Nick Neuman: Bitcoin Multisig Collaborative Self-Custody and Inheritance Planning with Casa
Summary
TLDRIn this episode of Coin Stories, Natalie Brunel interviews Nick Neuman, co-founder and CEO of Casa, a company specializing in multisig Bitcoin custody solutions. They discuss the importance of secure Bitcoin storage, the concept of multisig technology, and how Casa simplifies the process for users. Neuman highlights Casa's focus on removing single points of failure and enhancing security without compromising user-friendliness. The conversation also touches on inheritance planning and privacy concerns, emphasizing the company's commitment to helping users maintain control over their Bitcoin holdings.
Takeaways
- 😀 Casa is a company specializing in multisig custody solutions for Bitcoin, aiming to simplify the process of securing private keys.
- 🔐 Multisig, or multi-signature, custody involves multiple keys safeguarding a pool of Bitcoin, requiring a certain number of these keys to authorize transactions.
- 📱 Casa utilizes a mobile app for one of the multisig keys, which can be encrypted and backed up to the cloud, enhancing resilience against loss.
- 🔒 The inclusion of a mobile key in Casa's multisig setup does not compromise security; it's just one part of the required signatures to move Bitcoin.
- 🛡️ Casa's design philosophy focuses on removing single points of failure, ensuring that users maintain control over their Bitcoin even if one component of the system fails.
- 🌐 Casa operates as a non-custodial service, meaning they do not control user assets, which aligns with global regulations that do not require KYC for wallet software providers.
- 🚫 Casa's system allows for 'sovereign recovery' where users can regain access to their Bitcoin even if Casa is no longer operational.
- 👪 The company offers inheritance planning tools that allow Bitcoin holders to securely pass on their assets to designated beneficiaries.
- 🔒 Casa has a feature that enables account holders to lock out and prevent unauthorized access attempts by designated beneficiaries during a six-month waiting period.
- 💡 The discussion highlights the importance of self-custody for Bitcoin as a means to protect against systemic financial risks and to uphold individual financial sovereignty.
Q & A
What is Casa and what problem does it aim to solve?
-Casa is a company that specializes in multi-signature (multisig) technology for Bitcoin security. It was created to address the challenge of securing private keys, especially for larger amounts of Bitcoin, by providing a system that reduces the risk of loss or theft through the use of multiple keys.
How does multi-signature custody work in the context of Casa?
-Multi-signature custody with Casa involves having multiple keys that protect a single pool of Bitcoin. To spend the Bitcoin, a certain number of these keys (for example, two out of three) are required to approve the transaction, providing a layer of security against loss or theft.
Why did Casa decide to incorporate a mobile app into its multisig solution?
-Casa decided to include a mobile app in its multisig solution to provide a resilient and convenient key that can be encrypted and backed up to the cloud, reducing the risk of losing access to the key. The app also contributes to a more controlled and secure environment compared to a browser, especially for holding one of the necessary multisig keys.
What is the significance of Casa's approach to not being a financial service company?
-By not being a financial service company, Casa is not required to perform KYC (Know Your Customer) procedures for its users, allowing for greater privacy. It also means Casa does not have control over users' assets, which is important for maintaining the principle of self-custody.
How does Casa address the concern of trusting a company with one of the multisig keys?
-Casa addresses this concern by ensuring that the key it holds is not enough to move funds on its own. Even if Casa's key is compromised, the funds cannot be accessed without the other keys. Additionally, Casa has a feature called 'Sovereign recovery' that allows users to recover their Bitcoin even if Casa is no longer available.
What is the process for inheriting Bitcoin through Casa's system?
-Casa has an inheritance planning tool that allows users to designate a family member or a friend to inherit their Bitcoin. The designated person can request access to the Bitcoin after the owner passes away, which starts a six-month timer during which the original owner can revoke the request if they are still alive or if something seems amiss.
Why is it important for Casa users to consult with an attorney about inheritance planning?
-Consulting with an attorney is important for Casa users to understand the legal and tax implications of inheritance planning, especially to ensure that the transfer of Bitcoin aligns with estate planning laws and to avoid potential issues down the line.
What is the philosophical reason behind Casa's encouragement for users to self-custody their Bitcoin?
-Casa encourages self-custody of Bitcoin because it aligns with the core principles of Bitcoin, which include individual control and freedom. Self-custody allows users to have direct control over their assets, which is a significant advancement in financial autonomy.
