I like to say, like, we are not in the business of convincing people to want to hold Bitcoin. We are in the business of convincing people who have already decided to be in the Bitcoin Economy, or to own Bitcoin, or participate in Bitcoin, to, you know, have a way to save intergenerationally. And I think that also even like, more importantly than the like, all the care we we put in to make sure we're not advertising to people inappropriately, is we're also just like, not trying to convince granny to buy a life insurance product that she doesn't understand. And I think generally, if you you do your best to do right by your customers and follow the letter of the law like, you know, no one gets all that upset

Israel: 38:07

this. This brings to mind something I'd love to kind of pick your brain at Zach, and I'm sure it's part of the thought process and, you know, kind of vision you have for the company. But so life insurance, let's just take life insurance as a product. Globally, it has very different penetration rates around the world, depending on, you know, if you're in a developing country or underdeveloped country, you know, maybe cultural aspects of, you know, savings culture, etc. There's many factors. But did when you were thinking about a life insurance company based on a global model, or, sorry, on a global money. I mean, are you thinking that life insurance penetration will likely increase a lot because of the Bitcoin standard. I mean, suddenly, people in other countries, let's, let's say countries in weaker currencies. You know, historically, when you have such a volatile or, you know, weak currency, you're, it's, it's just harder to think about life insurance, right? Because that, that currency is not too reliable. So now, in this Bitcoin world, it gives people, you know, an amazing savings tool. It gives people a way to think long term. Is that the part of the thought process and vision for the for the company that you'll be that you will actually see a lot more life insurance, I guess. You know, let's, let's say market share just around the world, because it's in BTC. Does that make sense?

Zac: 39:51

Yes. In fact, this is the core, this is the core vision of the company, and why I wake up every day working on it. I mean, as nice as it is, to help you. Uh, people with 1000 Bitcoin like, you know, tax and estate plan, the ultimate vision for the company is exactly what you're saying, right? If you live in Argentina, you do not buy life insurance because you are going to live longer than the Argentinian peso. So it just doesn't make any sense. So we look around the world. And we actually say the world is underinsured. If you live in Argentina or turkey or Cambodia or India or Nigeria, you don't buy life insurance. And like our ultimate vision, is to systematically move from what are like, pretty big policies right now, like in time, to smaller and smaller policies now, it's also the case right that everyone, I think, or lots of people in the world right now, have concerns about inflation risk and currency risk and political risk and jurisdictional risk, and like, if I bought a million dollars in life insurance coverage for myself in 2018 when my son was born, I've Seen the purchasing power of that policy go down, tanning 30% from inflation, right? So, whereas, if I bought, I wouldn't exist in 2018 but if I bought a, you know, a 10 Bitcoin policy, I obviously would be, you know, in a, well, no, actually, or whatever, was a million dollars in coverage. I mean, like it would be, it would be so much, right? So I think that that dynamic is exactly right. This is global. It is decentralized, is outside the control of any government, and that that is going to be attractive, I think, to tons of people, both who live in countries where that sort of externalized stability has never existed, but also in countries where, you know, I think people have legitimate concerns about the stability of their

Lynne Bairstow: 41:56

currency. And also, I mean, I think the lending part of it is really interesting, because we're there in Israel, and I've talked about it. We've talked to a number of the new lending products that are out there, but this being your lend, you're borrowing percentages of Bitcoin versus dollar values of Bitcoin, so And on a tax deferred basis. And do you are there interest charges along the way, or does, does the whole interest accrue to the policy and it's deducted from the net death benefit? Or how does that work? Because I think it's just a great way.

