Luis Cuende is the co-founder and President of CitizenX. He previously co-founded Aragon, the tech stack for DAOs that helps sovereign organizations govern +25b in on-chain AUM.
You can check out his work at https://luis.com.
Podcast transcript:
Do you believe the decline in the west is inevitable, or
there are ways to slow it down or prevent it?
I've been thinking a lot about this question,
because the Western civilization is one of the
greatest civilizations that has lived in this planet.
And I would love for the answer to be that
we can reverse it and even accelerate the progress.
However, when you look at it from a
rational perspective and you start looking at data,
I think it changes a lot.
Like, the west is quite big, right?
So if you separate between the two main blocs, like the
US and the eu, then you notice a lot of differences.
I think that the west as it used
to be is definitely disappearing as a concept.
And I think while the US might be able
to reverse some of the issues that it has
right now in progress, and I think that's because
of a very strong constitution, very strong individual freedoms,
and a population that is quite resourceful and that
values capitalism and values financial freedoms.
That's why when there's a state or there's a
governor that tries to do something a bit sneaky,
Americans very quickly make it seem that, hey, there's
this amendment, I have these rights, I have weapons,
all of these things that protect those liberties.
While in the eu, which I think is definitely
the most declining part of the west right now,
I think there is just no reverse.
And I think that's because of two main issues.
One of them is the population pyramid, right?
If you put together an inverted population pyramid
with democracy and you start getting into quite
dangerous territory, especially when you have welfare systems.
Because basically what this means is there's a
very perverse incentive for the elderly to actually
not care about the youth, right?
And this is because essentially these welfare systems
are Ponzi schemes, and we think they've been
always there, but actually that's not true.
Like, pensions are something quite recent.
I think they have around 70 years of history.
So it's quite unproven, you know,
in the long scheme of things.
And people now, like, feel about their pensions
and they feel very entitled about it.
But in reality, we've never been
in this situation where the.
There's welfare and there are pension
systems that are ponchi schemes and
the population pyramid is completely inverting.
So if you look at Southern Europe, for example, you
start not really seeing a lot of kids on the
streets, and then you start seeing less and less young
people because they just go somewhere else.
And they go somewhere else because the tax and
they kind of like, not only like the financial
taxes, but also just getting stuff done is very
hard for them, so they migrate somewhere else.
And that reduces the amount of taxes
that can be raised by the state.
So what happens is that taxes get raised for
those who stay, and then that prompts more people
to actually leave because they see less of their
productivity actually translated into their wealth.
And so basically you have a situation where all
the bright kids in all of the Southern European
countries have left who are thinking about living.
So what awaits is even more draconian
taxation to essentially sustain the elderly and
the unemployed, which are also.
And the migrants who also are unemployed.
And so you end up in this situation where
essentially it's a train wreck waiting to happen.
And I don't see any other way than defaulting.
A lot of these countries will default, we'll
go into fascism, we'll go into communism.
And I really don't see any way out of it.
Because if you reason about it from first principles,
this is the answer that you get, which is
that no matter what happens, essentially the young people
are going to leave, they're productive, and that's going
to leave the people that are least productive.
And then you have, for example, Spain, right?
In Spain you have around, I think
it's 15% that are relying on pensions.
You have another 20% that are public workers.
And then you have like another, I
think it's like 11% that are unemployed.
And then you have maybe like 5% that
are underage, so they can all work.
So essentially what you have here, it's a
51% attack, right, where you have a portion
of the population that cares about pensions and
cares about public worker salaries.
Both things come from the same, let's say, from
the same treasury, right, which is public money.
So you have this dispersion of population,
which is the largest one, that just
wants to extract money from the treasury.
And you have very, very small percentage of pollution that
actually wants to work and wants to create wealth.
So, yeah, I don't think this
is going to work long term.
The US might have a chance at it, just
because they don't have a lot of these problems.
Like in the us, if you migrate there or if you
are a young person there and you want to participate in
society, you need to work, otherwise you just get expelled.
You don't have these problems with welfare and stuff
like that that we have in the eu.