How does Casa's approach to Bitcoin security compare to traditional financial institutions?
-Casa's approach to Bitcoin security differs from traditional financial institutions by offering a decentralized and self-sovereign model. It provides tools for individuals to secure their own Bitcoin without relying on a central authority, reducing systemic risk and enhancing personal control over one's assets.
What is the 'Sovereign recovery' feature in Casa's multisig setup and why is it important?
-The 'Sovereign recovery' feature in Casa's multisig setup allows users to recover their Bitcoin even if Casa is not available. It is important because it ensures that users maintain full control and access to their funds, regardless of the status or existence of Casa as a company.
Outlines
🔐 Introduction to Casa and Multisig Custody
In the first paragraph, Natalie introduces Nick Newman, the co-founder and CEO of Casa, a company specializing in multisig custody for Bitcoin. Natalie, being a new Casa customer herself, expresses her excitement to discuss how Casa helps secure Bitcoin through multisig technology and inheritance planning. Nick explains that Casa was founded in 2018 to address the challenges of securing private keys, especially for larger Bitcoin holdings. He emphasizes the importance of not losing or having the key stolen, which could lead to total loss of funds. Casa aims to simplify the process of securing Bitcoin through an easy-to-use multisig system, which requires multiple keys to access the funds, thus enhancing security.
📱 Multisig Explained and Casa's Mobile App
Paragraph two delves into the concept of multisig (multi-signature) custody, where multiple keys are used to secure a single pool of Bitcoin, similar to multiple keys needed to access a bank vault. Casa uses a two-out-of-three key system, with one key on the user's phone, one on a hardware wallet, and one held by Casa. This setup allows for secure transactions without Casa's direct involvement. The discussion also addresses concerns about security on mobile devices, with Nick arguing that a mobile app can be more secure than a browser extension, especially due to the controlled environment and security features like the secure element on smartphones.
🔑 Casa's Approach to Security and Privacy
In the third paragraph, the conversation continues with Nick explaining Casa's commitment to removing single points of failure in Bitcoin security. He discusses the option for users to replace the mobile key with a second hardware wallet key, providing flexibility and addressing security concerns. The discussion also touches on privacy, with Nick highlighting that Casa, as a non-financial service company, does not require Know Your Customer (KYC) procedures, allowing users to maintain anonymity while using the platform.
🛡️ Casa's Sovereign Recovery and Privacy Features
Paragraph four focuses on Casa's 'Sovereign recovery' feature, which allows users to access their Bitcoin even if Casa is no longer available. This feature ensures that users are not locked out of their funds if something happens to the company. Additionally, the conversation covers Casa's privacy measures, emphasizing that the company does not sell or facilitate trading of Bitcoin, thus providing a higher level of privacy for its users.
🏡 Inheritance Planning with Casa
The fifth paragraph discusses Casa's inheritance planning tool, which allows users to set up a secure process for their family members to access their Bitcoin after they pass away. This is done through a multisig setup that does not make family members a security risk before the owner's death but enables them to access the funds afterward. The process is designed to be simple, even for those less familiar with Bitcoin, and includes a six-month waiting period before access is granted, providing an additional security measure.
🌟 The Importance of Self-Custody and Casa's Mission
In the final paragraph, Nick reflects on why people should consider self-custody of their Bitcoin over convenience options like ETFs, especially considering the potential for systemic financial risks. He argues that self-custody aligns with the core values of Bitcoin as a hedge against such risks and offers unprecedented control and freedom over one's money. Nick shares his personal journey from investment banking to entrepreneurship and his passion for empowering individuals through Casa's products, which aim to help people take control of their most important data, starting with their Bitcoin.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Multisig
💡Self-custody
💡Inheritance planning
💡Private key
💡Hardware wallet
💡Sovereign recovery
💡KYC
💡Systemic risk
💡Decentralization
💡$5 wrench attack
Highlights
Casa is a company focused on multisig custody solutions for Bitcoin security.
Founded in 2018, Casa has become a major provider of self-custody solutions for Bitcoin.
Multisig technology requires multiple keys to access a pool of Bitcoin, enhancing security.
Casa's system is designed to be resilient against loss, theft, and human error.
Users can choose to have one key on their mobile phone, increasing convenience.
Casa provides the option to replace the mobile key with a second hardware wallet for those desiring more security.
