The CSE warmly welcomed Tiidal Gaming Group Corp. (CSE:TIDL) for a virtual Market Open on November 17, 2021.
Tiidal is an esports and gaming platform company focused on owning and operating synergistic businesses in the gaming ecosystem, including its wholly-owned subsidiaries Sportsflare and Lazarus Esports. They focus on media and technology as they believe the key to success is engagement; both their media and technology operations focus on increasing positive fan and consumer engagement and 10-X’ing the esports experience.
CEO Charles Watson and other members of the amazing Tiidal team kicked off the day’s trading at the virtual Market Open.
For more details about the CSE, including information on other Market Opens, please visit theCSE websiteor follow us onsocial media.
The CSE warmly welcomed CoinAnalyst Corp. (CSE:COYX) for a virtual Market Open on November 1, 2021.
CoinAnalyst is an AI-based big data analytics platform that enables traders in the cryptocurrency asset sector and other industries to access real-time data from the crypto and initial coin offering (ICO) market. The platform tracks influencers and monitors online social media and websites, and provides sentiment analysis, forecasting, and trading signals on the top 100 cryptocurrencies.
CEO & Co-Founder Pascal Lauria, COO Andrew Sazama, and other members of the amazing CoinAnalyst team kicked off the day’s trading at the virtual Market Open.
For more details about the CSE, including information on other Market Opens, please visit theCSE websiteor follow us onsocial media.
The CSE warmly welcomed Li-Metal Corp. (CSE:LIM) for a virtual Market Open on November 15, 2021.
Li-Metal is a Canadian-based company developing lithium metal anodes and lithium metal production technologies for use in next generation batteries. Their production methods are significantly more sustainable than existing products and offer lighter, more energy dense and safer batteries that are critical to tomorrow’s electric vehicles.
CEO Maciej Jastrzebski and other members of the amazing Li-Metal team kicked off the day’s trading at the virtual Market Open.
For more details about the CSE, including information on other Market Opens, please visit theCSE websiteor follow us onsocial media.
The CSE warmly welcomed Vejii Holdings Ltd. (CSE:VEJI) for a virtual Market Open on November 10, 2021.
Vejii is a unified digital marketplace and fulfillment platform featuring thousands of plant-based and sustainable living products from a growing list of hundreds of vendors. The platform offers an easy-to-use, omnichannel experience for both vendors and buyers, leveraging big data and artificial intelligence to elegantly connect brands with a targeted consumer base, both organically and through specialized marketing programs.
CEO Kory Zelickson and other members of the amazing Vejii team kicked off the day’s trading at the virtual Market Open.
For more details about the CSE, including information on other Market Opens, please visit theCSE websiteor follow us onsocial media.
In Episode 5 of the Exchange for Entrepreneurs Podcast, the CSE’s Anna Serin is joined by Jon Matonis, Chief Economist of Cypherpunk Holdings Inc. (CSE:HODL) to discuss privacy and cryptocurrency, as well as disruptions to financing and banking in the rapidly digitizing economy.
Watch the full interview, or scroll down to read the transcript.
About Cypherpunk Holdings Inc.
Cypherpunk Holdings Inc. is a Canadian-based holding vehicle, set up to invest in technologies and cryptocurrencies with strong privacy.
I have the honour of being joined today by Jon Matonis. He is Chief Economist with Cypherpunk Holdings, which is a CSE issuer. But Jon, first of all, thank you so much for joining us today.
Jon Matonis:
No problem, Anna. I’m glad to be here.
Anna Serin:
First of all, I’d love for you to tell us a little bit about your background. You have quite an interesting background. We’re obviously here to have a discussion around finance and banking in digital securities and digital assets, and what’s coming to market. But first of all, why don’t you tell us a little bit about you?
Jon Matonis:
Right. Early on in my career I was the foreign exchange trader for Visa International, going back to the nineties. As the chief foreign exchange dealer for Visa, we covered about $18 billion in international currency trade at that time. Anytime a transaction was made, an exchange rate would hit your statement. That was our team that was putting that exchange rate in.
