"The guards in prison asked me what coin to buy" | CZ Interview

yeah it's good to see a lot of familiar faces yeah thanks for being here so CZ honored to be here first question how is your summer actually much much less work to do so uh pretty R well today I want to get into binance I want to get into what's next for you maybe a little crypto talk uh but before that uh just the elephant in the room I want to learn about your experience uh by the way I'm Austin of altcoin daily CZ your first interview back um what was your experience like in prison

um it's not good it's less fun but now so um but um so I think the whole experience is um um is just very limiting a lot of ways right so uh your freedom is letting away um and you have nothing to do so it gives you a lot of time to reflect um I actually learned about a really important lessons um for example what everything is taking away from you what you miss the most what I found is actually is the human connection that I missed the most so I miss my kids my family

my friends my colleagues and Community um so um like there's there's a lot of other things I miss but not not nearly at the high level of degree that I miss the people so you know you miss the food you miss the nice bad um so but those things you know they don't bother me that much so I think it helped me to refocus my priorities in life do you think it was a fair sentence oh um so that's a very subjective one um if you ask opinions from anybody um they all say different things

right so um I think well Let Me Cave it with a couple uh uh conditions so there's a plea agreement which I agree to um and I'm uh in part of the ple agreement I cannot say anything bad about the ple agreement and I don't I don't intend to um I think look you enter into a deal that's the view separate from that there's a sentencing which I got four mon for uh for incarceration and then there was the process going through the prison experience so um in term of sentencing the judge has a really

tough job right so if he if you ask one side uh they will say you no it's too leing if you ask the other my side it' be like too harsh um I don't care I don't think about it's fair or not so I can give you a couple data points for for people to Benchmark um for this particular violation which is a banking secrecy act violation uh we get a register financial company uh in the us when we had us users and we failed to implement an adequate anti- money mounting program for this particular

uh violation no one ever went to jail for a single landage which is my which is my chge so I'm the only one who went to jail for this uh in US history and just two weeks ago there was um TV bank got f for like 1.8 billion uh and when I was reading that there were cases I think you described that they were exactly taking money to facil facilitate actions and no one was named just a company was f one. a bil um but you know fair or not doesn't matter that much um and

then um um the judge um also said a bunch of really nice things about me in court all right so he said look he never seen that many support letters seem like some nice standing guy and then but then he said um he does not have to photo prent um that's when I musics were not good and uh so uh but then when I got when I got into uh I found out actually 4 months is a really short sentence uh everyone there everyone else there is like 5 years 10 years 15 years 8 years

the only years but nobody gets a few months of sentence so from that perspective you know I was pretty lucky so I think in the judge's mind he treated me uh very vely so again it's a very subjective opinion I try not to think about it um I think everyone here will have their own opinions um but I just want to move on um I think it is what it is I uh I I did the time I addressed it um I you know I just took a head on and now I can move on

yeah let's talk about Finance two final questions on this though just a personal question I have do you make friends when you're in there or is just yes so you pretty much have to make friends otherwise if you're if you're alone um if you have no Community then you get you you are not enough well I think so no no Financial advice ask you GS ask you for all Quin actually I do have a cover of GS recognize me and then ask me like what coin should I buy I'm like I better not take the

wrong coin no I told him look I'm I'm I'm F inside I don't have any access to information right so um there's no internet um all my information is through like some uh limited uh length messages my friends and family send me and we don't talk a lot crypto so the I did I get get a few guys ask I did get a few guards ask me that uh I didn't make a couple of friends who I still keep in touch with um I you so uh um but no everywhere you go um so to

be honest I think they're very nice people you pris them [Laughter] so people are very chill um I think to to be honest I think a decent portion of them does what um have no reason to be there right so they were they were in there for the wrong reason they're super nice guys they may have know step on um stepp in some area here there but some of them are for very minor violations and they're they for very long time uh many of them are St for like 8 10 years for very minor offenses

so um some of them yeah for the ones that supposedly there are many of them are there for way too long um so but no me pris they're very nice people I didn't I didn't have any trouble from any of the um some the guards treat us a little bit harshly but also didn't have any issue from many guards so from that perspective I was very lucky that you know there was no physical harm um I was never extorted before I went in uh my prison consultants and that's the industry prison Consulting um uh there's

two million in the us alone there's two million people in prison it's one of the highest uh prison per capita prison populations right so this is a burining industry is growing um when it's supposed to be sh right so uh uh and uh the prison Consultants like look and right before I went like there was news reports of I I'm going to be the richest person ever to be in prison so that helped me from my safety perspective but I think I think the journalists doesn't care they just want to Quick qu um but my