The problem, I think, is that perception, like
reality happens first and then perception changes after.
So in the eu we still kind of feel that
we have the moral high realm, so to say, and
we are like first world and Stuff like that.
And I say we are because as a Spaniard, I
once considered myself European and aligned with those values.
Now I look at it and I think it's all fake. Right.
And these countries are not first
world countries by any means.
And when you travel around the
world, you discover that very quickly.
Yeah.
I mean, you were even advising
the European Union at some point. Right.
So it comes from, I think, a very grounded
sort of insider perspective where you were inside, you
realized what was there and then you are able
to make this really grounded criticism.
I had a similar feeling when I was
in the United nations that it was basically,
you know, many bureaucrats getting nothing done and
that it was, you know, sort of useless.
I think it's really interesting what you mentioned about the
US and especially many people in crypto are saying that
it's a pivotal moment in the history of the U.S.
also, you know, have some people within politics themselves
saying that is, you know, a key moment in
the history of the, of the U.S.
what do you think that would happen
if, for example, Kamala Harris gets elected
and they start taxing unrealized capital gains?
What places do you think Americans can exit?
Yeah, I mean, if they choose to actually execute
the unrealized capital gains plan, that would be the
end of the American dream and of the U.S. we know it.
Right.
The entire economy would essentially crash in no time.
And I think already things are getting quite
hard for Americans that want to like grow
their wealth and preserve their wealth.
If that happens, then it's kind of like it's gone.
I think like right now, if you're
American and you're worried about that, it's
definitely worried to explore other places.
And I think you have to
differentiate short term and long term. Right.
Like, I think short term for a lot of
Americans that just don't agree with like the citizenship
based taxation and, and stuff like that, then seeking
a second passport makes a lot of sense.
I think if you are looking kind of like in the
long term, where to move, I think that's a different question
and I think it's a really hard question to answer.
Probably the first thing you should do is just try
to hedge your bets and have an exit option.
Because right now for Americans, if you are there
and you make your wealth in the U.S.
okay, it's great.
But once you want to preserve it, or maybe your
wealth is not like US centric, then it's quite tough.
Like whatever you leave, you're gonna get taxed.
And the problem with that is you don't
know how Much the number is gonna increase. Right.
So right now your exit tax in the US
Might be, I think it's basically capital gains. Right.
When you exit the country, you have
to pay unrealized capital gains already.
And that's already, I think, pretty high.
I don't have the number off
my head, but it's pretty high.
The problem is once you have that and
that's a law and that has passed, then
it's a matter of increasing the number.
And you don't know if the number is going to
increase to 20%, to 30 or to 50 or 200. Right.
You don't know where you're going to, where
they are going to draw the line.
So having a plan B, I think makes
a lot of sense then where to move.
That's a different question.
Because right now it's quite tricky to decide.
Yeah, that's super interesting and we will
get into that a bit later.
I think also something very interesting right now in
the world, especially in what was considered the west,
but is at the same time the global south
is sort of this new American independence with people
like Bukele in El Salvador or Argentina.
I think it draws a lot of similarity to
the previous American independence where the United States basically
didn't agree with the high taxes from the empire
and they just decided to declare the American independence.
That's very similar to what is happening now
in places like El Salvador, for example, with
Bukele and bitcoin sort of declaring this new
American independence, like adopting bitcoin.
It might happen also in Argentina at least they
are taking, you know, steps in the libertarian direction.
Let's see how that goes with with Milei.
But talking about El Salvador and second options, El
Salvador recently launched bitcoin program where they allow everyone
to basically make a donation of $1 million in
Bitcoin and get a passport in El Salvador.
What do you think about that program?
Do you think it's a bet on bitcoin?
Is it a bet on El Salvador?
Is it something that sounds interesting?
I mean, it's a bet on both, right? And right now.
They're quite intertwined, I think.
I think Bukele's vision on bitcoin.
I mean, if you look at the global scale and
you look at politicians these days, it's hard to find
someone that looks forward so much and tries to live
a legacy that will last for a long time.
