Do you think the ability to control your own money is free speech?
Oh yeah, absolutely. I mean, economic freedom is kind of like foundational to all freedoms because think about it. Let's say you in theory have freedom of speech, but someone can debank you or seize your assets. You're not going to be very willing to go actually exercise your right to free speech, right? But there seems to be a lot of fraud and waste. Um, which is just so it's like an unconstitutional asset seizure and then going to fraud. And that's where I start to get it. It just doesn't feel right to me. It's against my values, I would I think it's bad for the state and for America. My worldview is that technology is a great way to improve the world and we should all try to go build companies. There's
You think AI is going to cure cancer?
Yeah, eventually. So, Coinbase is great. We went public in 2021. I finally got some liquidity. And I was thinking like, okay, how do we go help the next big problem, help fix the next big problem in the world? How do we actually like double expected lifespan? I mean, if you go back 100 years, people in the US, the average life expectancy, I think, was like 35 or something, and now we've more than doubled it.
What's your favorite coin?
Well, Bitcoin is the original. I think that's great. And then, you know, things like USDC, like stable coins have been incredible. That's the top regulated stable coin in the world now that we have a role in.
Hi everyone and welcome to this week's episode of the Katie Miller podcast. We're excited to be in Washington DC today with Coinbase. How's it going?
Great. Thanks for having me.
What are you in Washington DC for?
Well, the president is convening a group of people to get the Clarity Act over the finish line. And you know, we're meeting with the regulators, Chair Atkins and Chair Celig. They've been making a lot of good progress about publishing clear rules for crypto. And now we've got to get legislation passed to make it durable and cement it so that it can stand for many decades into the future and can't get changed by some future administration.
You've been at this though a while. This isn't new.
Yeah, we've been working on legislation for crypto for years at this point.
So, what's the difference between the last administration, this administration, how close you actually think you are.
Yeah. Well, I mean, if you go back to the 2024 campaign, the president very astutely recognized that there were millions of Americans who felt disenfranchised by that prior administration and their kind of attack on crypto. You know, Gary Gensler especially was a very unpopular figure. The president very famously at this Bitcoin conference on the campaign trail he said on day one I will fire Gary Gensler and it was like the biggest applause line I think even he didn't expect it and he said it again and you know he's lived up to his promise, right? Promises made, promises kept, that whole line. So in the first few weeks of him taking office he put out this executive order asking his administration to go create clear rules. He then appointed Chair Atkins and Chair Seelig, two of the most competent and pro-innovation regulators anywhere in the world. And then of course the administration passed the Genius Act last year for stable coins. And so now we've got an opportunity to do the second piece of it with the Clarity Act and get that over the finish line.
And you know, make no mistake, there are people out there actively fighting against this. There's entrenched incumbents who don't want competition from crypto companies that would provide better financial services. And so some of them are actively lobbying against it, trying to kill it. There's senators like Elizabeth Warren who are out there trying to kill it.
There's not many things Elizabeth Warren likes, though.
That's true. I mean, so anyway, you're on the right side of history maybe if she doesn't like it. I think she wishes the government was running all financial services or something like that.
So, if you break it down for the person who's like, 'What even is crypto? I don't own crypto.' Or, 'I've tried to open crypto and then I got confused with the wallet and I clicked out and I was like, no thanks.' That's where I am.
That's where I am.
So, if you start at the beginning and say what you guys are is like the bank for all cryptocurrencies, right?
Something like that. We don't have a bank license, but you know, we're
How do you decide what crypto is accepted versus not?
Well, okay. So, you're right. By the way, a lot of people are still learning about crypto. And it started with Bitcoin, which is kind of like digital gold. Now, we see people using stable coins. I think in the future, people aren't even going to really know they're using crypto. It's just a faster, cheaper, more efficient way to access financial services. Whether you're doing payments or you're getting a loan or
Well, because it's built on modern rails, right? The legacy or traditional financial system was really kind of invented around the 1970s. A lot of the mainframe computers, it's still being run on this like very outdated system and that's why you can't send money over the weekend and there's high fees to send a wire or the average.