Casa's multisig setup allows for the secure inheritance of Bitcoin, even if the original owner passes away.
Casa offers a non-custodial service, meaning they do not control or facilitate trading of users' Bitcoin.
Users can sign up for Casa without undergoing KYC, maintaining privacy.
Casa's 'Sovereign recovery' feature allows users to access their Bitcoin even if Casa is no longer available.
Casa's inheritance planning tool is designed to be user-friendly, even for those less familiar with Bitcoin.
The account owner can revoke access requests from beneficiaries during a six-month waiting period.
Casa's CEO, Nick Newman, shares his journey from investment banking to entrepreneurship in the Bitcoin space.
Casa's mission is to empower individuals with control over their most important data through private keys.
Nick emphasizes the importance of self-custody for Bitcoin as a hedge against systemic risks.
Casa's product is designed to be simple and secure, making it accessible for users of all technical levels.
Transcripts
[Music]
welcome back to the show joining me this
week is co-founder and CEO of Casa Nick
Newman I'm really excited to talk to you
Nick and full disclosure I am a new
customer of Casa and recently partnered
with them I'm super excited to share
more information on how you can safely
um secure your Bitcoin with multisig
custody and talk about inheritance
planning so Nick welcome to the show
thanks Natalie I'm Rel I've been wanting
to do a show with you for a while so I'm
really excited to be here well let's get
right into it um tell us a little bit
about Casa because when it comes to
multisig custody I feel like there
aren't a lot of solutions out there so
how did CA start and what makes it so
special yeah so Casa was really one of
the O probably the OG multisig company
and so what we when when we created Casa
as it is today back in 2018 we were
talking to people who owned Bitcoin and
just realizing that everything really
comes down to the private key and very
many people were feeling just nervous
about securing their private key
especially when you're securing larger
amounts of Bitcoin you have to really
make sure you don't lose that key or
else you've lost all your money or you
have to make sure it doesn't get stolen
or you know for uh stolen through a $5
doll wrench attack these these kinds of
things are real things that bitcoiners
have to think about and it was just
really difficult to do that we as humans
are not meant to be perfect around
keeping one thing safe right we can
barely secure the passwords to our
Facebook how are we going to keep this
like password to our Bitcoin secure
forever and so we looked into multisig
as a way to solve that problem and
realized that while multisig was doable
in some kind of difficult ways with some
of the the software that was out there
there was no company that was really
making that easy for people and so we
built Casa to use multi- sake technology
to make Bitcoin security easier and so
we've been around since 2018 we are one
of the largest providers of self-
custody for Bitcoin in the world we
protect billions of dollars worth of
bitcoin today and all of that comes down
to back to just making it really easy
for people to secure p multip private
keys to protect their Bitcoin through
multisig technology and to do that in a
way that just feels simple and safe and
that that it one it needs to actually be
simple and safe but the feeling part of
it is pretty important because when it
comes to people's money they really want
to make sure that they feel comfortable
with whatever they're doing and so
everything we've built in Casa is really
built to in uh impart that feeling to
people and that's really important for
us well I can attest to that um it's a
very simple mobile app we're going to
have a how-to video that you can check
out so that you can um just follow along
follow the steps and have your handheld
while you're putting your uh Bitcoin
into multisig custody so for people that
might be listening or watching that are
brand new what is multisig multi-
signature custody how do you describe it
simply to people yeah so most of the
time when you think about securing
Bitcoin and self custody you've got one
private key and that one private key is
protecting all of your Bitcoin you lose
that key you lost the
Bitcoin uh with multisig you've got
multiple Keys protecting one pool of
Bitcoin so it isn't like you have a
little bit of Bitcoin on each key think
of it like you've got a pool of Bitcoin
and then you've got a set of keys
protecting that so just like if you have
a a safety deposit box at the bank or
you imagine like a bank vault you go to
the the actual Vault they've got
multiple keys that they have to put in
and turn at the same time in order to
actually access the Bitcoin and so um
with multi-sig on on bitcoin what you're
doing is let's say you have three keys
you need any two of those three keys to
actually spend your money so you um with
Casa you've got one key on your phone
you've got one key on a hardware wallet
and you've got one key that's held by
Casa so anytime you go to spend B
Bitcoin typically what you're doing is
starting in the mobile app approving a
transaction from your phone and then
going to your Hardware wallet plugging
that into Casa through your computer and
approving the transaction from the
hardware wallet so that gives you the
two out of three signatures or approvals
that you need to move Bitcoin so let's
say that and in that way you can move
Bitcoin without Kasa ever being involved
let's say you lose your Hardware wallet
normally if you didn't have your seed
phrase you'd lose your Bitcoin but with
Casa you can use that key that's on your