It is still uncertain whether it will actually
last a long time because everything that gets
built quickly can also get destroyed quickly.
However, if you look at the global Scale.
I think Bukele is literally the
Lee of Singapore decades back. Right.
So I think if he executes on his plan,
El Salvador can be like the new Singapore.
And it's crazy to think about that and it's crazy
to think that it can happen within a few years.
But if you look at Emirates Singapore,
you see that it can happen.
I think what, especially in this case is that he
is like at the stage to really bet on crypto.
And so we can actually get like one kind
of like small enclave in the world where you
make sure that your crypto rights are protected.
And I think that's extremely valuable.
So yeah, I think the program is great.
I think in terms of like the price
sensitivity, let's see how it evolves over time.
But I would like really.
And for Americans it's quite attractive, right.
Which is quite close to the US So I would
like definitely encourage Americans to keep track of it.
Yeah, I've seen a lot of interest in El Salvador.
I think there are some things that could have
been done differently in the program, but definitely the
long term thinking and leadership is key.
That's something that I really
admire about the Middle East.
People in the uae, they really have this sort of long
term planning that is harder to see in the West.
It worked for Singapore, it has been working for a
place like Dubai in the UAE and so on.
But I think what's really interesting about El
Salvador is that they really set the first
stone of a new movement, you know, a
movement where countries can finance themselves directly from
citizens with this crypto citizenship program.
Do you think other countries will follow El
Salvador and start crypto citizenship programs where they
basically allow people to get a passport and
get citizenship in exchange of crypto?
Yeah, definitely.
I mean, what we're doing right now,
I think, you know, basically enabling anyone
to get citizenships via bitcoin.
I think that's great.
The next step is discounters realizing that they
can actually take the crypto so we don't
need to offload it for them.
They can actually just take it.
And I think that's going to happen in no time.
Also, I think fundamentals to
some extent follow price action.
So when we get the bull run, the next bull
run, I mean, we're kind of like in the middle
of one, but it's been kind of sideways.
But when it really gets the next exponential leg up,
then I think it's when a lot of countries change
their mindset and they are like, oh, our target user
is not a target user that we had 10 years
ago or 20 years ago, it's like the new crypto,
the new crypto kind of like user group.
And so they will very
quickly accommodate to their needs.
And I think the cool thing is that most of the
crypto wealth has been created is going to the youth.
And that is great because up until now
the newer generations are not getting really a
chance to build wealth like the boomers did.
And so I think this is going to
be quite meaningful in a lot of ways.
And I think finally the youth has
a chance to essentially fund new countries
that actually welcome their needs.
Because if you look at the global scale, especially in
Southern Europe and other places that are kind of like
very old world, the youth are very repressed.
And so you see very high depression,
very high criminality and stuff like that.
But that's because we don't rule, right?
Like back in the day, if you are in
like your prime age, you usually like, you know,
are able to like govern the country and build
things for people that are in prime working age.
And we're not getting that chance.
And so I think like these countries, like El Salvador
are going to attract these people, they are going to
attract wealth and then they're going to be able to
essentially like restart the cycle of wealth creation, which is
you get people that are in working age that are
productive, they're also, they're also raising kids.
And then essentially you restart the economic production
cycle and you become a wealthy country.
Talking about crypto and these wealth flows, seeing
where people might move next or where they
might invest next, you basically created daos, you
co founded Aragon, which helps sovereign organizations manage
more than 25 billion in assets under management.
So as a crypto OG, which countries do you
think are the most interesting for crypto investors?
I mean, Caribbean is
obviously quite established, right?
Like I remember Roger Ver was the first
like crypto OG to get a Sangeet's passport.
And I think they're still pretty well established.
Obviously Sankits leading the pack in
terms of like being established.
And then for families, you have Antigua and Barbuda.
That is really a wonderful program.
Then you have some European ones
that are quite more pricey.
We can see what happens with eu,
Things are quite uncertain for sure.
Even whatever happens with the eu, you
always have this thing that again, reality
was first and expectations are created later.
