In this episode, Sunny Ray sits down with Ryan Selkis, founder and CEO of Messari, to trace his journey from traditional finance and venture capital into becoming one of crypto's most prominent researchers and entrepreneurs. Ryan recounts starting in banking, moving into VC, and later attempting to launch a charity tech startup before discovering bitcoin in 2013. After liquidating his 401k to buy in, he skipped business school to write full time as an independent analyst, eventually breaking the Mt. Gox story and joining Digital Currency Group. The conversation covers his evolving views on Ethereum, why bitcoin's rigidity is both a strength and limitation, skepticism toward retail trading versus buy and hold strategies, institutional adoption trends, and the founding thesis behind Messari as an open information network for crypto research. Ryan closes by sharing an unresolved concern about bitcoin's long term fee market and miner incentives as block rewards decline.
Messari founder Ryan Selkis on selling his 401k for bitcoin in 2013 and building crypto's information backbone.
What is your story prior to learning about bitcoin, and then post bitcoin?
I started in traditional finance as a summer intern, then went into venture capital after undergrad during the recession. After three years in VC I started a charity focused tech company, but we hit regulatory red tape and had to wind it down. Around the same time in 2013 I made my first bitcoin purchase, the price went up 6x, and I ended up liquidating my 401k that October.
What did your early relationship with bitcoin look like, was it hesitant at first?
I first heard about bitcoin in 2011 but didn't buy it, instead I bought gold and shorted US treasuries. In 2013, with more infrastructure available, I got financial exposure and then started full time research since I was between business school and shutting down my startup. I broke the Mt. Gox story, which got me known industry wide, and six months later joined DCG.
What common threads have you found among entrepreneurs building in this space that could help someone thinking about getting started?
You just have to make the leap, even part time, toward researching or contributing code. At Messari we've run a community analyst program that's placed dozens of people at investment firms and infrastructure companies, all starting as volunteers on our open research library. It's a permissionless, green field market, you just have to pick a specialty and start producing.
What key insight led you to launch your own project, Messari?
I've always been on the research side, producing high quality information for new and professional audiences entering the space. We saw early on this would be about more than bitcoin and Ethereum, with an explosion of assets and protocols. Going from bitcoin to Ethereum to hundreds of applications is next to impossible without a guide, so we built tools to help people level up.
As new traders enter the space, what tips do you have for them?
I don't really cater to traders and I'm not one myself. Trading is extremely difficult to do profitably against experienced professionals, and buy and hold is far superior tax wise compared to trading in and out and getting hit with income tax liabilities. Unless you're a professional trader, it's usually better to just buy and sit tight.
Do you buy into the narrative that large institutions and pension funds are coming into bitcoin?
Yes, it's definitely happening in drips and drops, though significant by historical standards. I don't think we've seen the real deluge yet. The biggest uncertainty this year is how the new US administration will view crypto regulation, and if the worst regulatory impulses are kept in check, that could be a positive institutional catalyst.
Has your thesis on Ethereum changed over the years?
Early on I was skeptical because it seemed like you'd only need one money like currency to power decentralized apps, and bitcoin could be that asset. My mind changed around early 2017 when it became clear Ethereum had critical mass, and today it's the settlement layer for DeFi with real applications like lending and exchanges, not just ICO fundraising schemes.
What is one truth you hold that most others in bitcoin would disagree with you on?
I still struggle with what happens once bitcoin fees decline and annualized miner rewards fall below something like the 2 percent Fed inflation target. At the next halving you'll need a healthy fee market to offset lost miner income, otherwise network security becomes an issue. Long term network health is still a very open question for me.
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