Do you think that like AI could solve some of their coding issues and bring Wells Fargo, Bank of America, some of the big banks up to a better standard instead of saying running on COBOL?
Yeah. Well, AI is making every organization more efficient, including the banks and the folks who run kind of that legacy infrastructure. So, I think that will help, but there's a lot of reasons why it's not moving fast that have nothing to do with like if it was purely a technology problem, I think it would get solved faster. In some ways, they like the inefficiency of it because they can charge high fees for it and it just it's hard for big established institutions to change unless they have new entrance coming in to create competition.
Well, a memecoin is something - it really got created in part due to the lack of regulatory clarity in the US because there was no clear pathway to say raise money for a company on chain like a true security. And so people started trading these meme coins and it was really like some people call it an attention market. It's like what are people interested in right now? Now there was a bit of an unsavory element to it in the sense that these groups of people, some of them would try to like pump these meme coins and dump them. And so there was aspects of it that were unsavory, but I think the idea of it is probably going to persist and there could be a next generation of memecoins.
Like actually, you know, memes are great. Like that's kind of the modern-day political cartoon, you know, going back to Benjamin Franklin, you know, join or die or like these famous political cartoons. A lot of ideas can just be like, you know, it takes a thousand words to explain it and no one reads it. But if you see a really funny meme on X or something like that, an idea can go all the way around the world and really stick. So there might be some way that the next generation of memecoins taps into that.
What happened to NFTs and where have they gone?
Well, NFTs are still here. I mean, I think people aren't trading as much like, you know, these Bored Apes and things like that, but the idea of an NFT is actually broader than that. It's really any kind of - you know, Bitcoin we'd say is like a fungible token, meaning any one Bitcoin's exchangeable for another one. They're identical. An NFT is like a unique digital item. So, these could be used not just for artwork, but also for say like governments to issue an ID or a license or a credential like a university diploma or something like that.
So, it just be on your cell phone.
Well yeah, I think in the future people will have this identity that they control and it can have certifications and attestations attached to it which would be NFTs underneath. People may not call it that but the technology is pretty broad.
What do you think the biggest misconception is people have about crypto?
I think it's that you know they think it's kind of for libertarians or anarchists or something like that. And that's like an outdated view. I mean, I think some of the early adopters of Bitcoin were like that, but crypto is now updating every aspect of the financial system. So, it's not just a Bitcoin thing. It's changing payments like we talked about with stable coins, making that efficient all over the world. It's doing things like prediction markets, which help people figure out what's going to happen next. Borrowing and lending, and even things like tokenization of real world assets like stocks are getting tokenized now. All kinds of different funds.
So it's really updating every aspect of the financial system and that's something I think people haven't fully realized yet. By the way, Agentic Finance is going to be a big thing too because AI agents need to do real-time small transactions all over the world. I think there's going to be more AI agents than humans in the world and so we need a new financial system for them. That's a whole another thing that's going to be solved by crypto.
Do you think that the AI agents will be nefarious in terms of taking someone's money or being abused by somebody if not properly regulated as well?
Well, I think with any new technology, it can be used for good or for bad. Even going back to fire or, you know, the invention of fire, discovery of fire. So, I think that the good news is that roughly my mental model is like 99% of people are good, 1% of people are trying to do something bad. As long as regulation can help in certain instances. But I actually think free market competition is like sometimes the best regulator because it gives people choice about which one to go use and assets accumulate to companies and products and services that are trying to do things that are good in the world and providing better products at lower prices. So anyway, I'm a favor of free market competition. Regulation can sometimes help, but there's a danger in overdoing it.