Zac: 42:31

Yeah, interest is accrued along the way. Basically, you should think of the fundamental we're very transparent about this. I think most insurance companies are the business we're in is that 10 to 15 in your policy, there's an implicit guarantee there of a rate of return. And that can basically be like, simplify a complex set of math, because there's a probability distribution when you're going to die, and you're taking the present value of that, like, basically, it's like, we're, we're guaranteeing you 2% returns, and then what we do as a business is we get 3% returns. And come back to how we do we do that, but that's basically what we do, is we guarantee you 2% returns in this, like, tax advantage vehicle, and then, like, we go get 3% returns. So we make that, like, 1% spread. So what? How does the loan work? What we do at the loan is, you borrow out of Bitcoin, we just charge you 3% so the policy is still accumulating in value. That 2% and we're charging you 3% in the loan. We're not making more money than we would otherwise. So, but how that's accumulating is, again, that we owe you a lower death benefit. As I mentioned, it's like netted against it, right? So actually, our dream is that everyone takes policy loans, because, from our perspective, that is a low a way to get our 1% spread with no credit risk. But you know, some people will, some people will, okay, that

Lynne Bairstow: 44:02

makes it simple. Zach, you have, there are some places I've read where you have kind of an AI overlay on some of the the way you operate. Can you explain how you're utilizing artificial intelligence or AI inside of your business? Yeah. I mean,

Zac: 44:20

we had a big asset manager offered to participate in a and I ended up not taking the money because I didn't really know what they were gonna add. But their whole theory of the case, like, you guys run a full stack Life Insurance Company with eight people, it's like, unheard of. Look, I don't wanna overstate it like we're not It's not like we've trained a bunch of personal, you know, huge models, and spend hundreds of millions of dollars like making life insurance bot. But we have certainly automated our operations like we close our books, we close our books for q2 and Like. Uh, you know, a day. So there's a lot of automation. There's a lot of really boring ways that workflows and agentic AI can come together to, like, make underwriting better and KYC better and, um, serial, I don't know, stereo planning better, and we just slowly but steadily below that stuff. And the truth of the matter is, for some of our investors, they see Bitcoin more as this amazing go to market strategy, because we have a product, insurance product that no one else has, when what they're excited about is okay when, like, everyone knows that you could build a better insurance carrier because you're just data and technology companies. But that doesn't help you when you're small. It really helps you when they're big, right? Like, if you could have a 15% percent return on equity company instead of a 10% return on equity company like that would be huge when you have a trillion dollar balance sheet, or whatever, multi 100 million dollar balance sheet doesn't really help you when you're small, because no one trusts you, and like the little extra margin is probably even viewed with suspicion. So I think that we, we're doing all that stuff, and that will actually be probably the long term durable advantage as of you know, eventually someone else will launch a Bitcoin Life Insurance Company, or, like, integrate Bitcoin into their life insurance products. So the long term mode is having built everything ourselves and better, whereas the short term. Amazing thing about the company is like that we use the hardest money in the world.

Lynne Bairstow: 46:46

This business with 10, with eight employees. Can you talk a little bit about

Zac: 46:50

your Well, now we have 14. I just want to be clear.

Lynne Bairstow: 46:52

Okay, all right. Well, that's, that's still, that's still, like amazing. Talk a little bit about your team members and where they're based at the remote, or if they're walking the pink sands of Bermuda or sell that, yeah,

Zac: 47:06

um, you know, one thing, that's the main thing about us is, I actually would say, in some ways, our secret sauce is that we have mixed together a bunch of different expertise. And, you know, some of us are more bound together through Bitcoin and others. But yeah, in Bermuda, we have a chief financial officer who's, you know, a chartered accountant and worked at one of the big four, and there's a lot of our like finance and ops work. We have a chief risk officer who's a life actuary, who came from Catalina, who's which is a big reinsurer in Bermuda. And then we have a like head of distribution, starting in Bermuda as our third Bermuda employee, he was the head of district, like agent distribution at a big offshore, direct insurer. And then in New York, we have our head of insurance, who was at New York Life for 22 years, from actuarial student to leading the entire individual life insurance business. And then he quit to work on Bitcoin before. And then we found him, and he's like, Oh, this is the business I should have started. And then our head of credits in New York, and then the rest of us are in San Francisco. So that's, you know, software engineers. My co founder and I, Steve compliance officer, who's just this amazing, like former CEO of a AML company, who PhD in financial crime. She's amazing. I have a chief of staff, and we have some, like, really amazing sales and partnership guys who, if you go to our website, meanwhile.bm, and sign up for a policy, they reach out to every single person who signs up and, you know, gets an hour with them and talks them through the policy. I think I'm missing someone, so I'm sure they'll be offended. But, you know, gives you a sense