phone and the key that's held by Casa to
still access your Bitcoin and then get a
new hardware wallet rotated in to the
set and still get back to full health
and be able to to S uh remain very
secure with your Bitcoin and so it gives
people the ability to make mistakes
without having that lead to catastrophic
loss and one of the things that Jameson
says all the time and Jameson Lop is is
my co-founder at Casa is he always says
Casa is all about removing single points
of failure we really want to make sure
that you don't have a single uh mistake
that's able to make you lose your money
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such a great point you actually took the
words out of my mouth because with
Bitcoin you don't have a single point of
failure it's decentralized you also want
to decentralize the risk with your own
self- custody um and before when I've
done multisig custody I did not use my
mobile phone so why did you decide to go
in that direction of having an app and
for those who might think well I'm
worried about this being on my phone
what do you say to them yeah so what's
really nice about Casa is that yes one
key is on your phone but that's just one
key out of the set that you need to move
Bitcoin and so what we've tried to do as
we as we designed Casa was create a
system that is resilient against many
different types of problems so one of
the things that you get from a mobile
key that you don't get from a hardware
wallet key is you can encrypt that
mobile key and back it up to the cloud
and so that makes it actually a very
resilient key so now normally in Bitcoin
security everybody's like don't put your
keys in the cloud that's Danger
dangerous right that's true if it's the
only key protecting your Bitcoin because
in that scenario if somebody were
somehow compromise that account then
they can get all of your Bitcoin but
with a key that is just one of a set
it's actually great to be able to
encrypt that and back it up to the cloud
because it means it's really hard to
lose that key so if you lose your phone
all you got to do is log in Casa log
into iCloud or Google uh your Google
account and boom your key magically
syncs back to the new phone and so it
gives you a level of resilience that is
different than a hardware wallet now a
hardware wallet is going to give you
protection against hey this uh it's
going to give you protection against
compromise of online accounts so this
Hardware key is always offline you know
somebody would need physical access to
this key in order to use it but it's
much easier to lose that key than it is
to lose a encrypted and backed up key
that's in the cloud and the last thing
that we say on this point is just in
case people are really worried about the
mobile key especially in the three key
Vault where it's a two of three multisig
they can always switch that out for a
second Hardware wallet and so then you
know if you really don't want to trust
Casa you can have two Hardware wallets
in a casa key that are part of that um
multisig setup so I thought that this
was really cool that you have that
optionality because um when Nick and I
were talking last month offline I was
one of those people I was very worried I
um I'm kind of I have my tinfoil hat on
all the time I'm worried that there's
some back door in these devices and that
somehow it it's more vulnerable if you
if you access your Bitcoin via your
mobile phone um and and so if there are
other people out there that are a little
bit worried about just the security
component I mean you you basically are
saying that your phone is more secure
than your desktop browser right I think
in in certain scenarios it it definitely
is because your it depends on you know
what is on your computer and how many
extensions you have in the browser and
all of that but um a phone especially
like an iPhone is just a much more
controlled environment than a browser
and so you you have a better sense for
what is running on that phone and what
the phone is capable of doing and and
you have a better sense for things like
using a phone secure element to
segregate really critical key material
and so we think that a phone is more
secure than using a browser in order to
actually hold Keys like if you for
example compare it to holding a key in
an extension in a browser extension um I
I think a phone is is much more secure
than holding the key in a browser
extension now you might still choose to
use a browser extension for things that
are much lower risk or like smaller
amounts of money because you get some
level of convenience from doing that but
um it's all in this it's all in this
tradeoff that that everybody has to be
thinking about between security and
convenience yeah well I want to dig into
that a little bit more because um what
if people are watching and they say why
why would I trust a company with one of
my keys because essentially that means
you know how much Bitcoin I have and
what if what if something happens at the
company or what if there's a bad actor
at the company what do you say to that
so one of the great things about Casa is
that we hold one key for you and that
one key in all of our multisig vaults is
not enough to move funds so even if
somebody were to completely compromise
Casa and compromise that key they could
not access our our client funds and then
the second layer to this is go actually
goes back to um removing single points
of failure one of the things that we've
done is even remove Casa as a single
point of failure so let's say casa
disappeared overnight no warning we're
just gone you don't have access to the
casa servers no access to the casa key
you can actually take all of the keys
that you have go plug them into another