Because Dario over the weekend had said that, you know, they had tried the regulation route. Now he wanted to do something with an executive order versus having say national legislation or state based legislation. You're pushing legislation for crypto. Where do you think AI should land and why do you think crypto should be regulated then if not AI?
Yeah. So this is a great point because I think AI I think of it a little bit more like the internet. Like part of the reason the biggest technology companies in the world have been created in the US which is a huge boon for American soft power around the world etc, like Google and Meta and all these companies, is that the internet was largely unregulated, right? They allowed the market to go create these things and move fast. I think AI should follow more of that model. So far we've had lots of frontier labs competing and there's all these kind of hypothetical things people could come up with that are dangerous, but honestly, none of them have happened yet. And so, I think it's a bad
So, when Anthropic or OpenAI say that their model broke into the sandbox or escaped the sandbox and did this bad thing or Mythos could be that scary, do you believe that?
I think that those are accurate statements. I think, by the way, they're also a little self-serving because it's great marketing for their product. But the reality is human beings do that too, right? There are instances of human beings who try to do something nefarious within an organization. So, you know, just because you say, 'Oh, well, this AI model, it lied to me.' I'm like, well, human beings lie sometimes, too, and the world didn't end. So, that to me is not like a good argument that we should just, you know, slow down all progress on AI. I think just to answer your prior question, crypto is in a little bit of a different situation because we're already dealing with 100 years of financial services regulation and the lack of clarity has really held back progress and it actually got weaponized in the prior administration. So I think in this case clear rules like with this Clarity Act coming up for a vote on September 15th, it's almost going to like protect us from bad government with clear rules. So I think that that's an important distinction.
You started your career at Airbnb.
Yeah. Well, you can go back as far as you want, but I did work at Airbnb, yeah, around 2009 or so.
How when you decided to start Coinbase in your 20s, what did you take from working at other startups and moving that into yours? And what was the decision when you're like this is going well or I seem to have made it, this idea works.
Yeah. Well, you're right that I think it was 2010 actually. So, I was an early employee at Airbnb. I had tried doing a startup previously, by the way, in college. And it was like I was in the education space tutoring. I would say it didn't go super well. It was kind of like a base hit. You know, I had a small exit from it, but it was not a success. And so I joined Airbnb early on because I wanted to see what it was like to have a successful startup or be a part of it. I learned a lot from them. They had an incredible bar for talent. That was one thing is like, you know, if you're not a hell yes, you're a no on a candidate. They really had a high bar for design and quality of software engineering and then this incredible culture that they had created.
And so there was something - it's actually oftentimes very powerful I think for people to get around you because if you just read about people on the internet sometimes you put them on a pedestal and you're like oh they're some genius and I could never do that. Working every day with these folks you realize they are very talented but they're made of the same stuff that you and I are made of and this is possible. This is doable. It kind of gave me a little bit of confidence. And so when I first read the Bitcoin white paper, I started to think about that and sort of nights and weekends started working on a prototype for what would eventually become Coinbase while I was at Airbnb. And when I did leave to finally go do it, I took some of those best practices and I think it helped to make Coinbase successful.
Back in 2020, you had famously said to your employees, 'We're not here to be a political company. We're here to just work.' Do you think that was the right decision at the time?
Absolutely. Yeah, I think in hindsight it was one of the best decisions I ever made as a CEO. And it was a very contrarian view at the time. Of course, we got lots of attacks for it.
But yeah, in that zeitgeist, that moment, you know, with George Floyd and all these kind of COVID where people weren't spending as much time together in person, this kind of anger or lack of unity really bubbled up where
It's hard to do in San Francisco though.
