Join us during this captivating episode of Diving into Crypto, where we delve deep into the realm of digital currencies and explore the fascinating intersection of technology, finance, and transactions.

In today's episode, we're thrilled to have Phillip Lord, President of Oobit, a pioneering mobile payment app revolutionizing the way we transact with cryptocurrencies. With Oobit, users can seamlessly tap and pay with crypto, bridging the gap between digital assets and traditional payment systems.

Exploring the unique features of Oobit's mobile payment app, Phillip walks us through the user experience of conducting crypto tap and pay transactions compared to traditional methods. Discover how Oobit ensures security, convenience, and fiat currency accessibility for both users and merchants alike.

Join us as we unravel the world of digital payments and gain a deeper understanding of the transformative potential of cryptocurrencies in our daily lives.

Coins & Conversations: Unraveling the World of Digital Payments

Participants:

• JP (CMO of AdLunam)

• Phillip Lord (President of Oobit)

Welcome. Welcome. Welcome to this episode of Diving into Crypto, the show where we talk to the movers, the shakers, the candlestick watches, and everything that's happening in the web3space. This is the show that focuses on the journey of these wonderful players who are in the space, taking us through not just their journey, but also the insights that they've learned along the way, which they will share with you so that you can benefit in your own journey when you are in this particular space. This show is brought to you by AdLunam, who is a trailblazer in the Web3 investment sphere, functioning as the world's leading gamified NFT integrated Web3 investment platform. The company provides feedback access, hands on advisory services, and NFT integration enabling users to transform communities' growth. We have a few exciting announcements that are coming up, as well still, hold on till the end of the show for us to be able to do that.

A few hygiene announcements. Our speaker’s investing their time here today. So if you come across a gem that they have shared with you, by all means, give us a reaction, tweet about it, talk about it, and you can certainly ask your questions. Because at the end of the show, we're gonna take a few minutes for some QnA, which you can ask the audio the speaker directly. Our team will pick those up as you find them during the show. Also, few hygiene announcements just in case we get cut off. Please go back to AdLunam Inc., and you will find the link that will bring you back into, the room so that we can continue the show uninterrupted as much as possible. And, that being said, yes, I can see that the room is filled up.

So without further ado, ladies and gentlemen, let's welcome our special guest today, Mr Phillip Lord. He is the president of Oobit and has been doing some fantastic stuff in the crypto space. He's got 25 years of experience in finance, a seasoned professional with expertise in business development, fundraising, and strategic leadership, all of which, Phillip, I'm gonna ask you questions about today because this is something that everybody in the audience, no matter where they are in web2, web3, web1, across the globe, would certainly need to know a bit, a little bit about or a lot about based on where they are at this time. And he also has profound knowledge of the crypto market, which encompasses coin and token issuance, both central on centralized and decentralized exchanges. Moreover, Phillip has advised several Web3 companies in navigating bull and bear markets. Phillip, it's an absolute treat to have you on the show today. Thank you so much for accepting our invitation and being here. Ladies and gentlemen, Phillip Lord, the president and cofounder of Oobit.

Phillip, you could say hi.

Hi, everybody. Thanks so much for, letting me come on. It's a really, great honor. So, yeah, excited to be here.

Super. Super. Super. So, Phillip, without further ado, I'd like to dive right into it. Right? So, tell us a little you know, I've read a small introduction about who you are, but I really wanna know what got you into the space. So tell us a little about your background, you know, before you started Oobit.

Yeah. Perfect. So, I was in, Asia for 20 years, you know, at a sort of top tier investment banks doing investment banking. And then in 2017, I went along to a crypto conference and, you know, noticed what was going on, the disruption, and got very excited. In fact, it was Roger Ver that sort of, I watched him on stage and, you know, like was like, there's something special going on here. I think Bitcoin was, like, I don't know, 1500, 2,000 bucks. It went up to 4 and then, and then come back and then then it went from the 20k rally. But, yeah, it was just, so I've been investing in a lot of different crypto companies and, you know, sort of made some wins and made some losses.

And when, SPF happened, I thought this was a great opportunity, you know, with the FTX crash, basically, to go all in. And I was very tied with, the VC that owned, a big chunk of Oobit. And, you know, he approached me to come and join the board, you know, help out with the business developing fund fundraising and, some amazing cofounders. But, you know, I was sort of better geographically placed to sort of help out with, you know, the, strategic deals. So, basically, with that, yeah, we we've been 11 months in Oobit, and it was a very simple business. I just wanted to you know, there's a lot of complication in crypto, things that I don't understand, you know, and this is very simple. I wanted to be able to spend the tokens that I've got, you know, whether it's USDT, whether it's Solana or Ethereum or Bitcoin. And the card solutions down there were, like, expensive, you know, and also always converting back to a stable coin.

I never use a card in my day to day life. I always use Apple Pay. What the guys created was basically Apple Pay for crypto. So, yeah, we, we've got MVP. It's not MVP. We're live in Europe now on Android. We're live on IOS in the middle of the month, and then we go for an aggressive, rollouts across the world afterwards, probably March, April. So a lot of exciting things going on.

We've partnered with a lot of different protocols, which you'll see up and coming announcements shortly, to spend their tokens because, you know, there's no utility of the token if I can't go and buy a Starbucks with it, you know, or a pair of shoes or have dinner with my wife. So we saw that as a great opportunity. Also, we wanted to make it reasonable prices as well. By the time you do multiple conversions, your fees will end up being 4, 5%, you know, on conversions. As is very simple, it's 1.35% off of the spot price. You know? We're not taking FX spread off of anybody. We want people to spend day to day living, costs, you know, on our app.

Alright. Okay. So, Phillip, I wanna pivot a little into, what you've said in terms of, sometime ago in 2015, you said you attended a crypto conference. I mean, over there, there had to have been something that, you know, put that switch on, that flipped that switch, which made you think to yourself, hey Web3 is the space to be for me. Tell us what that was like.