prison Consultants like scared me like saying look you don't deposit too much money on your comers account um just deposit 50 bucks right and then when I go there every other guy had like 200 bucks on their account the poor guy so overall issue and I met a few friends who I still keep in touch with and I'm trying to help a few of them to fight their case um through legal means uh hopefully to get them out early and uh and some of the guys there you know um they one guy I think Michael

is probably somewhere yeah Michael's right there so Michael Sandos he he he he did 27 years in prison for um movies some marijuana 40 years ago right but now marijuana is like legal so um and then he also got a University degree while he was in prison um he wrote six BS uh so there are guys who like know really really push and it's a very difficult environment to do that um I get access to a computer for 15 minutes each time and then every 15 minutes I get kicked off and then within that 15

minutes on that computer there's no cut and past there's no paste function so uh whatever if I write a paragraph and I move to one paragraph to on top of the other I cut it out after we type everything um so I so um the the tools that in Michael S days they they don't even they don't even have computers so um so but there are a lot of people who are there buying books reading learning getting degrees Etc so uh you know uh there are a lot of really nice people there yeah Cy my

brother and I have been at this conference but binance blockchain week for two days now the energy is electric I'm going talk about binance and the biggest question on everybody's mind is what is your relationship with binance now uh so yeah so um I have stepped down from the CEO role uh I am not supposed to be involved in any day-to-day operations of the company um my shareholder rights as far as know I'm not impacted so I'm still I'm today I'm still a large shareholder of Finance uh I believe I can still request for information

Etc I just cannot make decisions or give orders so and uh the relationship is actually a pretty good one uh given that now there's a bunch of other guys working really hard and I'm forced to retired so um when that first happened uh the first month was a bit difficult you know it was it was emotional it was a difficulty to detach it's a company that uh I put my heart and soul in and for seven years Etc but I always thought you know the CEO should not be on the post for more than 10

years because you know this the the world changes right now there's new AI there's I didn't spend a lot of time learning about AI before I didn't have a lot of time to to look at you know even defi in a lot of detail right so uh um so now I actually have more time to look at all of those stuffs so I think it's good that um Looking Back Now was actually this there's a lot of good stuff about being forced to step down see if I step down myself if I say hey look

guys I'm quitting a bunch of you guys will be pissed off and so like this guy ran out of stamina and uh so now I'm forced to step down um and so I'm like well this is not my choice but um actually now I have a lot of point and also um um just looking back right I think I'm actually very very fortunate for a number of reasons um I still have a little bit of fun left to deploy to do to be able to do stuff so that's a strong ener um I think uh

my reputation is changed but in the I'm not trying to minimize the offense so I think that's a Ser bage violation is a serious offense but um it's also validation that there's no fraud um there's no no users lost money with us um so that's in some like I believe if you ask anybody in the room that uh my reputation is still pretty strong um and then on top of that as I said now I'm really lucky that I actually have a lot more time now and I'm not super young I'm not very young but

I'm not also not super old so I still have energy to do more stuff so uh very few people are in this fortunate position to be able to do this things that I can do now yeah I read a headline that um there's a lifetime ban on managing any crypto exchange is that true and will you still be investing in crypto projects sure so there's two yeah so so the first question is um based on the best of my knowledge there's no word saying lifetime or ban those two words doesn't exist in in the um

in my C agreement with the government uh what is in the agreement is I step down a CEO I don't think there's any timelines for it but you know everything changes agreements can be updated with new agreements even governments change um but I have no plan to go back to be the CEO I finally got away from that post and I think the team's doing a good job um so um I don't have any need uh to go back I don't have any wish to go back so even like even today if I was allowed

to go back I probably won't um and uh so I think the lifetime ban is just creative um journalism where they invented two words to make it more Sensational is it wrong we're not sure um is it right those words do not was not in the in the agreement the agreement is public so it's a public uh agreement um so that's that's my that's to the best of my knowledge what was your second question will you still be investing in crypto oh yeah absolutely so right now I'm really do only doing two things uh I'm

working on gigle Academy and then I'm doing Investments right so and then on the Investments there's really three sub parts uh there's blockchain there's Ai and there's biotech um so very simple um and what those are three big areas so I no longer want to lead any project myself um I don't think I have the energy to do that anymore uh and I'm not I'm not as hungry either um no I'm not as hungry as I was seven years ago um so now I want to be I want to help other entrepreneurs um to build

their own companies so I can I can help them with u funding with advice with coaching mentoring if they if they want it um with uh access to other resources uh connections Etc so that's what I that's what I want to do so I think uh I have a I have a few mentors who I value really strongly um and um I would like to become a mentor myself U for those who uh who wants to I'm sure a lot of people in this room would love you as a mentor uh I hope so um