multisig wallet like an open- Source
multisig wallet like a sparrow or
something like that and syn it all and
boom you've got your Bitcoin right there
and we we call that Sovereign recovery
so it's something that where you have
the ability as a sovereign individual to
still access your Bitcoin even if Casa
is not there to help you and that's
really important because it means uh it
sets us apart from something like an
exchange like FTX or Celsius or one of
those guys where they went bankrupt and
they locked down and all of their users
funds were were locked down with them
with Casa if something were to happen to
us everybody could use a completely
different set of software to move their
Bitcoin
out well what about the Privacy element
because I thought that this was
interesting too your company doesn't
sell Bitcoin or facilitate trading it it
is a custody solution an inheritance
planning solution so if I if I wanted to
sign up and I didn't want you to know
who I am or how much Bitcoin I have
what's what do you offer for that yeah
so one of the things that people worry
about is they say well Kasa knows how
much Bitcoin I have and so if I'm
worried about somebody coming knocking
or from a government perspective or I'm
worried about a hacker getting in and
and seeing the data base or something
like that um I don't think I feel
comfortable with from a privacy
perspective with using Casa and the
first thing to know is that we um we
have to know your balance in order to
show you the balance in the app that's
just how that works right and so how do
we give you the ability to protect
yourself against some of those problems
well well because we aren't a financial
service company and because we don't uh
facilitate trading or anything like that
you can sign up for Casa without going
through kyc and this is completely
within the laws um globally where uh
wallet software providers do not have to
kyc their customers because we don't
have control over your assets we're not
a custodian we're not facilitating any
any money transfer so you can sign up
for Casa with a anonymous proton mail
address if you want to and then you
would never know that it was you using
Kasa so there's really no way to tie the
balance as a line item in the database
that you see in the app to your identity
as a person I this is a huge selling
point I really think so yeah I think
it's a really compelling thing for
people who who are worried about this
and we've got we've got clients who uh
because we part of our service is that
we'll actually get on a call with our
premium clients and our Private Client
members and help you set everything up
right we're going to go through a little
bit of that later in the in the tutorial
that we're doing some of our clients
will never show up on camera for that
they'll be there they'll just be called
in from their phone but they don't want
us to even see their face and that's
totally fine with us like if you if you
want to remain that private that's
that's totally fine other people say no
I actually want you to know who I am I
want you to know my family because then
you can be there and actually get to
know us as our advisor and help us and
so we we serve this really wide range of
desires and people around the Privacy
aspect and we like to be very flexible
with that that's awesome yeah once I
learned that I I found that to be
fascinating because there are a lot of
questions and controversies around kyc
and this is literally non kyc within the
boundaries of Regulation and law whereas
a lot of other companies are kind of
operating in the shadow
um so I I find that to be awesome um
okay so anything else you want people to
know about the company because one thing
that I really respect is both you and
Jameson you're really passionate about
the technical side and you do make the
the the user experience really simple
really clean whereas um you know
sometimes these these technical aspects
of Bitcoin can be very intimidating
especially if you're just starting out
you're worried you're going to somehow
lose the Bitcoin um so what do you want
people to know
we put uh basically half our effort goes
into making sure that the product is as
secure as possible and the other half of
our effort goes into making sure that
it's as easy as possible and so we've
built things that over the years that
address all of the major problems that
you might have when you are self-
custody in your Bitcoin so we've talked
about just the general kind of loss
aspect in protecting against loss
protecting against theft or $5 wrench
attacks uh what we haven't talked about
is protecting against uh the problem of
what happens if you die so this is a big
problem for people when they are self-
custody Bitcoin because you have to make
sure that your family members or whoever
is your next of kin can actually access
that Bitcoin or else it can just be lost
forever and what we realized was that
multisig actually enables you to do this
in a safer way because without multisig
you're in a scenario where you've got to
give access to your one key to a family
member and that opens up a security risk
where now they are suddenly in attack
Vector for the Bitcoin that you're
holding because they know the location
of or they know the actual key with
multisig and the way that we've built it
with Casa you can actually set things up
so that your family members are not an
attack Vector before you pass away but
they can still access the assets after
you pass away and we do this by sharing
just enough key material with them that
when combined with the casa key after
you pass away your family members can
access your funds and so this is
something that is we released this
earlier this year and we really built