Yeah. I actually just saw a lot of energy in the room. A lot of people trading crypto. There was a lot of disruption from John McAfee back in the day. He was also on stage with Roger Ver, and I just felt like this is can be really ripping up ripping up the sort of financial box, you know, that we're used to. You know? I think stock markets, you know, shouldn't be just, you know, an access to an individual country or, you know, like, you know, a luxury or investment you know, wealth products shouldn't be a luxury product. You know? Access just for the rich. They should be, you know, able to be handed out to the masses.

And that's what crypto you know, the bit that I like about crypto, is basically, you know, if you're sitting in Kenya, if you're sitting in, you know, India, or if you're sitting in, you know, USA, you still have access to the exact same products. Whereas if you have to, you know, qualify or they don't operate in your country and you wanna buy Nvidia or Microsoft, it's hard. You know? Also, the other thing, you know, I know investment banks get paid to make a lot of you know, we there's no point improving price prices for, you know, when you work at an investment bank. You know? You're there to make money. You know? The cost of sending money is very, very expensive. You know? I just transferred, you know, £10,000 the other day from my UK bank account to my Dubai camp my bank account, and it cost me £300, and it took 3 days. It's just pathetic. You know? So the people that really need the money, you know, if you're doing cross border payments, you know, yeah, some of these people get paying 10%.

You know? And it's like, you know, workers and, you know, people that really, really need the money. So I saw there's a gap that this is gonna be disrupted and, you know, we can make faster payments at better prices. You know? So that was another thing that attracted to me. The third and final thing is obviously, like, you know, the US debt situation.

Right.

You have 34,000,000,000,000 of debt. People said they don't understand Bitcoin. You know? How do you understand 34,000,000,000,000 of debt? You know? There's 21,000,000 Bitcoins. It's pretty easy to understand. You know?

Truly. Truly. I mean, you know, some of the stalwarts they say, of course, debt is what makes the world go round. We know it is. Money makes the world go round. But now I'm certain that this crypto is gonna turn all of us on our heads, you know, the way that it's being utilized. And of course, you guys are at the forefront of it.

I find that extremely interesting when you say that, you know, you wanna do a bank transfer, and it takes 3 days. I mean, that's ridiculous.

It's crazy. You know? Yeah. I'd much prefer to have my life in, Tether, you know, or other stable points. You know? I've got a friend working on a product called DRAM, which is a basically, an AUD stablecoin. He’s ex-head of SoftBank Europe. And for Indians, working overseas and Pakistanis working overseas, they can literally, you know, stuff like that that can change the world and hand money back to people that really, really need it. You know?

Truly. And, of course, I mean, it is something that, you know, most of us have either experienced it ourselves, or you can see that it's something that's been happening, you know, across the spectrum, especially when it comes to organizations even having to transfer money or to do business transactions. That's when it gets trickier, especially when it becomes more time sensitive. So, super. Okay. I think that that gives us a brief idea about, you know, where you stand and what got you started in the in the entire web3 space.

But, of course, at this point of time, you've started this great company, you know, which is Oobit. And it's solving a real world problem. Right? What I wanna understand, of course, is, walk us through some of the ways that mobile money or, you know, payments that are made almost instantly or for day to day transactions. Right? How does that work? And then let's go into a little bit about how, you know, Oobit solves that problem better.

Yeah. The one of the, things that we haven't really talked about Oobit is if you have our wallet and, your friend has that wallet and you are in London, Mongolia, it’s a free transfer Right? If you transfer Tether or Solana to them, I mean peer to peer is free. If you think about that, like, workers overseas, they wanna send money back to their mother in the Philippines, say. Right? So they're sitting in the US, and they're sending money back to their mother. Their mother then can off ramp that cash immediately, any Visa MasterCard, you know, machine anywhere around the world. I mean, that's incredible. Instant transfer, you know, and then spending, you know, in 10 seconds at a, you know, a shop just down the road. You know? The traditional institutions can't compete against that.

You know? And there's some POS solutions out there, like, you know, Binance Pay, et cetera. You know? If you could've put 90,000,000 POS systems out there, it's gonna be a long journey. Right? Visa, Mastercard's been at it for 30, 40 years now. You know? So we didn't wanna disrupt Visa. You know, what's a great system. You know? Paying on your credit card is amazing. You know? You can go across across the world. What we wanted to do is really disrupt the fees and give you the choice of the currencies and, you know, be it cryptocurrencies to spend in.

Truly. You know, and, of course, card payments came over. Card payments changed the way that people used to make traditional payments, which were, of course, when it came to transactions globally, making the world, making the world market smaller, accessible to everybody. Where earlier you only had the option of a check or a bank transfer, and then you had to wait that large duration of time. In some cases, when you speak about remittances, I know that in some cases, earlier, remittances used to take as much as 2 weeks at a minimum. Especially if it went from Europe to Asia or even across the, you know, even across the pond, so to speak, when it went to the US.

Yeah. Absolutely crazy. Right? You know? I think in 2018, I saw a campaign outside our consensus in New York outside the big conference. Right? And it was hilarious because, basically, there's all these bankers, dressed in suits, you know, with billboards up complaining. You know, Jamie Dimon said Bitcoin was a fake, you know, and, it's a scam.

And then they had other billboards saying it's fine to charge Mexican workers 19% to send money back home. Like Wow. But, basically, it was you know, they all look like they were in a big demonstration. What it was a crypto company that hired those people to be actors, and they were just making joke out of the system. You know? Which is true, you know? You shouldn't be charging these out outrageous fees. You know? It's crazy. So we wanted to, cut fees, make it easy for people to pay.

I think as well, you know, US tends to dominate the regulation, you know, certainly noise wise. You know? And, you know, at last count, there was 6 a half billion people outside of the US and Europe. Right? And a lot of those countries depend on the, US dollar as their currency. They're not benefited from having a stable political system, you know, with no corruption. So, you know, Telus and and Circle, you know, are used in a way more outside of the US. You know? If you've got a country like Argentina with bad debt problems and corruption and, you know, your cons your currency is depleting, like, by 40, 50 percent. You know? Turkey last year, you know, you don't wanna be in your local currency.

You wanna be in a stable coin like Terra, but you also wanna be able to spend it. You know? So your power of, you know, spending that cash is a lot more.