I want to talk about G giggle Academy I have plenty of questions but before that on altcoin daily me and my brother we speak to an audience of over three Mill million across all social platforms and one of the number one questions we get is outlook for crypto in 2025 are you still just as bullish on crypto next year uh okay I'll try not to give any Financial advice but um uh and also um uh history doesn't predict the future but I we can I cannot predict the future I can analyze the history uh historically

um Bitcoin has went through very clear fouryear Cycles so 2013 was a b was a bll year uh 2017 was a bll year so actually 2012 was a recovery year I think most people don't look that don't look back that far and then 201 13 was a b year uh 2016 was a recovery year 2014 2015 was tough 2017 was a uh 2016 was a recovery year um and then 2017 went went all the way way over and then 2020 was a recovery year and then 2021 was a um a bull year um and uh

this year now we're kind of back to the previous alltime highs so like the 2024 is a recovery year based on the pre based on the current analysis based on the current crisis um next year I don't know what's going to happen but I'm overall the long term for the industry I think there's so much more that has to be built uh that needs to be built and that will be built so I think the industry will get bigger uh more and more people will use crypto um so and with more people use crypto the

utility value will increase so longterm I'm still very very bullish short term it's very hard to predict what aspects and you know a couple sentences what aspects of crypto are you most bullish on is it D is it me coins um well actually I wouldn't go that specific um because um uh it's very difficult to it's very difficult to predict like that specifically like which one's going to be the next one you know beginning of um 20 beginning of 20 2017 I probably could not have said icos is the next thing but by June the

the trend was clear by by July we launched a platform by December with the larg platform so uh and uh um I think it's a but depends on which project explode in those in in in those n or in those small sectors um I think all of those have tradition tra have potential to to to grow uh right now like I'm meeting a lot of funders this morning I met funders who are using AI with a very interesting integration with blockchain ideas I never thought about right so uh if any one of those projects take

off that sector will will become big so it's very hard to predict but I'm you know I'm just I'm just trying to support any all the builders in the space and then see what happens let's talk about legislation I want to pick your brain uh how do you see legislation today and also where's it going as a guy in the space um well I think um currently today well the legislation regulations are improving um and in C some countries like here they're improving fast in other countries uh many of them are especially in bigger countries

they tend to move slow slower uh bigger countries do move mov for there more departments more more people to discuss Etc but overall I think it's actually moving in a very positive direction I'll give you another example right just personal personal uh personal feelings a week before of a sentence in Middle April of this year uh Elizabeth Warren declares a war on crypto this is like a week before my sentencing and then the judge sentences me and then I went to prison and then by June Donald Trump is pro crypto but by end of June

uh both parties are pro crypto was just sitting in prison like what the what the hell happened um so did I could should I just waiting for two two months um so uh so it it shows that now now the U uh the well but that basically shows that the people wants crypto when the people want to wants crypto then the government have to respond so I think it's yeah I think it's moving in the right direction I live in the US that's my PO and crypto is very much an election issue in your opinion

teris or Trump who do you think is better for crypto oh uh I have no idea so I I was I will not comment on any election uh topics because um uh right now I got enough trouble with the US laws I know I know they have a election interference law so anything I say publicly could be taken out of context so I don't want to touch it now I don't even want to get close to line I don't even want to see the line so I just want to stay as far as away as

possible yeah so no comments I think both parties are pro crypto that's fantastic I love it I respect it and I love it yeah give it [Applause] up as we look to legislation regulation in the future again I have a US point of view what's one policy or one piece of legislation that you think is super important well I think the most fundamental one is actually just classification of crypto right so now there's so many debates about uh well in most other countries they just treat with money Japan treat uh recognize Bitcoin as a currency

uh many other countries recognize Bitcoin as a crypto as a currency but of course they different type of crypto depends on coin I guess um but I think in the US that's like kind of the large debate right now um and again I won't comment too much there they ongoing losses uh with SEC Etc yeah CZ final questions as we wrap up I want to talk about Bitcoin and of course I want to know about giggle Academy but let's just say one year from now you and I are at Finance blockchain week 2025 we're on

this stage doesn't have to be above price but where will Bitcoin be/ crypto um a year from now a one year is really hard to predict uh but I think there's a high chance if there high chance that you know the future photos of History so then we will be in a pretty good place