Lynne Bairstow: 49:05

that's fascinating. Now you've also been one of the most, I think, high raising in terms of funding for your for your company, with just closing a $40 million round this year, with a total of 60 and a half million in equity that you've raised since, the founding. So with a small team, I'm sure that's, I mean, that's, that's, that's very commendable. But can you talk a little bit about your fundraising journey? Perhaps it was you already had the relationships built because of the two other companies that you'd been involved with and your network in Silicon Valley. But how was it raising funding as a Bitcoin company compared to those other journeys? And what can you talk to us about your your you know, your cap table and your investors?

Zac: 49:52

Yeah, I think we've been very fortunate in fundraising, all in all, and we things have been you. Uh, we've hit our timing with some luck, I think, which that's important. So, as I mentioned, we raised our first$7 million from Sam Altman and lucky groom and Parker Conrad and Dylan field and a bunch of Zach Abraham, you know, a bunch of people, but Sam and Locky, but led the round, and that was in January 22 and that really got us off to the races. Let us start the conversations with Bermuda, like hiring some people, and then we got license. We got permission to do what we're doing. It doesn't mean we launched. We got permission, and then we raised what I ended up calling the seed to which was mostly from insurance people. So huge insurance asset manager in New York, called Hudson, structure, Capital Management, Santander, the bank, Ms NAD, there's a big Japanese insurer, I sort of knew, or we knew, that we wanted to have our Series A led by a Bitcoin or crypto specialist, and we understood that they were never going to be able to diligence our insurance capabilities or expertise. So my theory of the case was, Okay, I'll go get a bunch of insurance companies to invest in this, like seed too. So that was like$13 million these are both approximate. So we had raised like 2020, and a half million dollars, and that really got us through from like early 23 which even that $13 million was pretty lucky, like, right FTX blows up. Like, blows up, like, late 22 so we raised that $13 million like, right after FTX. But I think, you know, we had gotten the license and people like, proceed, and then we basically went for two years, right? We built the entire insurance company. We launched, we got a bunch of users. Our union economics are great. Oh, still. Mark invested in that round too, which is this amazing Bitcoin fund. Really love Elise. Huge respect for her. And, you know, it's January this year, the ETFs been approved for a year. We have, like, year on year financials that are, like, quite impressive on growth, even on a small base. And again, our unit economics are good and etc. And yeah, we went, we basically went to market. We pitched everyone. And I think it was tough. He actually it might be easier. Now, I've been with the Bitcoin Treasury companies, you know, I think there it was sort of in the air that was Bitcoin was doing well, probably, like, our business is just complicated. So it took time. We have like, a 20 page series, a memo that's like, honestly, there are pages. They're like, what? What is the business of insurance? Why Bermuda? You know, these like really fundamental things, and it just took a lot of meetings, and it's like any process, I guess, to make an entrepreneur feel better, which is like, you get your nose first. So, you know, we started in the new year, at the end of January. I'm like, Okay, well, maybe this just isn't happening. Like, good thing we have, like, a lot of funding. We have, like, because we bought a lot of Bitcoin to capitalize the company. And then, I guess, to be honest, they like hit we hit all time high Bitcoin highs. And we got a few term sheets in a week. And then ultimately, we really liked two of the people we got term sheets from. One was Fulgur, which is a sort of like Bitcoin focused firm, sort of all Bitcoin all the time, really doing growth now, right, like block stream and signum. So they, they came in and just made a great offer. And we, like, love them as a potential partner. And then we had another competitive term sheet from a fund called framework, which is like more crypto defi fund. Actually, they're, like, in chain link and maple and Ave, but they really, I don't know, they really are. They're serious about, like, financial services and crypto and we basically pulled all of our investors, ton of our, like, policyholders, ton of our friends. And what we happen over and over again is like half the people are like, I love folder. They're amazing. Who is framework. And then the other half of people will be like, framework, best of the best. They're like the bench. Arc of crypto. They're amazing. Like, who's Fulgur? Like, never heard of those guys. And we were like, Oh, and this is an opportunity actually, like, it's an opportunity in their perspective. It's an opportunity in what we're signaling to the market. It's an opportunity that they've, like, never co invested. So we did a lot of difficult wrangling, and we got them like to agree to co lead that made us basically have to force everyone else on their own and give no one their pro rata. So it was really just the framework and Fulgur and then wensys, who's