So even though the EU might have a lot of problems, I
think the passports still are going to keep a lot of their
power over the course of at least the next decade.
But yeah, I would say like the Caribbean
Ones are probably still the best bet.
That's really interesting when it comes to especially
citizenship, to basically crypto investors that want to
just have a second option, a backup plan
when it comes to living.
I think that many people still struggle
to see themselves living in the Caribbean.
What places are you looking at personally or you
see friends that are looking at those places?
Maybe, you know, we talked about El Salvador or other
places that, you know, in terms of lifestyle and basically
day to day life makes sense for crypto people.
Yeah, I mean, obviously we think about this
all day as it is an X.
And for the viewers here we have like,
obviously when we have lunch or dinner together
or whatever, like basically macro talk is one
of the only things that we talk about.
I think at some point the people around us are going to
get fed up of that and you still have to shut up.
But we think about this a lot and
we have so many conversations about Latin America
and how things are changing there. Right.
I think we are at this very weird stage where
in the fourth generational cycle where we are almost, I
would say, reaching bottom in the west, not rock bottom,
because rock bottom is like usually where democracies tend to
go towards fascism, communism and that is rock bottom.
And then after rock bottom, the people realize
that there are changes that are needed and
there usually revolts and stuff like that.
You don't want to live in a
country that is reaching rock bottom.
Essentially at the same time, the countries that are
like emergent are still quite emergent and the quality
of life might not be what you want, especially
to like raise a family and stuff like that.
And so Salvador, for example.
Salvador is probably a great bet
as long as Bukele is alive. Right.
But there is some uncertainty around that.
And Latin America in general, it's
quite unsafe in some places.
If you go to, for example, Argentina, the trajectory
is quite great and like 10 years from now
it'd be an amazing place to live.
But right now it's still quite unsafe and
you have a lot of issues and also
very isolated from anywhere else in the world.
So if you have roots in the us,
if you have roots in Europe, it's quite
far away, then obviously you have the Emirates.
I mean, the Emirates, I think it's already
quite established and has great quality of life.
If you like hopping into a car and going
from point A to point B and you can
tolerate the extreme heat and constant sauna effect.
And then Singapore, Singapore is probably the place that is
most established right now, together with Switzerland and where I
think people get the best quality of life from, from
what I've heard from people living there.
And I think Switzerland is
obviously the most established.
What will happen with the EU
is worried for Switzerland as well.
And I think two things can happen for Switzerland.
One of them is either people stop moving to
Switzerland because they realize that the EU and what's
around them is getting worse and worse every year,
or the contrary happens and people who value their
European roots actually move to Switzerland to be close
to their family, friends, whatnot.
And then Switzerland even captures like more talented
people into it and basically have a brain
drain from everywhere in the EU into Switzerland.
The UK was an interesting one because it had a
very long tradition of rule of law and personal freedoms.
And I think that's because London, that's
why London attracted so many talented individuals.
Now that's reversing quite quickly in the uk.
So I think unfortunately the UK is known
to be a lie place for talented people.
That's very interesting because, you know, the UK
has gone down a lot, but still the
common law is extremely valuable and that's what
has allowed places like the UAE to prosper.
Also what's really interesting is that if you look
at the countries that have direct citizenship programs where
you can basically just invest or donate to the
country and let citizenship in exchange, they are mostly
common law countries that have gained full sovereignty.
Places like Malta or in the Caribbean like St.
Kitts Dominica, places that are commonwealth that
had common law and that allowed them
to basically offer direct citizenship.
Whereas, for example, in Europe you have these
programs like golden visas where you are required
to basically live in the country.
And that's something that I think it would be interesting
to talk about now that you mentioned, you know, this
sort of decline in Europe, but that you still think
that the European passports will be valuable.
So what do you think will be the
future of golden visas and European passports?
Golden visas I think are a wonderful set of programs.
And obviously in some countries it created quite a lot
of criticism, like Portugal being one of them, where the
cost of living went up substantially in real estate.
But just because that's just because they don't build.
If they build, then, you know, kind of like
demand matches supply and then everything is okay.