That gave me a glimpse into the international payment system and how all that worked with various currencies and cards and payment instruments. Which was also about the same time that the world was moving into cryptography, because Visa then became one of the early investors into Verisign. And I moved over from Visa, going into Verisign in the payments division with digital certificates and encryption.
The whole financial cryptography area was booming in the mid to late nineties. And this is all pre Bitcoin, pre cryptocurrency. In fact, the institutions back then were looking at ways to get into the market for being their own currency issuers. You had a group at Visa that was examining how they could be a digital currency issuer by creating a Visa monetary unit, even. They were, in a way, forecasting a lot of the things that we were to see later on.
But it was that blend of finance and cryptography that was so interesting to me, that was booming at the time. And eventually just led me into being involved with digital currencies, going all the way from the mid nineties to when Bitcoin was created in 2008, released in 2009. I wrote extensively on Bitcoin. I wrote for Forbes, I wrote for CoinDesk, and I eventually joined the Bitcoin Foundation as a founding member in 2012.
I was the person behind the Bitcoin conferences that we had in 2013 and 2014. We had the biggest Bitcoin conference in the world at that time in Amsterdam in 2014. The Bitcoin Foundation today is not so much of a driving force in Bitcoin because so many other companies have taken up the task of dedicating money, dedicating developers, and dedicating promotion. But back in the early days, there was nobody that was even forming a narrative for the press. We wanted to fill that vacuum and not let the press deviate into bad press for Bitcoin.
And we were successful in doing that. That takes us to about 2015, 2016, where I, at that point, started working with various companies, as a board director, that were in the crypto space. Focusing on fintech, payments, gaming companies, but also privacy tech and the intersection of privacy tech with finance. Which led me to Cypherpunk Holdings, the current listed company.
The reason that Cypherpunk Holdings and privacy tech is so interesting in this space is that you won’t have any success with cryptocurrencies, or DeFi, or NFTs, or any of those things unless you have a solid foundation of privacy. You’re not going to have any businesses adopt things where payrolls will be public information, or you won’t have any large finance deals happening if the sensitive information is not confidential. There’s a whole entire sub-industry working to solve the privacy problem with these startups. And that’s what Cypherpunk Holdings focuses on.
Anna Serin:
First of all, it’s so interesting to say that you started working with this foundation in 2012. It’s hard to believe that Bitcoin has been around for that long, because I feel like it’s a conversation that people are finally having just within the past maybe two to three years. It’s so interesting that the stuff has been around for so long. And even your work with Visa in the nineties, which might be considered the first digital currencies that were working.
I saw you do an interview and I thought you said something that was really interesting. You said, “Money doesn’t do bad things, bad people do bad things.” And I think that’s a really interesting way to view it. I think people are afraid of privacy around currency, but you did dive into that a little bit. Can you tell us a little bit more about that?
Jon Matonis:
I think you’re right. I think that government and media use the opportunity to tarnish what they want to tarnish. But if you strip it down to its essence, it’s really nothing different than what we already have. The paper cash in your pocket has the same privacy attributes that something like Bitcoin or Ethereum would have.
And mainly those three privacy attributes are: user defined privacy. You get to decide if you reveal information. The second attribute is the irreversibility of the transaction. If you give someone a $100 bill, they have it and you no longer have it. It’s irreversible. And then the third attribute is the non-traceability. You’re not able to link a cash transaction to an individual in all cases as that paper cash moves along the transaction chain.
So when we move to the digital world with something like Bitcoin, it doesn’t add any new, hidden secret privacy techniques. It’s just the same ones that we already had in the analog world with paper cash. Which I don’t think that certain “powers that be” want those same attributes to remain in paper cash, so then they become concerned that those attributes are actually able to be retained when we go digital. This really wasn’t the focus of Visa so much, but it’s a focus of decentralized systems such as Bitcoin on the internet.
Anna Serin:
The original dollar was an IOU, essentially. That’s how paper money was created. We obviously had coins that were made out of certain metals, but the original paper money was IOUs. And now we live in this digital world, so it seems to make sense that we’re entering that side of it.