Yeah. I mean, the culture of San Francisco can be a little odd at times. It has like the most innovative companies in the world and a huge group of people who think communism is great. It's like it's a weird place. Polycules, you know, all kinds of stuff. But yeah, that was the first time as CEO I felt like the employees had really revolted. There was a walk out that happened and there was like lists of demands that were being sent to me and I was very confused at first because I was like, well, the mission of our company is to increase economic freedom in the world. We're working on crypto stuff. Why are you asking me all these questions about gun violence or, you know, whatever, police brutality or something? I'm like, there's a lot of problems in the world, but we're trying to fix this one over here. So, maybe we should just focus on that one while we're at work. If you guys want to do stuff outside of work, great. You can have whatever views you want. It was obviously the right call, but at the time, it was very controversial. You know, we got lots of attack pieces written up on us by various traditional media companies and things.
And about 5% - we offered an exit package, like anybody's not aligned with this path going forward. Here's a nice exit package, you can leave. About 5% of the company left and then we were all aligned going forward after that. So, it was important. Do you think corporate America is too political?
I think that if it's related to your mission, it's fine to be political. I think that there are another set of companies that frankly their mission is not that inspiring. Like they're just selling - I don't want to make fun of anybody in particular, but you know, they're selling some piece of software that's just like boring or kind of like a utility. So they tried to engage their employee base on some broader issues outside of that mission. And it's tempting to do that, but then you get sucked into every debate is like, well, where do you land on Israel Palestine? Where do you land on, you know, and it's like just a distraction. So, I think it's better to make a company that truly has an important mission and just get people engaged on that. And then you don't have to sell this kind of virtue signaling luxury belief stuff on the side.
What's something President Trump understands in relation to crypto that former presidents didn't or that other politicians just don't get?
Well, yeah, you have to give him a lot of credit because during the 2024 campaign, he very astutely recognized there was a massive voter base of people who felt disenfranchised by that prior administration. So like millions of crypto voters, people now realize - and by the way on the opposite side like who's the anti-crypto voter? Like nobody, there's no anti-crypto voter. It's like they have other things that they care about. Maybe they don't like crypto, they don't care about it, but they don't vote on it. Whereas the people who are really into crypto, they're really into it and they were so mad that they felt like they were being attacked unfairly, unlawfully.
And so, yeah, the president recognized that. And he also recognized, by the way, it wasn't just like a good political opportunity. He recognized that for the United States to stay relevant as a financial and technology hub, we have to embrace these new technologies and figure out a way to bring them within the US regulatory perimeter because if not it's all going to go offshore and then it's not like you can uninvent crypto at this point, right? Like someone is going to do it in the world. You can't just bury your head in the sands.
So whether you like crypto or hate crypto, you got to put clear rules on the books so it can be built here in America. You were outspoken about the way Gary Gensler and the Biden administration treated crypto. Do you think they were trying to regulate you guys out of business, trying to pretend crypto didn't exist?
Yeah, it wasn't just pretending we didn't exist. I think it was an active campaign to try to curtail or even kill the industry in the United States. I think that you know I think folks like Elizabeth Warren believed that the government should run financial services. She had lots of influence with the financial regulators at that time by you know basically applying soft pressure, one might say extrajudicial pressure because it was not illegal let's say for a bank to give a loan to an oil and gas company or a firearms company. It was not illegal but Elizabeth Warren through extrajudicial measures could go pressure the bank regulator to go in for their audit and crypto was seen as a threat to that and so that's partly why she didn't like it. And you know, luckily cooler heads prevailed or at least we're on a better path now.
Do you think the ability to control your own money is free speech?
Oh yeah, absolutely. I mean, economic freedom is kind of like foundational to all freedoms because think about it. Let's say you in theory have freedom of speech, but someone can debank you or seize your assets, you're not going to be very willing to go actually exercise your right to free speech, right? And that has happened with people in various - you know, the famously like the Canadian truckers got debanked and deplatformed that way. Many people including the president himself and his kids got debanked in the United States.
You can't get debanked from crypto though, right?
That's right. If you have a
I'm asking this as like a genuine question.
Yeah. So if you have a self-custodial wallet, that is kind of the ultimate sovereignty because literally if you have a phone and internet connection anywhere in the world, you can get access to this and have assets in a way that is truly property rights like nobody can take it from you.