But I think all the visas are
great and most importantly, sometimes they offer
quite a decent path to citizenship.
And if you look at some passports in
most European countries, like most European countries have
some colonies or ex colonies and they have
quite tight relationship with them.
And so for example, I'm just putting
an example here, like a Spanish passport.
Even though things might go downhill in
Europe, it still gives you access to
plenty of places in Latin America.
So if you believe that Latin America is going
up, then maybe good to have for example a
Spanish passport or a Portuguese passport if you believe
that Brazil is going to prosper.
The risk here is European
countries imposing citizenship based taxation.
And that's quite a big risk.
And that's why I think that the Caribbean ones are
a great bet because in that sense you know that
they probably are not going to do that.
And they're not going to do that because
if they did that then their passports will
be way less attractive and basically they will
kill their entire citizen by investment industry.
And they rely on these industries.
The EU does not rely on this as much. Right.
And so you have the risk of
some countries going down that route.
And from a populism perspective I can see the
discourse, I can see a politician coming out being
like, oh, these people were raised in this country,
they use our education, they like use our roads.
There was sunbathing under our sun because some
countries do tax the sun, for example Spain.
And so this populist discourse can happen, right?
And then they are like, oh, these people
that moved away, well, they still have the
passport, therefore they owe taxes, right?
And it's quite far fetched and it's quite crazy
because you can go to a private school, you
can, you can, you can buy bottled water that
sips from Italy instead of like drinking tap water
in like Spain or Greece or whatever.
But this populist rhetoric, I think we are
seeing a lot of it in Europe.
So I'm quite worried about that.
I don't think that that's crazy at all.
Actually something that not everyone knows or that often
gets confused is that the US and Eritrea are
not the only countries that have citizenship based taxation.
There are other places like Hungary that already have
citizenship based taxation and there are other places that
have some sort of citizenship based taxation.
We released a report on this
some months ago on Citizen X.
But basically Spain and Portugal, they already
have some regulation about citizenship based taxation.
And I don't think it's crazy at all to think
that basically they will just push it forward because the
slope is already there and it's a slippery slope and
I think it makes a lot of sense.
Basically once everyone who has a meaningful income or
net worth has left the country and the state
is broken and you know, it has defaulted on
the debt, basically the only tool that they will
have to tax more people will be citizenship and
they will basically Just go after, after their citizens.
Yeah, exactly.
Which you think about it, it's,
you know, you have two strategies.
If you are essentially becoming a failed
state, which like, you know, in Europe
you have plenty of those right now.
They might not look like it, but when you
take a deep look, they are almost failed states.
Also.
Another trend that I think, it's interesting
that I think hasn't been talked about
so much is citizenship based censorship.
And I like to think about that because, for
example, what we saw recently in the UK or
what we're seeing in the eu, especially, you know,
regarding X and Elon Musk and everything.
So imagine Elon Musk was a citizen of the eu.
Maybe, you know, they would like to exercise that,
that right to recall, you know, their, their citizen
and exercise some sort of citizenship based censorship when
they're basically using the, the citizenship as a tool
to, to, to jeopardize the freedom of speech.
Yeah, I think it's a matter of time until we have a,
you know, a warrant for, for Musk in the, in Europe.
Probably the uk, not in the EU per se, but
probably in the uk in the EU also, maybe with
the whole DSA drama around X and also what they
are doing, trying to basically gail people for running platforms
because you know, Pavel runs Telegram, Elon runs X.
There is not like a big difference on that.
So I could definitely see that happening.
The problem with that is not only the fact
that you have lost freedom of speech, it's also
that you are going after the people.
That should be examples to follow for your population.
So if you think about Elon, for example, Elon
can be crazy in many ways, but if you
look at history literally, he's the one person that
has made Keith dream again about the space exploration
and being a multiplanetary species, which is probably the
number one goal we should try to be.
If you love humankind, right.
If you hate humankind and you want us to
degrow, decelerate and basically die as species, then okay,
well, go jump off a bridge, right?
Don't take everyone with you.