Can you just tell us a little bit about some of the themes that you’re seeing in finance and banking when it comes to digital securities or digital assets? We can talk about cryptocurrencies, but just in general, what themes are you seeing? What are you seeing come to market in the banking world?
Jon Matonis:
There’s so many new business models that are made possible by this technology, so it ultimately will affect every single area. We’re seeing it go with the low-hanging fruit initially, low-hanging fruit being obviously financial services in the larger sector. But focusing in further within financial services, it’s the early applications around DeFi and decentralized finance, such as lending and earning.
These are normal banking functions, but when you throw it into the world of DeFi, it automatically sometimes takes on this new glamour, because people aren’t used to it without having a physical bank or an old institution. Staking your digital assets refers to earning a yield on your current holdings. It’s just like earning interest that you would earn interest on a CD. You want to earn a yield. There’s many products that are evolving around that. And the entire yield farming market is something that’s new to a lot of people still, but it’s exploding in DeFi land.
Then on the other side of it, you have the lending business. People want to be able to use their collateral for fiat loans. For instance, let’s say that you have a Bitcoin or Ethereum portfolio. You don’t want to liquidate your portfolio, but you want to use it as collateral to get a loan in dollars or euros so that maybe you can make a down payment on a house or something like that.
And there’s a multitude of companies that are springing up to be able to do that and address that market. It’s moving so fast and so quickly that the regulators, not only can they not keep up with it, but they can barely even understand it.
Anna Serin:
Do you think that the financial institutions are resistant to this change?
Jon Matonis:
Largely I do, but I don’t think it’s their fault. I think the financial institutions are resistant to the change because right now they’ve been deputized to be almost a law enforcement wing for financial surveillance. Their agenda is very conflicted.
If you go into any major bank right now and try to discuss anything about new product offerings or the future of finance, what you’ll run into is not open-minded product people, but you’ll run into a wall of attorneys. I mean, the compliance team and the legal teams outnumber the new product teams by a wide margin in banking.
I don’t think it’s their fault because they’ve been deputized in this way and they’ve been chartered, and regulated. But I do think that there’s a certain number of financial institution players that are looking at this space and they’re looking at this space for acquisitions, and that’s how they’ll enter the market.
Anna Serin:
Do you think that we’re going to start seeing this in all of our daily banking? For example, do you think at some point you could go to your brokerage account, deposit Bitcoin, and buy stock?
Jon Matonis:
It’s funny you should say that. I think one of the brokers just announced that they’re accepting cryptocurrency deposits, that was last month. We might start seeing that sooner than you think. But absolutely, the answer is yes, and I think it’s going to be driven by the wallets. And Cypherpunk Holdings has the thesis that it will be driven by the wallets.
Which means just like the browsers steered our entry into the web and how we navigated the web, the digital wallets that people have, whether it’s on their phone or their desktop, it won’t be like a normal wallet. It’ll do so many things for you behind the scenes that you won’t even realize. That user interface is what’s going to allow this technology to go mainstream because it’s going to simplify it for the end user.
For instance, some of the things that you’ll be able to do with your digital wallet, you’ll be able to construct complex smart contracts in DeFi by just plugging your wallet into the web. You’ll be able to have privacy on transactions that you define, which will all be managed by your wallet. The wallets will be able to talk to each other, but everything will still be under your control. Just think of it as we’re moving from browser-based land to wallet-based land to access these services.
Anna Serin:
It’s so interesting. Now my final question for you, and this is a bit of a big one. Hopefully I’m not overwhelming you with an answer. Obviously we know Ethereum and Bitcoin, obviously people can create cryptocurrencies, they have the ability to do so. We also have crypto exchanges that are coming to market where people can trade these.
If we’re implementing this into our everyday banking life with lending, with investing, with financing, how is it being dealt with as far as going back to regular currency exchanges? How are we valuating these cryptocurrencies as they’re coming to market and implementing them into our everyday financial life?