What's your favorite coin?
Well, Bitcoin is the original. I think that's great. And then, you know, things like USDC, like stable coins have been incredible. That's the top regulated stable coin in the world now that we have a role in.
What's your favorite meme coin?
Well, I love lots of memes. There's not like - the problem is if I say one in particular, it's gonna be like, yeah. I mean, so I don't want to be seen as like pumping any of these in particular. But I do think there's been a particular fascination with my dog for some reason, and I do think it's funny that people create coins around that, and I'm not endorsing any of them, but I think it's funny.
What's your favorite NFT that you've seen sell?
Well, I actually just recently bought a Crypto Punk, if you know what that is.
Okay. Well, these are kind of like some of the most original early NFTs on the internet and they were basically like profile or identity characters and there was 10,000 of them and they were given away for free. Anybody could claim them. And now they trade anywhere from like $50,000 to $20 million each. And they're like anyway, they're kind of like the Mona Lisa of the digital art world if you want to make that analogy. So I think those are interesting.
What do you do with the digital art? Like what do you do with it?
Well, you can use it as your profile photo on the internet and how people feel some sort of affinity to it if it like represents like who they wish to be online.
Got it. Yeah. Why do you think so many tech founders are leaving California? We've seen, you know, the billionaire tax. What are you personally doing? Have you worked to fight against it?
Yeah, I mean, it's basic, it's the wealth tax, right? I think it's deeply un-American to seize people's assets. It might be unconstitutional.
You know, we all benefit from various things in the United States enormously and we should pay taxes. I don't have an issue with that. I've paid tons of taxes on profits and income, but after you've already paid your taxes, they want to come take another tax from you and seize your assets. That to me starts to feel like a third world country. That is a dangerous dangerous path to go down.
And it wouldn't - if I thought they were going toward good outcomes, especially like in California, I wouldn't be so opposed to it if it was being well managed. But there seems to be a lot of fraud and waste, which is just so it's like an unconstitutional asset seizure and then going to fraud and that's where I start to get it. It just doesn't feel right to me. It's against my values I would say. I think it's bad for the state and for America. So we're considering all options basically at this point in terms of relocation.
Roana had said for founders that he was going to take a percentage - you know, say their assets were held in a stock instead of in cash, that the government could take some of their percentage
Yeah. I mean you go down a very dangerous path with that. I mean just think for a minute about the way it's architected. So how do you even value all of these people's property, right? Can you imagine some government bureaucrat coming in and, you know, hey, how much is that necklace worth? How much is that lawn mower worth? I mean, these are matters of opinion and the way it's currently drafted, you have to basically have an auditor come in and value all these things. And if they get it wrong, they're criminally liable or they're personally liable. So, every auditor is going to sandbag it and put in all this kind of buffer. It just you get into a - this starts to feel very third world to have the government coming in and seizing your private property. I think it'd be a terrible precedent.
You know, the political winds are such that in California this could genuinely pass though. I mean, I think there's probably people in my own family who might vote for it, right? So, it just if you see something on the ballot that says, 'Hey, should billionaires pay more tax?' Everyone's like, 'Sure.' But they don't think about the second and third order consequences of that. And by the way, it's not just going to be billionaires. They're already talking about it going down to 50 million. And so if you're an illiquid tech founder, like people have this misconception that tech founders or billionaires have like billions of dollars of cash just sitting around. Most of the people who are billionaires are on paper and all of their net worth is tied up in like a private company stock that's illiquid. So you know you might raise $50 million for a company that now has a $2 billion valuation and on paper you're a billionaire but you have like $2,000 in your bank account. So to pay this tax, you're going to be a forced seller of an illiquid asset. Like most of these founders are going to have to just move out of California and it'll put a huge deficit on the state that is already overspending. So it does not bode well for California.
You've made billions building a crypto company and then you decided to fight human aging.