But if you do believe that humankind is good and
that we're a great species and that we've done common
good, I think hating Elon is just reckless.
So talking about freedom of speech and
basically, you know, protecting your freedom, your
general freedom, do you think crypto is
a good tool to protect your freedom?
And how do you see the future of crypto, especially
as states are trying to take over general freedom?
Yeah, I mean, crypto is definitely our bet to have
Some of these freedoms, because wealth is freedom, right?
To a large extent.
And so if the state can control your
wealth, then it can control your freedom.
And I think for the first time, you can
take your wealth with you anywhere in the world.
We're still, I think, to see the
true effects of that in societies.
The first effect I think that we're going to
see in places that crack down on crypto is
that they are going to tremendously accelerate their decline
because you cannot put capital controls anymore, right?
And do like the Coralito in Argentina, for example.
And so I'm still waiting for the
first countries to completely prohibit crypto.
I think it's going to happen because again,
basically my thought process right now is everything
that can fit into a populist rhetoric.
And that mainly boomers come by because they are
the main voting group, I think will happen.
And so I can see the populist rhetoric
that makes the argument that crypto people are
pedophiles, they are terrorists, and they are sending
funds to North Korea, whatever.
And I can see how countries that
have fiat currencies that are failing can
actually blame crypto for their currencies failing.
And because of that, I can
totally see them prohibiting crypto, right?
Or expert payer in it, for example, or really Germany.
I mean, what their money did was not
exactly like that, but what your money did.
Dumping all of their crypto was
a strong sign to the market.
It was like, this is like toy money. We don't like it.
We want to harm crypto by doing that.
And the next step is just
a little bit more expropriative.
But again, if it's democracy, right?
So if 51% support it, apparently it's fine.
I think it's really interesting because I feel
like the countries which try to impose capital
restrictions, they try to bank crypto.
Those are the countries that in
the end have the highest adoption.
Like places like, for example, Argentina,
which still has capital controls.
The crypto adoption is enormous.
And you see so many people using
USDT on Tron, USDT on Solana.
Then you also have China, where crypto has
banned, I don't know, like 10 times.
And people still use a lot
of crypto because it's really useful.
But something that I think we both like to think
about is that, all right, you can move your money
freely, you can move your wealth freely across borders with
crypto, but you're still limited by your passport, you still
have to go through some physical border.
So in case shit hits the fan in the
eu, either through censorship or citizenship based taxation or
even the crisis scenario like World War Three.
What places do you think are interesting
to look at in those scenarios?
I mean definitely the Americas, like you know, Caribbean,
Latin America, I think those are super interesting.
And when it comes to World War 3 escalation, especially if
you look at like the range, the missile range, and I
think you posted something about that the other day.
But like Latin America is very safe, very, very safe.
You just have like New Zealand, Australia.
But, but I think that's not for everyone.
That's really far away from
people that have western roots.
But if you are worried about those things happening,
I do think that Latin America has quite a
especially because again first principles right now you might
think that oh, it's dangerous and they're developed, but
if you think about the trajectory, they already had
rock bottom, it's already done.
In Argentina, for example, inflation already hit numbers
that are completely insane and something woke in,
like something happened in people's minds that they
made them realize that actually this whole libertarian
thing might actually work.
Obviously if you think about Milei in the eu, for example,
he's labeled as a right wing extremist, but then you listen
to him and he's like, okay, that makes sense.
And the population in Argentina realized that
this is not some kind of fascism,
this is actually exactly the opposite.
This is like, okay, try to spend less
money, be responsible and let's try to build
a society that can work for generations coming.
It's common sense.
I think it's common sense Also I think something
that is worth mentioning is that in Latam, in
places like Argentina, El Salvador, you have volatility.
And volatility can be good.
The same as in crypto.
It can be good because it allows something to go up.
It can also crash to zero.
But you have that, you know, sort of volatility.
In different scenarios that can happen.
Whereas in Europe I believe that, you know, the
trend is clear, there's not so much volatility, but
it's going down with some, something very similar.
I feel like I would comparison
would be fiat and crypto.