Jon Matonis:
Excellent question. I mean, I’ve never really said that Bitcoin or cryptocurrencies is going to totally eradicate the government fiat currencies. It’s not a situation where you’ll immediately see a replacement like that. I think what you’ll see is Bitcoin keeping the fiat currencies competitive, keeping them honest, so it’ll just be another point of competition for fiat currencies.
And I also don’t think you have to be overwhelmed by 5,000 different cryptocurrencies, because there’s only going to be a handful, maybe two or three, that function as a pure store of value, which would be a currency that people want to hold onto for a store of value to use later. A lot of the other cryptocurrencies are application specific. They give you access to certain smart contract platforms, different blockchains. So we’re not getting into a world of 5,000 different stores of value. There’ll be a small number of competitors.
Think of it like how we settled around Celsius and Fahrenheit and Kelvin for measuring temperature. I mean, we only have three different ways to measure temperature. We’re not going to have a thousand ways to measure value.
Anna Serin:
Super interesting. Jon, everything that you said today I found super interesting. I hope I can bring you back at some point to do another interview.
Definitely take a look at Cypherpunk. I think it stands out a little bit in the market, just the fact that you focus so much on privacy, which is an important element of it. Thank you for your time today and look forward to chatting with you again.
CEO Richard Carleton was pleased to sit down with Greg Hasty from Highly Capitalized during MJBizCon Las Vegas to discuss the CSE’s position in the global cannabis space, how the industry as a whole is maturing, as well as M&A activity and brand building among US cannabis MSOs. Read the transcript of the interview below.
Greg Hasty:
Hey everyone. Welcome back to our continuous coverage of MJBizCon 2021. I’m Greg Hasty here in downtown LA at the HCN studios. And I have the pleasure of being joined by Richard Carleton, the CEO of the Canadian Securities Exchange. Richard, how are you doing?
Richard Carleton:
I’m doing well. Thanks Greg. Pleasure to be back at MJBiz in Las Vegas after a couple of years off.
Greg Hasty:
Absolutely. I’m very jealous. I’m already envious of you being on the floor while I’m stuck back here in the studio in LA, but great to see you again. Great to connect with you again.
Lots of changes, lots to talk about since the pandemic hit, but not all of them negative. Some really, really good developments in cannabis and adjacent markets. Tell us a little bit about what’s exciting you. What are you pumped about coming out of 2021?
Richard Carleton:
I think for people who don’t know who the Canadian Securities Exchange is, just a bit of a backstory, we made the fateful decision about five years ago to not just list companies from Canada in the cannabis space, but to begin to work with the industry in the US as well. And we really became the partner for the US multi-state operators to access public capital in Canada, and the United States as well. And all of the significant MSO operators who are public now are listed on the Canadian Securities Exchange.
We have roughly 160 odd companies in the cannabis space on the exchange overall. And it’s a significant percentage of our market capitalization, and daily trading turnover. From that strength, we have levered that position in the industry to work with companies from Latin America, South America, the Middle East, in particular, Israel, as well as Asia.
So we’ve really achieved a lot for a small Canadian startup. We’re now 20 years old, in a significant position in the cannabis finance space globally. So it’s been a wild ride up to the pandemic. And of course, we all had some uncertainty in the early days. And broader markets were certainly under extreme stress. But then by June, things had recovered dramatically, not just in the broader market, but in the cannabis market specifically when it became obvious that consumers were in fact rotating their purchases in the cannabis space and really supporting the industry in a big way.
And so, as the companies reported ever-improving results in Canada and the United States, increasing sales and moving towards profitability, that’s opened up a whole new range of opportunities for these companies to raise more capital and to begin to think about planting the flag in new states and new jurisdictions, and expanding their businesses organically.
Greg Hasty:
Absolutely. And I just love the journey that you’ve been on. I’ve been following you for at least six or seven years now and I remember even in my earliest interviews, people talking about getting involved with the CSE and how the CSE is really helping them get out there. And you really were the launchpad organization for so many businesses in the US, let alone businesses in Canada itself.
So talk to me a little bit about the current state of MSOs and Canadian businesses as well. There’s a lot of activity. M&A is a big thing right now. Tell us about the market shift and what trends you’re seeing.