Lynne Bairstow: 55:38

Bitcoin patient zero.

Zac: 55:40

Bitcoin patient zero, like founder of Zappo, so that that was our, our $40 million series. A

Lynne Bairstow: 55:47

question about Sam Altman. You know, everybody today thinks of Sam Altman connected with open AI, but he was also the lead of Y Combinator. And I just wanted to see if that was a connection that you made with him. I mean, you had mentioned that Y Combinator could have been that choosing that over working with stripe was a, you know, financially wouldn't be where I had but yeah, but you know, if that trajectory, you never know what relationships you build, and at times in your life.

Zac: 56:21

So Sam was a visiting partner. When I went through, it was Paul Graham. It was his last batch, or second to last batch was the one I went through. So I knew Sam how the round sort of happened. I'm gonna sound so tactical, but anyway, basically we decided we were gonna start the company. So what we did is we had this like, week where we were just talking to angel investors we knew, and we get into a lot of commitments, and then what happens is you start getting inbound from like Sequoia and Lightspeed and whatever, right? Because they know you're you're doing something. And so I was like, No, I'm not having any meetings. Like, all the fun meetings are gonna be in the third week of January. This is 2022 so I'm scheduling all those meetings so, like, you don't get, like, early nose, a bulldog, and then basically, in that second week, walkie, who I worked with at stripe, who's, like, a solo capitalist. Now, he got really interested and like that. Like would be that a soft would have been amazing, just a really great founder, friendly guy, like, always available with text, like, super involved. And then he called me maybe, like, 12 hours after we, like, you know, like 11pm or something, and said, um, so, you know, I mentioned this to Sam, and like, Sam wasn't open, AI then, but like, he wasn't, like, Sam Altman, open. I was CEO, you know, he was a big deal in Silicon Valley. But like, you know, he wasn't globally famous anyway, Lockheed, like, oh, Sam. Then, you know, to my surprise, was really interested in this. Like, will you talk to him? So I talked to Sam, and Sam's, like, just so smart. He's, like, because of YC, like, looked at so many companies, it was probably like a 40 minute conversation. But like, probably the best questions, I don't remember. I should've written them all down, right? But fundamentally, what Israel mentioned is our was our pitch like, Hey, I think there's an opportunity to build the biggest life insurance company in the world. Like, our goal is to serve a billion people. We're going to use digital money to reach them. We're going to use AI and automation to serve them profitably. And I think that that vision resonated with them. At the end of the call, it was just like, hey, how about Locky and I co lead this the seed round. I was like, Oh, this is great, you know. Like, there's no, there's no signaling risk, really, and Sam and lucky like that is that they, they won't do the if they don't do the A I don't have to have all these meetings, you know, like, I'm done. So, you know, we haggled on price, and then that was that. But I think, like, Sam, Sam's brilliant what I like to tell people, and I don't think he'd be offended by this. Like, Sam is incredibly busy, and I asked him to do like, one thing every six months. Who does it? But if I asked him to do one thing every six weeks, he wouldn't respond to my emails. I think so I like when I and I've never asked for something like, too ridiculous. But I bet if I was like, you know, the company's life depends on like me talking to the Secretary of Commerce, like tomorrow, like he might make it happen, right? Like he, he can basically make anything happen. But you, you also have to only ask him to do, like, mission critical things, and even those infrequently.