Indeed. Indeed. And, man, I mean, there are some real horror stories, of course, when it comes to payments getting lost, using SWIFT or sometimes even bank transfers and going to the wrong accounts, which is where I'm certain that the blockchain takes care of, so many of those problems a lot more easily, a lot, more, economically, and certainly with speed.

Yeah.

Yeah. Okay. So when you say okay. So tell us a little bit about, about Oobit's payment system. I mean, you said that this is something that you all developed. It was, of course, a labor of, a lot of thought and ideas that came together from a team. And, you know, when you see a team out there, you see that they are a team that has been very, very passionately involved in this entire space. So tell us a little about how all of that got together.

Yeah. So, look, everybody in the team, there's about 34 of us, is, 2 amazing cofounders. I'm present. I can't claim victory for, you know, starting the company. I've come in later to, you know, help its progress. Was it but, basically, you know, the 2 cofounders, amazing technologists, they're based in, Tel Aviv, and, then another cofounder is based in Singapore. So, you know, we have around 34 staff. We've been building the product for about 8 or 9 months.

Yeah. It's been IDA for, I would say, 18 months. And, you know, the logistics in the back end, it sounds very simple to do, but the logistics in the back end, you know, the compliance in the back end is where the problems, have been solved. So, yeah, we went live about 2, 3 weeks ago in Europe on Android, iOS, middle of this month and then global rollout.

Uh-huh.

In terms of the funding, you know, we achieved just a great milestone in the company. We've been going out for funding last year, even though we thought we had a great product. And sometimes, you know, like Warren Buffett says, keep it simple, stupid. You know, that motto. And that's kind of motto there. Right? We were solving what we thought was, like, an obvious problem, but a highly scalable problem. You know? So we went out, and we got the knockback off a lot of venture capitalists and a lot of investors. You know? We really started this process probably February last year, but we set our eyes on, you know, some, yeah, targets.

You know, they were our dream targets, and I sort of say this is, you know, to entrepreneurs out there. It is a big grind getting funding. Right? Last year, especially because we were in a massive bear market, and we've only really been in a bull market 8 weeks. But, you know, keep that vision board up. Keep focused. Know that you're building a really scalable product, and you're offering consumers a great product. So we targeted, you know, Tether because that's like the Federal Reserve of crypto. Right? They're making $3,000,000,000 a quarter.

But, you know, we knew people are gonna be spending Tether. You know? So we thought we solved the problem for them. You know, they already do lots of transactions, whether it's in crypto exchanges or cross border payments. But, actually, you know, micropayments into shops, that's the problem we wanted to solve. We wanted people spending it every day. So we approached them, and, you know, obviously, they wanted to do their due diligence and make sure the, products worked. We saw that they did a test transaction. You know, we were in test net, and they did a transaction, you know, close to their office at a beach bar, and, we were like, yes.

We were so happy. But was it, the other one as well? And this is a good story because I saw Anatoly from Solana on stage at Permissionless, and, you know, I was overwhelmed by his presence, you know, like, his vision and, like, the audience that absolutely adored him. Right? So I hadn't really traded around in Solana, but I was like, this guy's, like, metallic or, you know, CZ. You know? People love this guy. And so I he's like so I'm walking around the conference, and I was like, you know what? Damn. I'm gonna go over to him. So I went over to him and approached him and said, look. You know, this is what we're doing.

And so I think we'd love to get a Solana on there. I wasn't asking for money. You know? I was just wanting to do something with Solana and because I knew they had a great community. If we added that token, we'd get more users. Anyways, he liked the product so much. He sort of gave us a check, and, I didn't intend to do that. So I just I knew that he's, one of the special, people in the industry. And then you know? So, like, good hustle, I would say, to entrepreneurs out there that are looking for funding you know, key solve a problem, get a vision board of who you want in the cap structure and, you know, where you wanna open and stuff like that and keep focused on that prize.

We've got another amazing investor in this, called CMCC, one of the funds, we've known for many years. Incredibly due diligent fund. I think anything they invest in, they really do the work on the company, and they also kick in a lot of value as well to the company with introductions to new partners. So, I mean, yeah, 2, 3 days of the announcement after the announcement, they're already kicking in huge value. And the same with 468 Capital. Yeah. Super excited to have them on the cap structure. So we really had you know, we put Ronaldo, Messi, and David Beckham, and, you know, Pele on a football pitch in terms of our investors.

You know?

True. True. I mean, those are those are obviously some those are obviously some well known people in the industry, you know, fantastic backlinks for you to have on your team and exactly like you're saying. Right? Ronaldo's, the Messi's, you know, and the Beckham's being, being on the same team is certainly a dream team that's there.

Yeah. And that does help you in the long run. You know? Having one that is a as accreditation, but, also, you know, we plan to, you know, really go aggressive on user acquisition. You know? I think, we already we're seeing the benefits of having those type of investors in your cap structure, but the introductions that they can make as well.

Super. Phillip, I've gotta ask, though. I mean, you know, investors invest not in the solution, they invest in the team that's behind it. Right? At some point, the 3 of you as founders probably, you know, sat in a coffee shop, spitballed some ideas or, you know, met at some place and then decided that, you know, you'd come together and create Oobit. Tell us about that journey.

Yeah. You know, as I say, you know, Amran and Aharon founded the company with Eric. And, really, I saw the opportunity. You know? And so, you know, I've invested in the company and, said I'd like to, you know, go on, you know, board of the company. You know? I saw the opportunity, but, you know, yeah, there's a lot of sleepless nights last year where we were like, god, why can't we you know? We've gotta get faster on the technology, got to make more money, you know. Amran, is an amazing technologist, you know, really is. Like, big credit to him. He's very disciplined.

He has an amazing team around him. You know, for me, you know, I'm more on the, fundraising and the business development side, you know, so strategic relationships, and, you know, we all complement. I think if you're looking for cofounders in a business, find the opposite of what you are. Right? You know? If you think you're a superhero power at, you know, technology, find the, the Elon Musk, you know, of, you know, the promotion.

Skills are complementary. Is that how you mean?

Yeah. They gotta complement, you know, not everybody can be like Elon Musk. They're on their mission.