Richard Carleton:
I think the important driver across the board here is a decreasing cost of capital for the large Canadian LPs and the US multi-state operators, with the number of opportunities that are opening up in new jurisdictions in the United States. We obviously have the tri-state area on the east coast. Michigan is obviously developing jurisdiction, Pennsylvania’s developing, maybe Ohio at some point in the not too distant future. They’re even talking about medical in Texas.
So there’s still tremendous opportunities for growth in the US markets, specifically. All told, I think it’s about a hundred billion a year between the illicit and the legal markets in the US now. So we know that there’s an enormous addressable opportunity for the operators to take advantage of, and they are. What we have seen is that companies from the US space, through the CSE, have raised more than $4 billion on a year-to-date basis.
That money is pretty much earmarked for mergers and acquisitions activity, as well as to build out in some of the states where they’re currently already operating. And again, there’s a significant cost of capital advantage. We’ve seen debt capital raised by a number of these companies that are now down in the single digits from a coupon perspective.
A year or two ago, companies were looking at 15% interest on debt. We saw last week an issuer raised debt at a 7% coupon. And the difference, of course, is that they have cash flows to secure that debt financing against, and so, the cost of capital has come down. They will use those advantages, as I say, to be very active in mergers and acquisitions activity, and they will continue to expand their footprint in the United States in particular.
Greg Hasty:
Do you see any difference in how MSOs are approaching M&A activity compared to what they were doing pre-pandemic? We saw a lot of MSOs build themselves up. And sometimes, it was a little “cart before the horse” in a lot of cases, and sometimes they would tackle almost too much in activity.
Are you finding that these MSOs that you’re working with and have partnerships with are being a little bit more strategic in their approaches? What’s kind of top of mind for them right now when they’re looking at different M&A opportunities?
Richard Carleton:
I think we understand well now where the value in the chain is highest. With cultivation assets, I think this is what you were saying was a big focus of investment in the early stages. And we now see over-capacity in a variety of regions in the United States, particularly California. Clearly that’s not going to be a source of margin for these companies moving forward.
It’s all about building brands, rationalizing your supply chain, and getting more and more product on the shelves, whether you own the dispensary, or through license agreements or agreements with recognized retailers, to get your high margin products in the hands of consumers. And I think that’s a sign of the increasing maturity of the industry, and understanding where future revenue and margin growth is going to come from.
Greg Hasty:
I’m personally really excited by that as a marketing and branding guy, to see people focus on consumer experience, on brand loyalty, on proper brand stewardship in cannabis, and not just cannabis-adjacent markets. You have psychedelics that are coming online. You even have technology companies that are now focused on the consumer experience and quality and stuff like that. So it’s really nice to see that maturity come into the industry, and it sounds like it’s just going to be more and more of a benefit for our partners moving forward.
Richard Carleton:
That’s absolutely right. And when we look at, for example, the Canadian LPs, they have real challenges in building brands because of the marketing and advertising restrictions that are placed on those companies.
That’s actually why you see the Canadian LPs wanting to invest into the US business lines, because that is where you’re able to develop those brands, and build consumer loyalty. Because again, this isn’t really the same as any other consumer packaged goods where you’re trying to build a brand from scratch because you know there’s an addressable market. You’re trying to win back share from the illicit market.
And so to do that, to command a bigger and bigger share of that brand loyalty and a successful consumer experience, it’s obviously going to be absolutely critical in winning that share.
Greg Hasty:
Wonderful. Well, Richard, I really appreciate your time. I love chatting with you. We can go so much deeper in the flow of the markets, but what’s wonderful about cannabis is that it’s always exciting and there’s always something going on. So every time we talk it’s a new and amazing adventure. But that being said, the trend of maturity keeps going. Seeing these markets come online stronger, seeing these companies come back stronger is such an exciting thing. But thank you again, Richard, I love the chance to talk with you, and I hope you enjoy your time on the floor. Always make sure to check out the Canadian Securities Exchange on their website, and Richard, I believe you also have CSE TV, which is your social media outlet, correct?