this to make it comfortable for the
family members to use use not just the
original owner of the Bitcoin but their
family who's often less Technical and
less familiar with using keys and all
that and so we've built it in a way that
all your family member has to do is scan
a QR code on your phone to get things
set up at the basic three key multisig
security level and it takes three
minutes literally like I I set this up
with my wife who is a little bit less
Technical and she you know we were kind
of thinking uh she was thinking it's
going to take some time it's going to be
kind of a pain we were done in 3 minutes
and I was like yeah we did a good job
building this product I'm I'm proud of
this product that we built because it
was it's so simple even for the the
people who aren't as familiar with
Bitcoin it's time for a quick break to
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to the show yeah I'm I'm really excited
for people to see this and go into the
show notes the show description you will
find the howto for signing up with Casa
setting up multisig as well as the
inheritance planning tool because um one
cool feature is let let's say you you
offer that um to a family member or a
friend and they try to access it in a
way that's maybe nefarious you can
literally lock them out you'll get an
alert and you say uhuh no way um can you
talk a little bit about that yeah sure
so part of the security model is that
after the original account owner passes
away the person that they designated as
a recipient goes into their Casa account
and says I'm requesting access to this
Vault and that starts a six-month timer
so we don't give that access right away
because that's that's part of reducing
that attack Vector from a security
perspective so they go in they request
access to the Vault it starts a
six-month timer and it sends a
notification to the account owner that's
saying hey access was requested to this
fault you can go in then as the account
owner and reject that access at any
point during that six-month period and
we're bothering you the whole time we're
sending you a notification every month
like saying basically like hey are you
actually dead if not please go in here
and cancel this thing and so then you
can go in and and revoke it if you're uh
if it was a mistake or if there's
something nefarious going on and if
there isn't then after the six months
the person gets access to the assets
they get access to the casa key and they
can um get some help from us with
actually moving the Bitcoin and they can
put it into a new Casa account that is
fully healthy that they've set up for
themselves or they can move it to an
exchange if they're you know selling it
as part of the estate liquidation
process or or however the plan works out
yeah and make sure to consult um an
attorney I know that sometimes people
are worried about that and and you have
to um account for the tax implications
and and so um definitely consult your
your financial planners and estate
attorneys for that but um okay um before
we start to wrap up I wanted to ask you
there are people out there who are maybe
newer and they're used to just their
traditional brokerage accounts and now
the ETFs are available and so it's
convenient right going back to your
earlier point it's just convenient to do
it the old Fiat way why do you feel that
that is the wrong decision why do you
want people to actually become sovereign
and take custody of their
Bitcoin this is a great question and I
think it is a very timely question for
our industry right so I think there's
really two reasons why you would think
about doing this the first is a more
practical reason I would say think about
why you are investing in Bitcoin a lot
of people are investing in Bitcoin to
hedge against
inflation um and overall inflation risk
but another benefit of investing in
Bitcoin is that you're actually hedging
against systemic risk and when I say
systemic risk I'm talking about
problems in the Legacy Financial system
that are very widespread problems that
tend to be like Black Swan events like a
uh great financial crisis type of
situation and a lot of people when they
think about it are actually investing in
Bitcoin for those systemic protection
reasons and that could go even as far as
like something as bad as the collapse of
the dollar system right so if you think
about that and that is a reason why
you're investing in Bitcoin because it
would protect you against that if you
are holding that Bitcoin in an ETF which
is very tightly tied with that Legacy
Financial system what is the chance
you're going to be able to get that
Bitcoin if that entire system is melting
down very little so so that's the first
thing think about why you're investing
in Bitcoin and if systemic risk hedging
is part of that then then you want to be
holding it yourself because you need to
have it held outside of that Legacy
system so then the second thing is more
of a philosophical
one one of the big benefits of Bitcoin
is that it is the first time ever that
you can actually self- custody digital
money or any form of digital data using
private keys and we've had centuries or
Millennia basically of human behav
Behavior being built around money needs
to be stored with a bank because
physical money was too difficult to
self- custody practically it was Heavy
it took up a lot of space you know you
don't want to there's a reason people
make fun of uh cash under the mattress
type of people because it's just so
impractical but now for the first time
in human history it is the easiest it's
ever been to self cost
any amount of money in the form of
Bitcoin and so this is a huge
advancement just for human freedom and