Phillip, I think I've lost sound for a second. Lost you there for a sec. Last thing we heard you say was, you know, if you wanna find a killer team, find the opposite of what you are.

Yeah. Exactly. You know, there's very few founders in the world like Elon Musk, where you're on a mission. Nothing's gonna stop you from building that electric car. But you also be need to be mercenary. Right? You need to be a salesman to get that cash in and do the deals. Right? So Mhmm. You know, generally, what you find with founders is, like, you know, 1 is good at 1.

You know? That's the reason why Elon Musk is worth 300,000,000,000. Right? But, you know, if you got 2, 3 founders, everybody's, you know as operations, you know, like, I see so many great business plans. You know? I see so many great business plans. But you know the back end is disastrous. Right? So you're gonna have the tightest back end because investors won't invest, you know, if it's a, you know, if it's you know, if it's a mess in the back end. So, you know, a COO/CLO, you know, a technologist, and somebody that can do business development fundraiser. You know, the 3 big key components for me, you know, in a company when I invest.

True. True. And, yes, you find the best investments coming in with, of course, the best teams who are able to have that complementary skill set to be able to take something to the next level. They need to be able to depict that, not just on paper, but also in the way that present themselves. Yeah.

Through your background, the journey of how Oobit came about, some of the financial system that exists, you know, and how your solution's changing that. Right? To, of course, make it more convenient to for people to pay, you have, this experience of conducting, you know, a crypto cap. And I remember, I recall watching on one of the channels that you had a demo from, Nikita Sachdev of Luna PR, you know, where she does this video, and she walks down in Dubai, picks up a ninja drink, and pays for it using Oobit. Right? Tell us Exactly. Tell us how that works and how that came about.

Yeah. Look. I mean, we've all been spending money now, so, obviously, Nikki has a good, presence. So, you know, we want people to, see it. So we got Nikki on, to do that. And, you know, Lyn has been helping aggressively on the marketing side. They've done an excellent job. In terms of the, the other person recently was a Roger Ver from Bitcoin Cash.

You know? I was at Satoshi roundtable over the weekend. You know, Roger's the reason why I got into crypto. You know? I'm really inspired by him. And, basically, I said to Roger, look. I'm gonna load up Bitcoin Cash. I would love to show it to you. Sorry. I just got a bit of background noise.

Just give me one second. Sure.

Okay. Well, then Yeah.

So sorry.

Go ahead. Go ahead, Sorry. Yeah. Yeah.

I was just I'm telling the audience to use the emojis for, you know, for every gem that they've come across because I've got so many myself.

Yeah. So Satoshi Roundtable, if you haven't heard of it, but it's like the 500 leaders, you know, at the crypto go there for 5 days and, like, you know, whether it's, you know, Solana or, you know, Binance or, you know, Bybit or whatever. Right? You know, a lot of pretty different protocol leaders and visionaries in the industry. So I saw Roger, and I went upstairs and said, look. Buddy, I wanna just buy you a coffee on, you know, Bitcoin Cash. I had it loaded up. He's like, oh, you know, you need a POS system or something to do that. I'm like, no.

I just loaded it up this morning. I'm gonna buy a coffee with, Bitcoin Cash. He's like, well, if you can do that, I'm gonna video it. I'm gonna post it. I'm like, but you're a legend. And so kindly, Roger did it. You know? So you can all watch us on my, on the YouTube, Twitter. You know? And, yeah, fuck.

I wish we could afford to hire him as a salesman if he wasn't a billionaire, you know?

Indeed. I mean, like, you there there is no better than endorsement than somebody that's using it, shows that it works, and loves it. Right? It it is so natural, so authentic. And there's Yes.

You know,

No amount of money that could make up for that.

Yeah. And that's what we want. And, like, you know, as we hit, you know, aggressive rollout, you're gonna see a lot more cool videos. We love the TikTok generation style video, memes, and stuff like that. And, you know, right now, you know, these tokens have got utilities of, you know, different stuff, but, like, I wanna buy a coffee or I wanna buy a beer or whatever it is. Right? That's a good utility. You know?

I mean, easy as. Right? I mean, if you're gonna deplete your bank account so, you know, the reason I'm coming to that is because I know that there's more places on the planet that do not allow you to purchase crypto, beyond the peer to peer system. Right? You can't buy it on your credit card. You have to use a back a system that's not entirely regulated and in many times, of course, not safe. And there are huge disadvantages to, you know, to be able to on ramp, any amount of crypto into a wallet, and be in the system.

Yes. But, you know, I mean, look, you know, we're believers in, you know, strong KYC AML. You know? There's a fast process on our system. We've got it down with an amazing company. You know? So you unwrapping, like, 30 seconds. So you KYC AML in 30 seconds, and then you send money into our wallet, and then you'll get downstairs and spend it on whatever. Right? So the crypto's checked in the background as well. We we're really compliant.

We don't wanna break any rules. Everybody likes going to United States. So, you know, we're not trying to there are crypto solutions out there with a lot of these credit cards where you can get, you know, $10,000 limits and KYC, and that's just a short game. We're a long game. We're gonna be a unicorn company. You know, we're gonna get mass, mass user adoption. We've got some incredible deals coming up, you know, with big users, and with, you know, a solution as well, we'll be able to partner with wallets. So, hopefully, one day, you'll just know that it's a, you know, payment solution within Trust or MetaMask.

You know? That's the way we'd like to be. But at the moment, we're going B2C. But, yeah, we'd like to be the, the off ramp payment solution for a lot of exchange wallets and wallets out there, and do something really good, make it simple.

Indeed. Indeed. And, Philip, I wanna dive more a bit into, you know, how that works. I mean, give us an idea, that you know, obviously, you can tap and pay, and that's the back end. Somebody can download the app, load their wallet in some way, and then go ahead and use it. Is it as simple as that?

Simple as that. It's like 3 clicks. Like, that's the whole thing. We wanted to make the user experience the best user experience. You know? Simple is good. You know? It shouldn't be this complex. Look. Would I advise you know, we have really strong custody solution with Fireblocks.

