 So, first of all, my question is how did you yourself get into crypto? That's an interesting story. I think it was now around maybe two, two and a half years ago that a colleague of mine in my previous job just told me about this whole new technology that's out there and that he actually invested into some coins back in the days and then he started doing some research about the potential behind it and he introduced me to it. So it was, I think, two and a half years ago almost and it happened basically over lunch break in our canteen in my previous job and we spoke and spoke and spoke and we spoke, I think, for like two and a half hours and I think I missed too many things that time. But it was then that he started to really infect me with that kind of virus so he started his interest and then I, first thing that I did because I myself am more like a cautious person so I did a lot of research about the whole idea behind the technology behind it where could I invest, what platforms are out there, is it risky or not to have a complete black box until then. And since then I've been very engaged in actually trading also in the industry myself and it was the right decision for me back then to listen to my colleague and to get into it. So did you invest into crypto back then or any other time? No, I did not invest on the day obviously because as I said, I myself I'm more like I like to do a lot of research before I do anything so about like one or two weeks after I started investing into various platforms some assets and just to see how it goes made my first experience, had my first little crashes had my first breakdown and I lost my money but this is how you run, this is part of the learning path. Yeah, fair enough. But then you joined Kraken, right? Yes. Why and how did you join Kraken? Well, the how was quite easy. I was looking for a job opportunity in that field. In the cryptocurrency industry? In the cryptocurrency industry and I was a private user of Kraken I know the quality of their product, the high level of customer service that they do and yeah, I found this opening on their website so it's quite easy actually, quite simple there's a bit of a better story behind that and I wanted to change in the industry because I myself have a banking background I was working in a mobile bank in Amsterdam and I wanted to change into this whole crypto space because I saw of course the challenges that these people in the industry faced the whole fact that it still was undiscovered markets and unclaimed territories still I have not every market share taken already so there's a lot of opportunity there in that market it was still like a huge adventure also because there's so little regulations or so many things that can still happen so fast those were the attracting factors for me to go into this industry So my next question is obviously you already answered is it difficult to be a crypto exchange? I don't like using the word difficult is it difficult if you have a bad job and you have five kids that you have to put on your own that's difficult but for us it's a challenging world that's also for me personally of course why I joined Krak and it's a challenging world because you're dealing as I said in a completely new industry a completely unregulated market so the factor to 99% a market where I think maybe half a percent of the active traders are currently in the market I think the really huge majority of people are still holding out to get into and now it's part of companies like ours like Kraken to actually build the trust to educate people also about the products and the potential behind that and to thereby generate trust and that people are willing to step into the industry because let's be honest there are a lot of scams out there there are a lot of like sheeps out there and it's for companies with good reputation and with decent companies like ours that's part of their job to also not do the platform but really take people by the hand and give them like an entrance into this world and this is part of our job and also part of that everyone in our company feels like it's part of our mission statement also and can you speak about what your trading volume is do you know the numbers? Myself or for Kraken in general I mean you see obviously if you check out certain websites you have hundreds of millions on a daily basis that are going back and forth it's still obviously currently more of a karma period like about this crazy, crazy months we had a few months ago it was crazy but this is actually good it's good that right now we still have a lot of activity a lot of new users every day but it gives us some breathing time still to you know get up to our growth to onboard new people to train new staff because the people on our end our customer service department those people they deal in the end with people's money so they need to be properly educated in order to handle this responsibility it's not like everyone and we do not want to expose any of our users regardless if you or she has one euro or one million euro on the platform to someone on our end that is not properly trained and educated so we're using this time right now to really bring people up to speed to train them, educate them so that they can then deliver the best service There are so many crypto exchanges appearing and entering the market every single day do you consider them competitors? Well obviously as I mentioned the whole blockchain industry is incredibly fast moving and there are new crypto exchanges out there as you mentioned like quite quickly especially crypto to crypto exchanges only we do not perceive them necessarily as a close competitor for hours because we are crypto to fiat exchange and with that it comes additional level of responsibility we have been in the market for several years now if you look at the total market cap of exchanges now we've always been in the top 10 for a long period of time now which in other industries would equal to maybe 50, 60, 70 years feels like it at least and we look of course at what our exchanges do some of them are doing a great job I have to say that but we primarily focus on ourselves we know our strengths we want to deliver we want to compete the factor on quality service and stability, reliability, security and this is something that we compete on and the people that we compete on most of is probably ourselves because as you know we are growing exchange growing company and for us it's very very crucial that we keep our quality high What do you think about decentralized exchanges? It's definitely a very interesting concept I definitely get the appeal behind that idea to be quite frank I myself have not yet made up my mind on it I need to see a little bit more details a little bit more experience about it a little bit more proof about it before I can make any assessment on it so I would not feel welcome to make an assessment now Do you think they can replace centralized exchanges? Well I don't think any replacement will happen I think maybe in the midterm there might be an additional tool for certain types of investors however giving the fact that that we are a centralized exchange we have one order book that we have our banking and financial institution partnerships this is something that generates a lot of trust with our users and this is something that especially this industry needs more than others trust, reliability and so as I said definitely an interesting concept definitely a deal and I have not yet made up my mind on it probably needs a few more years also needs to see more whitepapers more tests etc and how things really would work out but as of now we know who we are we know what we do best and we know that we have still untapped maybe half a percent of the whole potential So you've mentioned that you joined in December 2017 That's exactly How many clients did you get since that time? I do know of course the numbers it's obviously if you take it our if you look at our trading volume you see that it has exploded over the last few months especially in the let's call it hot face that we had in the last winter got more and more mainstream