Fiat doesn't have that short term volatility,
but long term it's going to zero.
And crypto has short term volatility, but
long term it's probably going up.
And I think like right now, because of
this like weird moment that we are in
history, I think we are all very confused.
Like literally every week I talk to someone
that is like a talented individual that has
plenty of options to move around the world.
Sometimes they have families Sometimes, no.
If they don't have families, it's kind of easier.
If they have families, then it's harder and
they have much more concern to where to
live in the next, like, one, two decades.
I think everyone has, like, is placing their
bets on what will happen in 20 years.
And I think in 20 years, directionally speaking, you
can see that Latin America is going up.
You can see that obviously Southeast Asia is really going
up, and societies that are quite prime, I think, for
a breakout, but they are not there yet.
And so I think right now the best
thing you can do is buy optionality.
And you buy optionality by having crypto so you
can move your wealth around and by having a
second passport so you can move yourself physically around.
Now, I think a good way to finish
this conversation would be to obviously ask you,
you were talking about buying optionality second passports.
What is the best way to buy a
second passport with crypto now in 2024?
I mean, of course, here, CDC
is definitely the best way.
And I can provide a bit of, like, your personal
input on, on how, like, we crafted this experience.
But essentially, when you, when you think about
personal freedoms, then again, you think about mainly
two personal freedoms, right, that are very important
to then move around and choose a place
that gives you more, even more freedoms.
So one of them is always a crypto and
being able to, like, have so many money.
And for me, that's something that
has always been very, very important.
And then after that, you kind of like, have
the freedom to organize and create online organizations and.
Which really drew me to daos.
And once you have those freedoms to organize and
carry your crypto and, like, transact with other people,
then the important thing is, like, to be able
to move your meat and bones somewhere else that
treats you well, where you can literally use your
laptop to transact, right?
I think a lot of us don't really ask for much anymore.
More like a place that has good freedom to
transact, freedom to transact and Internet, which now, thanks
to Elon, again, you can have pretty much anywhere.
But you have this last piece
that is very hard to tackle.
And so that is the freedom of physical mobility.
And when you're an entrepreneur
that transacts with bits.
This is crazy, right?
Like, at some point you figure out that, wow, like,
these are the countries that I can go to.
When Covid hit, for example, many of us realize how,
like, crazy and draconian some of these policies can be.
And so if another pandemic hits or you have a
world war, or you have Mobilization, like in Ukraine, right.
Like, this is not crazy.
These are not crazy thoughts.
Like some people in Ukraine now, for example, if they
want to renew their passport, males in this case, and
this, you know, they have to like come back to
Ukraine essentially because Ukraine passed a law and.
And they essentially like need to come back.
And then when they come back, they are mobilized.
So literally their passport will expire
unless they go to war.
These things are happening right now and they're happening in
a country that is not that far away from us.
So anyway, we basically like took this
like big concern and turned it into
a product that addresses that concern.
And so basically, if you want to address this concern and
buy yourself some of the best optionality you can have in
this century, just go to citizennex.com, choose the place that fits
you the best and that treats you the best as a
citizen, which thankfully there are many places that we support that
treat you very well as a citizen and want to welcome
you to their citizen base.
And then everything else we essentially
make very smooth with online forms.
A lot of help also from the team,
of course, because there are some things here
and there that are very hard to automate.
There's so much that happens in the background. So much.
We don't need to go into it right
now because we don't want to bore people. Right.
But it's kind of like an Apple product.
Like, you open it and you're like, wow,
this is so smooth in the background.
There are so many things happening.
But we make it super, super easy.
We have people that literally like, you know, were able
to go through the whole thing in like two weeks. Right.
That's insane.
Yeah, we'll leave that for another conversation.
Also, you know, the whole topic of sovereignty that
I think it's enough for an entire new conversation.
Talking about sovereignty is a scarce resource that
only nation states have, and in the end,
either you lease it from them or they
have the gangs and the monopoly on violence.
So I really enjoyed this conversation.
Thank you very much, Luis.
Thanks, Alex.