You know? But would I advise somebody to hold all their crypto? You know? And I want it no way. Not that I believe it's unsafe, but you should hold it on a ledger. You should hold it, you know, hidden away somewhere. Right? If you've got 1,000,000 of dollars, hold it there. Right? But if you wanna go spend $10 or, you know, $500 or whatever, you know, use us. Right? So Yeah. You know, that's it, yeah.

Yeah. It's a lot simpler. It's a lot more utility for something that you don't obviously, you don't wanna see, getting lost. And, of course, you don't want it ending up in a landfill somewhere just by when someone cleans your house.

No. You know, you're court holding. You should look on a ledger in a safe deposit box and, you know, be as paranoid. Evidence tells us that. Right?

Indeed. Indeed, it does. Alright. Okay. So, Phillip, great insights about the journey, about, the utility, and, of course, a little bit about the team. I wanna ask you about this part with Oobit before I go into a little bit about your community. Alright? So, you know, when it comes to building a product like Oobit, you're obviously, you wanna have, to allay the fears and move away from what has been pinpoints with other competitors or those that are, you know, similar products in your same space.

Right? And that comes with having the right type of, you know, support and resources, especially when it comes to, you know, when you're offering this new world of currencies or when you're disrupting mobile payments, which has been a different experience for a lot of people. Right? Can you shed a little light about, you know, how that how that works with Oobit?

Yeah. Look. I mean, the current solutions are you send money into a credit card. You know? but, generally, you're paying 4 to, you know, minimum 2 a half percent, but up to, you know, 4 to 5% for the, fees.

Right.

Yeah. As is very simple. It's 1.35%. So that's a competitive advantage as well. Also, I don't wanna wait 2, 3 weeks for a credit card to be delivered, you know, or I don't wanna, have to worry which region I'm in. You know? I'm in sitting in Dubai. You know? Right. I would like to download an app, and I wanna spend it.

That's it. End of story. You know? Also, we do generate an, a credit card number in the app. So if you wanna go on Amazon or you wanna go buy your daily shopping, you know, using your Tether or whatever, right, you know, you can use it. You know? But I honestly don't have a credit card. You know? I have Apple Pay. You know? And so that's the solution. You know?

So now you've aroused my curiosity. Right? You're somebody who's been in finance for as long as you've been in finance, and still are, right, in so many ways. I have to ask, what is the, what's holding you back from the credit card? What are the things that we should know about?

Most people don't, I don't know, don't use credit cards anymore. They put it into their Apple Pay and then now use it on Apple Pay. We just fast track that. You know? It's a better solution. Also, you know, the merchants don't see who bought what, you know, whereas they do on, credit card solutions. So, you know, yeah, it's just a faster, quicker to market and with less fees.

Indeed. Indeed. Indeed.

We tried to disrupt, you know, the current solutions out there to the best of our abilities, and that was price. And that was, like, timing of getting credit cards. Right. You know? And, you know, just ease also multiple transactions. I have a DBS account in Singapore, and I gotta say DBS credit, DBS bank account solution is very good, you

know, for the personal banks. I can go around. I can spend Singapore dollars. I can spend, yeah, AED, and, they've made it nice for, the consumers there. But that's what sort of basically, we took that as, you know, precedent and, like, said, well, we can do that with USDT, DOGE, Solana, you know, Ethereum, Bitcoin. You know? On in terms of the currencies that are listed, you know, they are the big cap. We want the big cap ten. We'll go up to about 50 currencies.

Right. What we're gonna be doing is partnering with some of the strategic protocols. Uh-huh. You know, ideally, you know, anybody that's, founder of a protocol like Charles Hoskinson Cardano or, you know, Anatoli Solano, you know, hopefully, we can get

You know, some get them spending and make a video one day like Roger. They've been inspired by Roger. So, you know, let's see. I have to push hard.

Well, fingers crossed it works out, and you already have present.

Thank you.

Super. Alright. You know, it's interesting that you mentioned that, the solution you're able to utilize in these spaces like, for example, like you mentioned, you know, whether in Singapore or whether you're in Dubai or whether you're, you know, across the pond in the US. The beauty being that you can, you know, like you said, generate a card and then use that there. It solves a major problem when it comes to having to exchange money or, you know, work with forex. Because right now, for those of us that don't have, the ability to exchange or rather the solutions available at this point of time let's put it this way. The solutions available at this point of time is you get a forex card or you have to carry cash and then use forex at an exchange counter, you know, in another place. Recently, when I was at Singapore in, for token 2049.

Right? And I had US dollars with me, and but the one way that I could, you know, use that to spend, instead of incurring high transaction and conversion fees on my credit card, I had to go over to a money changer, right, and have it exchanged there for cash. But then I had to carry all that cash across the entire time that I was there.

Yeah. No. It's just not functioning right. You know? So I think there's better solutions. Like, also, okay, you're talking about physical, you know, US dollars to Singapore dollars, Right? Right. That's expensive. Crypto is just the next level.

You know? I mean, off ramping crypto has been a nightmare. You know? So we just simplified it. You know? I can literally walk around the world. I can be in Soho House in New York, buy a beer, buy lunch, or I can be in Paris and buy some shoes. And then the next day, I can be in Hong Kong. You know? And there are a lot of, you know, obviously, crypto people that travel and decentralized economies and everything. Or even if we just go to the other end of the spectrum where people like, you know, Silicon Valley startups are all, like, you know, focused on cost base now and, like, you know, they you know, what? They were they were raising $50,000,000 before. Now they're raising $5,000,000.

You know? So they're not taking those engineers and stuff like that in Silicon Valley. They're like, I can hire those engineers in Turkey or India or Ukraine or Belarus. And those guys are getting paid in, you know, US dollars or USDT. You know? But they wanna be able to spend it immediately. They don't wanna get, you know, ripped off at the local currency level. So, you know, we see the overseas worker market as a huge market for us.

Truly. You know, as you've mentioned, a lot of our listeners come in, from the Philippines, from Vietnam, from Turkey, you know, in, from India, from Pakistan. I was checking our website today, even, you know, some parts of Europe and Africa. And I've recognized most of those spaces don't have a proper off ramp solution. You know, would Oobit be a solution for them to be able to utilize for the while?

