 Welcome to Digital Asset News to get top stories in cryptocurrency and digital assets. Man, break them down to bite-sized pieces. So today, I'm going to have on the founder and CEO of StormEx, Simon Yu. And usually we do like a couple of stories and then we bring in the guest. Then we talk to him for a little bit and then we kick him out of here. But today I just want to really dig into what this all is. We've already talked about the news. Now Dogecoin is going to the moon. I think it's going to be very bad for this space as things start to drop off. Also, we talked about how Turkey is trying to ban cryptocurrency. Good luck didn't work out well for India. And that's really the big thing that is going on. So for StormEx, just so you know, I own StormEx. Just like everything I talk about on this channel, everything I talk about I own. And you know why I talk about it because I'm biased and that's just the truth. So with StormEx, I got in this because Alex Massioli said, look, this thing actually does something and I was like, what does it do? And he says, well, when you download the app, you can actually get crypto cash back. And I'm like, who cares? Because other other ones do that. You know, you got the fold the fold app card. You've got Rakuten honey. I'm not sure if they do that or not. But I'm like, there's a ton of that stuff, right? And he goes, yeah, genius. But what's great about StormEx is that you can hold it, stake it at 15%. And the more StormEx tokens that you hold, the more crypto cash back you can get when you're actually buying things. Then Ryan over there at TTC, you try the chain said, yeah, I bought some Adidas. This was like a couple of months ago. I bought some Adidas and because of the appreciation of the StormEx token, because he holds so much, he goes, the shoes were pretty much free. And I was like, now we're talking. So anyhow, I wanted to show you this on my phone because this is how you're going to actually look at it. This is how you can actually download it. So just so you know, I'm just going to go over here and go to Tukin. And then just so you know, also on the very top, the website is StormEx.io. I'll link in the description so you don't go to some scam website. But here is the whole tokenomics real quick. Actually, hold on, what I really want to do is I want to go to memberships. The token, I just pretty much explain it to you. So here's a bit to get a bronze membership. You need 3000 StormEx. Right now, StormEx is about six cents somewhere around there. So it doesn't take a lot for 1.25x. That's what you get for silver. You need 31,000 StormEx. You get one and a half X gold. You need 310,000. You get double the cashback rewards and a 25% reward time reduction. I think the reward time, I think it's like 45 days to 60 days. So maybe it could be 90. I can't remember. But yes, when you buy things, you do get crypto cashback. It just takes a little bit of time. But as you level up, it takes a little less time. Two and a half X for platinum. That's if you have over three million StormEx baller, 50% reduction. And diamond is three and a half X and 75% reward reduction. But that's like 6.2 million StormEx. That's a lot. Well, I'll talk to Simon about that. Anyhow, so when we're here and we're taking a look at the at the actual website on our phone, you just click on where you want to download it to. I've got, this is an iPhone. I'm going to click the app store. I also have it on my Chrome browser. And what's cool about that is if you ever go to any website where StormEx is actually accepted because they have 750 partners, it'll just pop up and go, you get 6% of Nike or you get 10% at ESPN plus or whatever else comes up. So it's kind of cool. You're doing this like, oh, I can get some free stuff. I'll do that. So I'm just going to click on the app store and actually just takes me to my the actual app because I already have it downloaded. And at first, on all honesty, I wasn't too impressed with this because I'm like, well, it's kind of sucks because they just lost Walmart. And Walmart goes in and out. And I'm like, that's where I do a lot of my shopping. So that's a bummer. Then I take a look at Albertsons and I know of Albertsons. And I was like, well, anything else you got, I have Kroger in here. So I'm like, okay. And I had Sam's Club. So I'm like, great. And what's great about this is that this is where I think the magic is. If you're looking for a specific item or something like that, or you want to search a store, you can search the store for whatever it is. But I like this shop by category because like, look at this right here. Like there's things that I would never really even think of. Okay. Electronics, let's try this. Samsung. So when you go here, it'll just tell you, look, there's exclusions, but you get like 4% cashback and you just activate the crypto on your phone. And then when you're shopping and you actually buy and you check out, they will send you the crypto cashback. So like Samsung is pretty well known. What else is here? I don't know what one plus is, scout alarm, sharper image. That's pretty bad. White technology. What else they got? Alcohol. They can order wine.com. Sure. I guess. Beauty. Benefit cosmetics. Like again, these are things that you would never think about. And that's why they're here because they partner up with Stonemax to go, Hey, put us on here so you can, you know, we can give you some discounts and pay. And then they, you know, separate those two and they give you the rewards. And that's pretty much how Stonemax makes it. That's how you make it. So I'll do this. It's pretty good. Activate crypto back and then off and off it goes. Right. So again, I think the big difference here is that first you can actually stake some things. And actually, let me show you this. So when you're clicking on staking on the app itself, 15% just to stake Stonemax. So now you get crypto cash back, you know, you can also stake it for 15%. And then we're, so that part's awesome. Just so you know, you're going to have to use the trust wallet, which is down here or see how it's, it's lighting up your metamask wallet. And you can stake it. A lot of the places where you want to be able to get a Stonemax token, Voyager has it, Binance and some other places. I'll link them in the description as well. But it's pretty simple to do. Also the rewards, just so you know how this works. If you want to do this, so the more, like we talked about, the more Stonemax you have, you just click on the, where it says join now for free. And it says connect your wallet. And you can verify your wallet. However it