you had like this big I call them old school newspapers that don't really know what they're talking about but they heard about crypto they didn't want to miss out and they started writing borderline true or not true articles about a lot of things and this obviously fueled the fueled the growth right but as I said still I still don't see that we are nowhere near market adaption or mass market adaption It is growing but it's not yet We are not there yet The way we see it it's still that we are somewhere in the if you want take the traditional adoption cycles of new products services we see it more that we are in the early adopter phase in the innovator phase where we still have people that you know they are tech savvy that maybe don't even have a established banking relationship you know for them banking is just a means to do something to have money on the wallet and send it around that people that grew up with the internet with the whole idea of free information and freedom of choice that they start adapting us using us but that a lot of the older investors or the old institutions also they are still for obvious reasons a little bit more reluctant to enter the market because they made some bad experience in the past they don't really understand the concept they don't really see maybe the potential in it they don't understand it so they are afraid of it so that's where part of our job comes in again to educate them a little bit in the sense that it's a legit investment type you can benefit from it not everything is a scam the legit process you know it's really part of it always boils down to taking people's fear of something fear of unknown fear of the unknown exactly it's always the same case it's money or something something that you do not know do not understand you fear more than something you understand and especially in the end we are dealing with people's money this is probably the next to health maybe the most sensitive area you could touch and that's why it's very important for us also as a company to be aware of that to understand that and you know do not expect anyone to think like us so for us it's very important to understand why certain people think in a certain way why institutions might not be that interested yet and you know try our best and of course to bring them on board and we have to be aware that it's an uphill battle and it takes time right when do you think in your opinion when can we say that mass adaption has been achieved so what should happen like a major trade in desks launched in at the GP Morgan and stuff so what would be the sign I mean obviously it's very difficult to put anything in this industry right if I look at the development in the last five or six months with some regulatory side it's it's an insane speed that happens so I would not feel comfortable making an exact prediction because yes I can't and if someone says he or she can then I would like to meet that person and I might like to connect to that person because I'm very interested in their opinion so as you said mass market adoption has several how do you say it aspects right obviously from trading aspects there should be more bigger fish maybe that invest more but also more retail users right because right now if you go out you have a lot of people that still have their money let's say in some saving account or something like this that generates maybe a half a percent interest or something like this and as long as you change your mind and come to the crypto side of things you might not be able to call it a mass market adoption a classical sense because if you look at the classical investment product for instance funds you name it they are all to some certain that this mass market adopted meaning that a lot of people invest in it some people might not even know it because they tell their bank to invest into certain things and they have no idea what they invest in but they do it the fact right and so for us it's to be to get more of these institutional investors in order to push those products also through to their clients in the end so I don't know if there will be like a certain threshold that you can say now it's mass market or anything and if it's not mass market but there's definitely a lot of ground still to cover and yeah a lot of education that needs to be done because I mean that's what I said and that's what you guys obviously know better than I do that if you take traditional media traditional financial media some of them doing great excellent journalistic work some of them don't some of them they write articles that are just factually not true and thereby of course they are hindering this whole mass adoption so by educating you also mean given the fact straight right so not on explaining but reporting exactly I mean for us as an exchange also as I said we deal with people's money so for us it's very important that we open direct discussion and let's be real there are black sheep in this industry but there are scams in this industry we should never ever forget about it we should never try to cover it up but then again this is part of every new industry to some bigger or smaller extent it's just that this industry so quickly fast moving that it seems like a lot but you have black sheep everywhere we should never cover this up we should be aware we should educate people that might not be investing in crypto now and that's also it's part of our job but it's also part of media yours for instance to report about this and to be the factor a certain educator in that market because let's be honest if not you or us or some other players who's doing it I don't see a lot of schools or universities starting you have to start in schools we're from primary school high school probably to educate people about these things I don't see that happening anytime soon it doesn't even happen necessarily additional investment products that's what I was going to ask exactly so they need to get their information from somewhere and this is part of our job also to educate our clients to help them even though we're not an education company we're an exchange the factors are core business but we do it because it's part of our mission statement and part of let's say crypto-specific news like you for instance or loose in general just speak to people learn about it before you write an article it should be to ask you as being a part of this industry and being in exchange a couple of funny or useful tips I mean there are a couple of useful tips that you can probably adapt to other parts of life as well I mean always obviously start do your own research if someone tells you hey this new product is great even though that person might have the best intention might be your friend or family member that's great but do your own research read about it see who the owners are the team of it if you can read this one part then be aware that it is an investment which means riskment especially our industry is also subject to a certain level of volatility yes it means the I mean obviously so we know that the price might most of you will go down at some point just to go up again so be aware of that that this will happen to you be aware of prepare yourself prepare yourself should they hold that we just up to every single individual what to do it's up to you you have to be aware that the price will fructate but you will never lose money until you hit the trade button for price that's lower than when you bought it so you have to be aware of it try to stay calm in those periods do something do yourself a favor and don't maybe necessarily look at the price every day because it just makes you crazy okay and also I mean obviously don't invest all your money in it be smart about it diversify not within crypto itself don't invest or just keep it on your bank if you want to spend some money on something else this is just advice for my that I can give and this is something I think personally I'm pretty sure you will find a lot of other people out there that might have different opinions just me personally but in the end you have to keep yourself true to certain values and also to who you are you