A 100%. It's there's NFC tech which allows you to tap. Right? Google and Apple Pay do have a bit of a monopoly on it. Right? So it's not, yeah, in the US and Europe and UAE and, Hong Kong and Singapore. So most of the places accept Apple Pay, but other countries. So India, I think, gets updated in June. That's gonna be a big target market for us. Obviously, Turkey's already in existence.

So I think, if we're not live there now, we will be shortly there, live there. You know, that's gonna be a big target market, and especially because the currency weakens. You know? But, you know, everybody knows you can hire amazing staff and, you know, tech staff and, creative staff in Turkey. So, yeah, those people are receiving a lot of people are receiving Tether. So we wanna allow them to quickly spend it, you know, in their day to day living. Indeed. So, Same with Brazil, Argentina, El Salvador, etcetera.

Oh, that's absolutely super.

And, sorry, Philippines, Vietnam. I'm telling you all our target markets now, but anyway, yeah, it was a basically anywhere outside of the US and Europe is our target market.

That's brilliant. I'm glad that you're sharing that because a lot of our listeners come in coming from these places. They obviously wanna know that, you know, a solution like this is available. You see a lot of them are excited about it. You know, those that are on the show right now, those that will tune into the show, later based on their particular time zone, and, you know, the if they have the ability to be able to utilize a product, a solution that you've got developed for them, you know, that that I'm certain is something that's gonna be a huge win.

100%. You know? It's a pain point, and, we would love to, yeah. And I think Tether, you know, proves this. They have a 100,000,000 wallet holders.

You know? We get 2,000,000 Right. In a quick period of time. We're proving it. Right? But I think, you know, our target is aggressive. You know, we have an aggressive rollout. So

Truly. I find it interesting because a few days ago, I did read, nothing was, maybe a month and something ago where I read that, in India, they have a system called UPI, if I'm not mistaken, if I've I got that right. UPI, and, apparently, that's, you know, disrupted the standard method of cash payments, bringing more people to online digital currencies. Would you be looking at them as a sort of a partner, or is that something again that, you know, you would, improve on?

Yeah. I think, it's a bit complex, so I won't go into it. But definitely for the middle of June, July, I think, India will be, yeah, this product will be available there. You know? But, yeah, I think, you know, even the current system, GPay, over there is amazing. My wife gives a lot of money to charity for girls in slums there. You know? Right. So last year, we went on a, sort of, yeah, just teach kids, you know, stuff in the in the slums and, you know, spend a couple of days with them and, you know, make some donations. I'm buying a cotton candy, and I'm buying it off a street vendor, and I'm just tapping, my GPay on the phone, you know, and I'm spending in the rupees.

He got it immediately in his account. India is way in advance, you know, of, you know, mobile payments. Crypto is a bit of a, let's say, not gray area. It's called illegal, I think. So, yeah, we'll see. But, I know we'll be able to operate there from, middle of June, July.

Oh, super. I mean, you know, glad, glad that you're making for us into the markets where these solutions are most definitely needed. You have a large development, you have a large team of developers. You get paid in crypto that I know come out from India, from, a southern city in India called Bengaluru. So yeah. So that's certainly something to look forward to. So those expansion plans of yours, you know, more power to you and the team.

I first went to interior in the 93, actually, and I gotta say it's incredible what, Modi's done, in the past 10 years. Yeah. There was you know, it was always growing, but in the past 10 years, it's just a, you know, one way bet on growth and I'm very bullish on India. I'm also married to a seat, to American, but yeah. So, it's India's always dear in my heart.

But can you point? Yes? Oh, as they say. Right? But behind every great product is a great community. Right? You know, Oobit’s success is so dependent on the fact that it has a growing family, one that's you know, that is committed to it, that's using it, that loves it, and is growing. But, of course, to get that started, it must have been a challenge. So, what have been some of the learnings you've had to develop that community?

Yeah. Like, yeah. I think, you know, provide a good solution to, the community. Otherwise, you're not gonna get any interest. Right? So we've had interest. And then you gotta have, you know, growth hackers and, you know, strategy for growth, and, and we work with good firms there on that. In the future, we're gonna be doing a lot more partnerships with protocols. You know? We'd like to, you know, get, you know, leading protocols to and you'll see some come out in coming weeks, but you'll see, you know, basically us either giving giveaways, you know, like, you know, XYZ protocol token, you know, to, you know, if you spend this and make a video, you'll win this or whatever.

You know? So we really wanna get people using this. You know? So I think there's, you know, I can't say too much because we haven't announced it, but there's gonna be a lot of partnership deals as we come out. You know? Whether it's NFT drops as well, that's gonna be a big thing. You know, we wanna get adoption and people spending and making it a day to day function for everybody.

Super. Super. Glad to hear, Phillip, and, you know, as I said, more power to you and the team to be able to do that. So to pivot before we go to the next question. Right? When you told us that, or rather in your in your bio, we don't know if that, you've worked through bull markets and bull cycles and bear cycles. Right? Give us an insight into what your main learnings have been from the bull and then, of course, the bear.

I mean, you know, it's easy to say, but don't forget to sell the bear the bull market. You know? But, it's, yeah, be countercyclical. I went countercyclical by investing in Oobit, you know, 24 months or 18 months ago. So, you know, SBF had just happened, and I was like, okay. Look. You know? Prices have settled down. It's been crazy. You know? When you see crazy amounts of money being made, you know, like we saw 24 months ago in crypto and, you know, you're just like, look.

How long is this gonna last? And, you know, 6 months later, FTX blew up. So you know? Yeah. But then, you know, if you're looking at the Armageddon, you know, and it's all over, you know, I thought crypto was done last year. I didn't think it was done, but, like, people thought it was done last year. Everybody's jumping on the AI bandwagon. You know? And I think AI is amazing. I don't think we've even seen you know, we're in, you know, the 1st year of the AI boom. But Right.

