Wally F

My name is Tone Vays. I have been in the crypto space for over 6 years now, and it’s like time just flies by. Before that, I was working on Wall Street for about 10 years mostly building risk models. I have lots of experience as a trader, as I started trading in the early 2000s, and have continued until this day. I am just a little too busy for active trading at the moment because I travel the world to speak about Bitcoin at conferences a lot. I also organize conferences. I run a Youtube channel, and educate people about trading on the side with webinars and masterclasses.

I don’t trade short term, I am not in bitcoin in the short-term but in the long-term. That is the same strategy that I use in the stock market too. I don’t do day trading and swing trading either. It saves more of a position trade, you are in something for 2 weeks but rather for years. When I first heard about Bitcoin back in 2013, it became an embarrassing moment for me. I did an interview with Peter Schiff and Brian Rose, and in the interview, I made the embarrassing statement saying that in a few years no one would talk about bitcoin. It is the ultimate video to fail.

I believe in Voluntaryism. I believe that you should not hurt people and don’t take their stuff, and leave choices up to the individual as much as possible. Many early cryptocurrency enthusiasts feel the same way. Bitcoin was first released on the cryptography mailing list, a spin-off of the Cypherpunk mailing list. Both of these lists focused on privacy, were very interested in creating a digital money alternative, and believed in making the world a better place using code. Bitcoin is exciting for people who believe in freedom and individual sovereignty.

I think there is a lot of interest for the Lightning Network and Bitcoin in places living under repressive governmental regimes and dealing with hyperinflation. We can see the potential of Bitcoin by looking at how much impact it has had on the people in Venezuela. The humanitarian impact is really powerful and there are a lot of folks working on that.

I have raised political funds with Bitcoin for the Transhumanist party in 2016. I began that campaign back in 2014, and so in 2015, I was one of the very first candidates to accept Bitcoin. Back then, it was kind of revolutionary. As a science political party, and we did and still do support cryptocurrency. When we talk about the radical top 10% of science, that includes cryptocurrency as well. It is a brand new way of dealing with money and exchangeable value. So, it seemed very natural for my team, and I thought “why don’t we accept Bitcoin?” At the time, we were not very savvy with the other coins as none of us were true cryptocurrency experts, and again this is 2015 before the big explosion of Bitcoin. However, we adopted it, and it was great.

One of the main problems that hinder development in developing countries is connectivity. In developing countries, many people do not have any internet access. A lot of people already have a phone, but mostly the phones are very straightforward operating mobile phones from the 2000s. According to the United Nations "the Least Developed Countries" classification list, 73% of people in those areas have phones, although the latest number from the International Telecommunication Union shows that less than 12% of people have internet access.

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, there was a liquidity crisis at one point where people were selling their assets aggressively, causing the market crash. Also, due to many exchanges promoting new things in the market, crypto was overleveraged. In the long term, people will come to understand the market. If you look at the US stock market and bitcoin markets, crypto is not performing badly as compared to centralized governments that are injecting billions of cash into the economy. People have realized that with limited supply of assets, bitcoin is going to be highly important. While all the centralized banks are injecting money into the system, the fiat currencies you are holding will eventually become less and less valuable. In terms of monetary policy wise, it is the best time for bitcoin ever, the greatest invention through bitcoin is not just the technology, but also the awareness of the monetary policy that people need to think more about. It makes one wonder about how the modern economy and modern banks work and don't work. I think right now it is the most exciting time for bitcoin as people look for what is real.

India is a nation of youngsters, and we are probably one of the youngest Nations. Comparing the culture of Indian job hunting to that of present-day Japan, many new university graduates are in search of a job at various companies and try to create a stable life. In contrast, young Indians prefer to become entrepreneurs. They prefer to make a living by themselves and are more willing to take risks and take a chance of creating a business of their own, even if it is a small company. The Japanese perspective of becoming stable by finding a job at a company was the scenario in which I grew up back in the day.

In Switzerland, the government was always open-minded. In 2018, president Johann Schneider-Amman publicly stated that Switzerland should be a crypto nation. Governments are big bodies that take time for things to get done, but it moves here and that is a good thing.When I joined, Prof. Dr. Georges Grivas was the one who initiated the first course within Switzerland. He has a great recognition of technologies that are becoming popular and relevant for the future. He decided to implement it rather early, and therefore was the first one. It was one of my major decision to join this university even though I had the opportunity to join many others. However,The Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts was the first to implement blockchain and Crypto courses and is the longest-running university with such programs.