Israel: 59:57

And you know, I have to ask as well. I don't mean to dig into all the aspects of the of the cap table here Zach, but Wences drew my attention because I hadn't seen him participate.

Zac: 1:00:10

What wence has said to me is like, I haven't done a tech investment in five years, because I don't think any tech investment will outperform Bitcoin, but you guys are like, a levered bet on Bitcoin. So if you succeed, you will outperform Bitcoin. But to give you a sense of that, I don't like Wences is like this very chill guy who's, like, sort of like somebody has a surfer vibe. I don't know if he surfs, but, like, this is just his vibe. It's like, just a very, like, chill guy. So I get invited to his house, and just has this beautiful house in Woodside. And actually, we spent like, 90 minutes talking about credit, which we haven't talked about earlier, but like, how do we get that 3% return? And he was just, like, instantly asking me questions, and he was really given this five, like, didn't know a lot about I just, like, want to know, like, how we do it. And then at the end, he's like, great. You probably don't know this, but, like, I'm actually probably the world's largest lender of Bitcoin, and you've said all the right things. And, like, I want to invest. Like, you have the exact same perception of credit, like, who's a credit worthy who's a credit risk, like, how these deals should be structured. So that was my experience with

Israel: 1:01:30

Lynne sells that. I mean, that's amazing. Lynne says it's just, you know, of course, very well respected. And you know, congrats to you, Zach, because you've, I mean, you've brought on some pretty amazing people onto your cap table and from different backgrounds, which I think is, is very valuable as well. I mean, we got into it, but from banking to insurance to Silicon Valley Tech to, you know, crypto and Bitcoin. So I guess you know, as we, as we round off the conversation. Zach, what? What words of advice would you have to other entrepreneurs, generally and as well as entrepreneurs focused in the Bitcoin space, if there's any you know particular advice there?

Zac: 1:02:17

Yeah, it's interesting. I sort of like, personally stopped making angel investments and, like, stop giving people advice, partially because it's like, it can be very time consuming, and I also I know that I'm humble enough to know there's a lot of path dependency. I think the thing I often tell people is, like, you are building a business. And there is this aspect of Bitcoin, which I believe in, which is like, there's an ideology, and there's a belief in the way the world should be, and there's also a lot of amazing technology, and none of those things necessarily add up to a business. And I think one of the things that resonated with our investors and like, let me just take even the most hardcore Bitcoin investors, again, like Fulgur and stilmark, one thing that resonated with them is, although it's really complicated. This is a discernible business model. We're not and we're doing it in like, interesting, novel, important ways. But there's no question that that it's a business and not either a research project or a political project. So I think that's often, like, my simple advice to folks is, like, I chat with them and like, yeah, often you're like, in one of these two categories of like, a technical project or a political project, and like that actually is fine. In fact, like having that as a sub component of whenever you're like, lark, like, I also have a political project. My political project is like, I think everyone in the world should be able to like, save for the long term. But it's also the case, if I'm successful at that, like, not only will ever all their lives be better, but also the company will be huge. So I think that that's, that's my big thing. I only, only other thing I'd say is, like I told my fundraising story, and like I am a very like, privileged fundraising story that comes from having founded my first company, and the perception of that company is that we were too early, but were quite right about those markets. And I think that gave me a lot of advantages and fundraising. But I think lots of people say it like Sam has said it, and I don't know, like Steve Jobs said it like, you know, reality. Every, everything in the world is made by someone. It's somebody's passion project. You know, every every company, every building, every croissant properly cooked, you know, is someone decided to do that. And I'm like, That's what company building is really about. Like, you just have to decide to do things and keep going and have grit. And I think some people want to do that, and some people don't. You just have to decide which of those types of people you

Lynne Bairstow: 1:05:32

are. Zach from inside of Silicon Valley and so much experience with it. I mean, one of the things that we see is that there is still a disconnect and the funding that goes to Bitcoin companies, Bitcoin oriented companies versus crypto I think that's switching a little bit. But you know, certainly there are a lot of VCs that are not yet understanding the opportunities that exist in the in the Bitcoin financial system and the or the the remaking of the financial global financial system on a Bitcoin rail. How can I mean, what would you say about, you know, helping those VCs understand the opportunity, or what is your perspective of how that can switch to get more funding and support for Bitcoin companies? Wishing.