You know, a lot of people are switching from crypto to AI and, you know, now they switch back. I've seen, you know, people make incredible money in the past 8 weeks, but we've got another good 18 to 19 months of a bull market here. And, interest rates look like they're going lower in the US now. You know, it's an election year. We've got Bitcoin ETF approved. You know, the grayscale flows come out and going back into, the other ETFs and, more buying. And then we're looking at Ethereum ETFs, and then we got the halving. I think it might be a little bit bumpy over the halving, you know, as we transition through.

But Nanette, like, they made 21,000,000 Bitcoins. Right? And they've got 34,000,000,000,000 of debt. Right? I know where my I would prefer to have my money over the next 5 to 10 years.

Indeed. Indeed. I mean, between April and May, there's gonna be a lot of excitement ahead between the halving and, the FMOC meeting where, hopefully, they cut some interest rates. But, what are your thoughts on that?

Yeah. Would you wanna pay that money on your issuing T bonds? You know, there's like, is it good for the economy? Will it jack inflation? Probably. But, you know, so, you know, the cost of US borrowing is bloody expensive, and the cost of everybody else's borrowing is bloody expensive. So, you know, I think, if you're getting the, yeah and, also, the economy is doing pretty well. I think the US housing market is pretty stable. I mean, it is an incredible economy where, you know, you think it's all over, and then, you know, as universities just spit out some new Stanford Kids that create the next Facebook or the next WhatsApp and, you know, or the next NVidia. You know? And, other countries are catching up, like India, China, obviously, and they all just been spitting unicorns the whole time.

The stock market's on fire. So, you know, as a Brit, I feel a little bit disheartened about the UK, I have to admit. You know? I think we're in negative GDP growth and, looking for a political change there. So I'm not investing in the UK. I'm sticking to, you know, Middle East, US, and, India at the moment.

Fair enough. I think, my thoughts on the matter are gonna be, centered towards you know, if they continue with their growth of innovation, they're gonna stay ahead of the curve, constantly. And I think that's the one thing that's kept them, at the head of the curve over the last 60 years, at least. You know, just being at the forefront of innovation since, well, in many ways, no, more than 60 years now, prior to World War one. You know? And I think that's been for them, one of the biggest points that has pulled them out of, you know, the great depression, and like you're saying, you know, debt crisis that keeps coming up. They find innovative ways to make the world, I'd better I wouldn't say better with products, but the thing is, you know, that innovation is really what puts them at the head of the curve. And I think that so long as that spirit keeps going, you know, they're gonna have an advantage at the very least.

Yeah. Education is an amazing thing, and I think those top Ivy League universities create incredible companies. You know? So but IIT in India is also, you know, Unicorn Central. So, bullish on, Oxford and Cambridge as well. So, you know, if you got entrepreneurs out there, you know, or wannabe entrepreneurs, honestly, you know, as much as it says don't study and start a business, study as much as you can and start a business at the same time. I'd actually invested in a, a young Russian kid out of London, and actually, a gambling business. And, you know, he's, like, 19 no. He's 18.

You know? And, I'm shocked at how much traction the kid has got. You know? But he's studying at Oxford at the same time.

Oh, that's brilliant. I think GambleFi is gonna be a flavor this year, a completely understated flavor, but you can see that there is movement flowing and chatter that's getting into that sector.

Yeah. For sure. Was it, I've got a lot of friends, you know, some of the titans in the gambling industry, and, basically, was it, yeah. Rightly, I don't gamble myself, and I don't recommend it. I don't like the numbers, but, you know, people do it. You know? And, you know, the numbers are crazy. I think what's going on with Telegram, Tom, and Open Network, you know, is crazy. There's a bot casino called Whale, and literally 3 clicks, you're gambling on it.

I would recommend it not to gamble. It's at Whale. Not to gamble on it, but to see the user experience of how quickly you can get onto a casino table through your Telegram. It's crazy. That that leads me on to Telegram. Right? You know, it's very hard to get developers onto TON. Right? There's 3,000 devs at the moment. So anybody looking to learn something, learn and, to develop on ton because I think there's high demand.

But when you got 850,000,000 users on Telegram network. That's already a big easy, you know, easy distribution. And, the WhatsApp's very behind. You know? If you look at WeChat and LINE, yeah, the user experience of, like, the ecommerce and gambling and, you know, general commerce, to buy things, watch things, yeah, is amazing. WhatsApp's like, you know, an antique in comparison. And, you know, I didn't get Telegram 3, 4 months ago, but when I've seen the way the casinos are operating on it, it's, oh my gosh. Like, you know, like, you wanna start any form of B2C business within Telegram. It’s crazy what's going on.

So developers out there, I'll be learning TON. I think there's a lot of money. TON I know the TON Foundation chairman very well and a couple of their big large investors. Amazing what's going on there. I think, that could be an Ethereum competitor at some point.

And it should. I mean, most of most of Web3 lives on lives on Telegram. You know, it appears, I don't know, the last couple of days, or rather last couple of months, most people have come back and, have noticed that, when it comes to WhatsApp, it's there's suddenly a heavy surge in, in data that that data and battery life that's being consumed by just that one app. Right? Head and shoulders of everything else.

Agreed.

Yeah. So, yes. And I know that they're listening now, sir, WhatsApp. If any of your customer service people are out there, you know what you have to do. Quit listening to the calls and and synthesizing data and focus on the good stuff so you have more users and better solutions, you know, and give Telegram a run for their money. But, you know, you gotta really implement that. So there you go. Okay.

Super. We're coming close to the end of our show, Phillip, but I don't wanna let you go without asking you, 2 more questions before I take 1 more from the audience, which I can see up here. That is, what do you see as the future of web3 and the crypto industry? What's your vision that it's gonna disrupt? And especially since you're you know, you have a background in finance, how do you see it disrupting everything over the next 5 years? What are your thoughts?

Yeah. I think, you know, obviously, Bitcoin is a store of wealth. I think, you know, as I mentioned, you know, building businesses within TON and Telegram is gonna be we haven't even seen the start of it. We're like, by 4 months in. I think that's gonna be crazy. Solana's doing amazing things. I think, you know, I'm not too complex, so I won't go into the type of, you know, I think the DeFi products are amazing as well. They're out there.