individual control over over things that
you care about like your money and so if
you aren't taking advantage of that are
you really missing this entire part of
the Bitcoin movement that is so exciting
about Bitcoin I think it's an it's an
under uh talked about aspect compared to
the inflation resistance side of it it's
under talked about that you have this
level of Freedom through self- custody
of Bitcoin that we've never had before
in human history and it's so easy
compared to at any other point and so
that's something that um that's part of
the reason why we built Casa that's what
we actually get excited about at Casa
and that's I think something that people
should really think hard about when
they're trying to evaluate do I want to
invest in this through a vehicle like
the ETF or do I want to actually own my
own money it's so true um and and such a
powerful point so many people take for
granted that something like a bank run
can can still happen today and you won't
be able to access your funds and or in a
you know at the drop of a hat your your
savings is inflated by 50% like some
people in in Nations literally wake up
and their savings have been devalued
because they printed so much money or
they devalued the currency so never take
that for granted because Bitcoin can't
be confiscated can't be seized you can
take it anywhere it does offer you that
transactional freedom that is so core to
our human rights um well I usually start
with this question but I'm going to end
with it can you just tell us more about
you why you're so passionate about this
and a little of your your background
that led you to Casa yeah so I um I
started my career in finance actually as
a investment banker so I always say I'm
a recovering investment banker and uh
that'll be for the rest of my life I
learned a lot of great things would
never do it again so the first couple of
years I I worked in finance and I would
say that kind of gave me a little bit of
this like Banking and money background
right and then I really wanted to start
doing things with startups I the
entrepreneurship was really attractive
to me from just a level of
responsibility control and influence
that you can have in such a small team
right and early on in your career it's
just all about like can you just get
after it and do the thing versus in kind
of the finance world it's like you got
to wait your turn you got to make the
you got to make the presentations and
the analysis for the partners and
somebody else to make the decisions
whereas in the in the startup world you
make the decisions and yeah maybe you
don't know what you're doing right away
but you figure it out so I moved into
the tech startup ecosystem and was at a
travel Tech start up as a product
manager for a couple of years and then
really started getting interested in
Bitcoin end of 2016 early 2017 and and
finally was like I got to do something
about this as 2017 and 2018 happened um
and the bull market you know a number go
up really drives a lot of interest for
people right so um I participated in a
hackathon actually in 2018 and built
something very similar to Casa and um we
ended up winning that hackathon and so I
quit the company that I was at and I was
going to start a company around this at
the same time the previous CEO of Casa
called me up and said hey uh we're
building something very similar Jameson
Lop just joined the team you should come
join us and be our head of product and
so I was like well they got Jame they
got Jameson that's an unfair Advantage
so I
joined as head of product and was head
of product for like the first year and a
half of Casa's life basically from early
2018 through the end of 2019 and then at
the end of 2019 the previous CEO decided
to step down there were some family
health issues going on and I'd kind of
been the number two and so he asked me
to take over as
CEO and that was crazy because I had no
idea how to be a CEO but luckily we'd
also we were in the depths of a of a
bare market right luckily I had a good
support system around us our team was
amazing our investors were were amazing
and I was able to grow very quickly into
the CEO role through 2020 and then you
know for the last four years we've just
been continuing to build the business
into what it is today which has been one
of the the greatest things I've been
able to be a part of and so um as far as
th that's kind of my journey and then
from the why am I doing it it really
goes back to what I was saying earlier
it's we think private keys are a
technology that really lets people
completely change how they interact with
the data that's most important to them
in their life and that starts with their
money with their Bitcoin and so we want
to build software and products that help
people do that and Take Back Control in
their life of what matters most to them
and that's that's why Kasa exist and why
I'm doing this that's awesome well Nick
you casa pilled me um I'm excited to be
a customer join me guys go to the link
in the show notes it's also on the
screen if you're watching this and make
sure to check out our howto videos it's
super simple that's what's so great um
so thanks so much Nick I really
appreciate you coming on the show yeah
thank you Natalie this has been great
thank you so much for checking out this
episode of coin stories this show is for
entertainment and educational purposes
only nothing should constitute as
official investment advice and you
should always do your own research my
inbox is open if you want to share
feedback or guest suggestions just reach
out at natalt talking bitcoin.com make
sure you're subscribed to the show and
check out my free newsletter Natalie
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