Richard Carleton:
That’s correct. That’s our YouTube channel. We encourage everybody to subscribe. Through the pandemic, we’ve been doing a lot of our shareholder and company education through the medium of YouTube, as well as LinkedIn and Twitter and Facebook and so on. But we really like YouTube.
Greg Hasty:
Beautiful. So make sure to go on YouTube, check out CSE TV. Really great quality content. And they’ve really put in the work, especially over the pandemic. Richard, thank you again. It was great to see you. Make sure to also check us out on highlycapitalized.com to stay up to date on today’s events and all the interviews you may have missed, as well as the upcoming interviews. And make sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Facebook to stay up to date on our broader services. We’ll be right back. Stay tuned. See you for the next interview.
CSE’s Barrington Miller is joined by Sean Bovingdon, CEO of The Green Organic Dutchman Holdings Ltd. (CSE:TGOD) to discuss how his company’s expanded focus on the US and recent listing on the Canadian Securities Exchange is setting course for a bright future for the firm.
Here’s an overview of what Barrington and Sean cover in this edition of the “Exchange for Entrepreneurs” podcast:
0:00 – Introducing Sean Bovingdon and TGOD
1:45 – Sean’s past experience in global growth companies
4:30 – The features of organic cannabis
6:54 – Delivering “craft cannabis” at scale
9:20 – Shifting focus to local markets, the US and paying debt
13:53 – Growing revenue and being agile during COVID
16:50 – Prospects for Germany and Mexico
19:00 – What really matters in the cannabis industry
About The Green Organic Dutchman Holdings Ltd. The Green Organic Dutchman Holdings Ltd. is a premium certified organically grown cannabis company focused on the health and wellness market. Its organic cannabis is cultivated in living soil, as nature intended. The Company is committed to cultivating a better tomorrow by producing its products responsibly, with less waste and impact on the environment. In Canada, TGOD sells dried flower and oil, and recently launched a series of next‐generation cannabis products such as hash, vapes, organic teas and dissolvable powders.
The CSE warmly welcomed Eat Well Investment Group Inc. (CSE:EWG) for a virtual Market Open on September 28, 2021.
Eat Well Investment Group is an investment company primarily focused on high-growth companies in the agribusiness, foodtech, plant-based and environmental, social and governance (ESG) sectors. The team has financed and invested in early-stage venture companies for more than 25 years, and maintains a current investment mandate in the health and wellness industry.
Founder & President Marc Aneed and other members of the incredible Eat Well team kicked off the day’s trading at the virtual Market Open.
For more details about the CSE, including information on other Market Opens, please visit the CSE website or follow us on social media.
The CSE warmly welcomed Blender Bites Limited (CSE:BITE) for a virtual Market Open on September 23, 2021.
Blender Bites is a Canadian food company that sells pre-portioned “easy smoothie” products that are organic, vegan, non-GMO, gluten free, soy free, and with no added sugars. Sustainability is at the forefront of their company, with minimal plastic packaging and a focus on plant-based ingredients. Blender Bites products are distributed nationally across Canada and are currently sold in over 800 stores, with a launch planned to enter the United States marketplace.
Founder & CEO Chelsie Hodge, Director of Sales and Marketing Jessica Evans, and other members of the incredible Blender Bites team kicked off the day’s trading at the virtual Market Open.
For more details about the CSE, including information on other Market Opens, please visit the CSE website or follow us on social media.
The CSE warmly welcomed Billy Goat Brands Ltd. (CSE:GOAT) for a virtual Market Open on September 20, 2021.
Billy Goat Brands is an ESG-focused investment issuer that invests in high-potential companies operating in the blue economy, functional foods, plant-based proteins, and nutraceutical markets. In addition to their capital investments, they provide strategic assistance, network connections, and support to help companies grow faster.
CEO Tony Harris and other members of the incredible Billy Goat Brands team kicked off the day’s trading at the virtual Market Open.
For more details about the CSE, including information on other Market Opens, please visit the CSE website or follow us on social media.