But, yeah, basically, allowing to you know, with stock markets, if I've got an account with NASDAQ, you know, is it I'm a European. It's easy for me, but a lot of countries can't invest. You know? Whether you're sitting in Africa, it's not that easy to, you know, buy Nvidia or Microsoft, you know, the best companies in the world. And I think that's what crypto does. It allows you straight away to, you know, go and get a cryptocurrency account and then go buy the best, you know, cryptocurrencies out there, whether it's Bitcoin, Ethereum, buy the top ten. You know? If somebody's starting, I'd stick to the top tens. The, you know, picking, the 20,000 cryptocurrency is harder. But, you know, follow the tech and, you know, invest in those type of things.

I think security tokens never really have taken off because, you know, they're generally paying either a poor yield, you know, compared to what, you know, some of the utility coins are taking, but I do think that is gonna be a big industry. Like, I would personally like to invest in Andreessen Horowitz fund. You know? It's making a security token on a, you know, an investment into the, Andreessen Horowitz fund. Right? Yeah. That makes sense. You know? And maybe I'll put $10,000 into it. Right? I don't want you know, I think a minimum ticket is $10,000,000 there. Right? But why shouldn't I have access to it? And I think that's gonna be the one of the most exciting things.

Premium product that was for either for university endowments or, you know, pension funds, you know, or just super high net worth individuals that are now able to be, you know, put on a type of format. It doesn't matter whether you're sitting in Lagos or you're sitting in Belan Manta or Hong Kong. You'll be able to buy a fraction of that product and have the same economic benefits as if you were as a billionaire sitting in New York, you know, that made the phone call, you know, to get into that product. So I think that's gonna be huge. The same applies to their properties as well. So I'm very bullish on, you know, you know, access for access to all. Would you prefer to sell, you know,

yeah, 50,000,000 people, or would you prefer to sell it to 6 and a half million people? And I think, you know, the mother with, you know, making investments in, you know, a small village in Africa should have the same access, you know, with her smartphone to investments all around the world. And I think that's gonna be, you know, incredible access over the next 5 years. You know?

Cool. In indeed. Indeed. And, that is something that is so intrinsic with what crypto, you know, came about to do, to be able to give people access to funds, and then again, by virtue of that, your opportunity to invest in it. Right?

Yeah.

Yeah. Super. Okay. One last thing, before we take one quick question from the audience because we're we're at the end of our show. Phillip, you've told us so many things about, you know, the bull market, the bear markets, the journey that you've had, the team that you've got, the, you know, the amazing, steps that you took, the luck that you've had with it, and cautioned us against gambling also, I might add. Through all of this, right, we've got a brief we've just got, a glimpse of the surface of, Phillip Lord, the president of Oobit. But the question that I'm certain that's on everybody's mind is, hey, what's your personal philosophy? Right? And what just what wakes you up every morning? What keeps you going?

I definitely like to do good in the world. You know? I try not to, you know, hurt anybody or, you know, kill any animals. You know? I'm not vegetarian, but wasn't, you know I just wanna do good and, you know, build the products, that people can use in day to day life and improve people's lives. So, you know, I think, yeah, I think that's enough trying to be harmonious with the world.

Super. Phillip, thank you so much for sharing your insights on the show. Ladies and gentlemen, we've come to the end of the show. But there's 1 question, I'm gonna pick up from the audience, that I'm seeing, you know and, of course, I think this may be an announcement that, is also gonna come from Oobit. Somebody wants to know, I'll keep the announcement for after this question. Alright? So we have, Snow that says, can you share any insight or best practices for crypto individuals looking to enhance the security of their crypto transactions? What do you think they should do?

Enhance the security there. Yeah. Like, obviously, keep those words safe somewhere. You know? I think, you know, I think, be paranoid about the WiFi that you go on as well. You know? Whenever we go to certain conferences, we're con constantly on a conference, circuit conference, you know. I won't say which country's, but, like, you know, regularly, I think you gotta be aware. You know? There's fast, smarter people in the world, you know, out there than, than, myself. So, you know, be careful about which WiFi you're using, and, you know, keep those passwords safe somewhere hidden, and they're not online.

You know? A friend of mine got hacked on MetaMask, you know, and, they basically just hacked his, and sent him money to an email before. And, just don't ever do that. You know? Your keywords are for a safe deposit box on a written piece of paper, not for, you know, sending to yourself on email.

Truly. Truly. Phillip, thank you. Thank you for sharing that questions. That that really makes Thank you, Snow, for that. As you've heard from Phillip, that was a brilliant question. Most of the other questions, Phillip, you've already answered.

I see some from, from KJ, for money, from SCEM, from CryptoCoconut, Isom Lar, I hope I'm saying that right, and 711. All of whom have, come in with questions, but most of which you've already answered on the show. So thank you so much, Phillip.

If anybody wants to, if anybody wants to ping us questions, I'll always answer. I'm pretty reactive. So, yeah, more than welcome.

Alright. So they can send them to you on sort of across to you. Right?

Yep. Perfect.

Okay. Super. So there you've heard it, ladies and gentlemen. Phillip, the last question. I believe that you guys are Oobit is launching its token at some point soon. I've seen an announcement there.

It's actually live already. So that's the original way the business was funded. So, they raised about $5,000,000 2 years ago and put it on MEXC. Actually, we just got listed on Gate about 2 hours ago. So, anyway, it was you know? It's up a bit, but, look, you've seen the quality of our investors. You've seen a vision into our plans, you know, without selling anything. We've got, you know, a good future ahead of us. So, you know, the token's available and OBT is the code.

Super. Phillip, thank you. You've heard it here, ladies and gentlemen. You know where to go, to get a little more, download the app. If you, download the app, and you know where you can find, if you wanna make an investment into Oobit, it's there on MEXC, as he says, as well as Gate.io just got listed 2 hours ago. Phillip, to you and the team, congratulations.

Thank you so much for your time. Bye.

You're welcome. You're welcome. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you once again for tuning into the show, diving into Crypto. This is JP from AdLunam Inc. wishing you bringing you everything about Web3 and wishing you an excellent day ahead, whether it's good morning, good afternoon, or good evening. Have a good one.