Zac: 1:06:20

Well, I mean partially, like, if you not to dive into my cap table, but like, you'll notice that there is no, currently, no like index or Sequoia Lightspeed or Andreessen, Andreessen, I think one of the challenges I've had some of those firms is like Bitcoin, not crypto. Certainly some of it is like post, FTX, just a ton of those firms have been really shy. I think I also end up having a challenge for us, which is that like the person who understands Bitcoin or crypto. I know there's like, there's different things, but like, the person who's knows that, that that, and the person who knows insurance, if there's anyone who knows insurance, are like different people. And that's always complicated inside firms like you sort of need, like, one, one, real champion, and it's hard if you sort of exist between expertise and people, that's a very like knee problem. But I think to answer your question, like, I don't know, actually, I was talking this week with a GP at, let's say, like one of the five. Like, really big crypto BTC funds, right? So one of the funds, like, have raised more than $500 million and I was asking him how it's going, and he's like, oh, you know, it's all my friends at the traditional VC firm. They call me again, asking me about things, so we'll see. I think it's been interesting that this year, like it's there's so much institutional adoption of Bitcoin, right? You got BlackRock and fidelity saying you should put 1% of your retirement savings in Bitcoin. These Bitcoin these Bitcoin Treasury companies had, well, we'll see how much success they really had in the public markets. But like they they've at least had some success raising a bunch of capital and hopefully buying Bitcoin. So it's been interesting to see the like tradfi markets be more excited about Bitcoin, and then the VCs, like, that's not usually how it's supposed to work.

Lynne Bairstow: 1:08:43

Coins kind of flips it. And it started with clubs, which has never been the case, where, you know, individual investors had the early in on a life changing investment opportunity or technology. So that's been interesting to see, too.

Israel: 1:08:59

Yes, absolutely we thank you for your time. Zach, it's been great to get into the ins and out of the business, and you're certainly, I think, setting a solid example for a purely Bitcoin denominated business. So you know, again, big admiration for everything you guys are doing. Thanks for the time, and we look forward to staying in touch with you guys. It'll be great to follow the journey. Yeah,

Zac: 1:09:24

really. Thanks so much for having me here and enjoyed the conversation. Great questions, and honestly, just always good to chat with. All bitcoin is and

Lynne Bairstow: 1:09:35

Zach. Where can people follow you and the and the journey of meanwhile, where's the best place? Yeah,

Zac: 1:09:40

so Well, if you're interested and learning more about the policy, you can sign up@meanwhile.bm meanwhile.com redirects, if, if you want to do that, I'm at Z Townsend on x and meanwhile is at meanwhile, life, meanwhile. I was dormant. If anyone does, oh, I can get it, you know, let me know. But yeah, that's us, and we're quite accessible. I think, as I said, like every single person who signs up in the website, you know, gets an email from one of my colleagues or me, and we offer that time like we've talked, I think, for over an hour. And there's often questions about every aspect of the company. You know, how's the policy work? Like, can you approve you have a license? Like, can people want to really go through, you know, how we invest the assets, what our chief risk government qualifications are, like all this stuff, and so we're really available to go through all that. You know our if you really boil down our business, it's based on trust, and we know that there's a complicated history in trusting counterparties in Bitcoin. So we really do everything we can to meet people where they are and share what we're building.

Israel: 1:11:07

Well, we'll be sure to include some of those links in the show notes. And thanks again. Zach, thank you.

Lynne Bairstow: 1:11:21

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