is, like, let's see here, verify wallet. Ah, right here. Any wallet with a web three enabled browser. I'm going to use that because I have the brave one. It's telling me to copy. It says copy paste the URL. I'm going to copy this. Let me see here. Let me go back. And here's the browser itself. I got nothing. And then, uh, so I'm going to put this in. I want to paste this into the, and there it is. Let me try this again. And then let's put it on this ledger. Ooh, I got two ETH now, the one. So next, connect sign. And that's pretty much it. So now all you got to do is just transfer everything from, uh, Voyager over to here. Let's hope that works out, Steve. And, uh, that's the big thing. So that is pretty much. Storm max and a nutshell. And, uh, the questions that I have now is for Simon, which, oh, and then real quick, let me show you this. If you're really bored and you want to fill out some surveys, they also give you crypto right here in the play, the play section. I think that's a big deal, but whatever. But, uh, the questions that I have is this looks like it actually does something, it has some utility. It has some function. The question I have for Simon is, uh, well, we know how it differs from the other ones, what's going on right now? How are they going to improve this and bring more stores into it? Because like rackets in that has like 750 stores, right? Honey's already been purchased by, um, PayPal. So that's all we're already there. Um, storm x looks to be very global. So what's going on right now? Where are they going to be in the next year, three years, five years? And then I just want to give his opinion on, uh, dogecoin as well. So let's jump in and talk to Simon. All right, everybody. So great. So Simon is here to set us straight. So we know exactly what, uh, storm x is what it does and how it all works. Thanks, Simon, you, thanks for coming on the show. Really appreciate it. Let's get down to it. What so much for having your up? This is great. So look, so storm x, what are we doing here? What are you guys doing right now? What's going to happen the next year, three years and five years? Is it all just a big progression or like, are there some big things coming on? Yeah, I mean, uh, everything is, you know, progressing based on stages, right? So we've been, you know, building this company for about seven years, which ultimately all flow into, uh, creating a marketplace for earning. And so we started out with micro tasks where you can do surveys, you know, check out the products and all that stuff. And then, uh, we added shopping and cashback. We boosted that even further with the rewards cashback and then we added staking and now we're launching this debit card, which we're really excited about. Uh, and then, you know, like you said, a few years down the line, we plan on launching gigs, which is the, you know, freelance marketplace. So people can create their own jobs as well too. So, uh, yeah, overall, all the products that are building is just, you know, how can we get a single platform or anywhere, you know, anyone could come from regardless of what country they live in and just find different ways to earn money online. Yeah, cool. So I remember you, we were on Alex's show and you were talking about some VC was talking about this is the next trillion dollar company. And I was thinking to myself, that's crazy. However, I mean, using the app, everything else. But when you talked about the whole gigs thing, I was like, I don't see it. And then I saw another interview that you did where you talked about how you guys have a patent where you're able to actually transfer funds, trap transfer cryptocurrency for like next to nothing. So, so real quick talk about that. Cause I think that might be the big game changer and one of those things in your arsenal. Yeah. Um, so I, I don't know if you guys, if you've ever used like prepaid phone cards back in the days, but you know, coming from Asian immigrants, right? So, um, you know, my family, we used to always use prepaid phone cards to call relatives halfway across the world, right? It was really expensive to call anyone, you know, but yeah, but nowadays because of, you know, voice over internet, like VoIP technology, we use Skype and Facebook and, you know, line and WhatsApp and all this communication. So it's to talk to someone halfway across the world. It's free. We don't, we don't think about it. But until that technology came about it, it was expensive, but we're sort of seeing the same trend happening with blockchain with payments, right? So it still costs an arm and a leg to send someone, you know, uh, like even like $5 to someone halfway across the world using a wire transfer. If you're in India or China or Korea or something like that in Europe, it would cost you $100, right? Yeah. Cause the wire transfer fees, foreign transaction spreads and all that stuff. But, um, yeah, I mean, what we've really identified back in the early days when Bitcoin was a little bit more scalable too was that like being able to send value across for like pennies and dollars did not make sense in the past, but now it does. And like we've, we've been one of the early adopters to be able to, you know, hone in on this technology. So yes, like a few dollars to watch a game, like you watch a survey or I mean, do a survey or watch a video or do something like that might not have made sense in the past, but to someone like in India or, you know, emerging countries, it does make a lot of sense. Or somewhere in Europe or US, if you're trying to hire someone halfway across the world without all these fees, all of a sudden this global marketplace becomes like for talent is it doesn't matter where you live anymore. And we've seen that huge shift shift this year, especially with COVID, everyone working remote. And now, you know, you see a lot of traditional tech companies too. That's hiring from Europe and some countries in Asia, for example, and people in those countries getting to work for US companies. But this is just the beginning, right? So there's so many jobs out there and a lot of it is just being shifted online. And so there's a huge untapped marketplace that hasn't been able to be penetrated yet just because the payment process was so expensive. And that's where we can disrupt. I gotta tell you, man, it makes a lot of sense now that I'm listening to it. And now if you really think about it, this all started off with an idea, right? You were a poor college kid. You want to save some people some money in blockchain. You did that in 2014 moving forward. You started off with crypto cashback awards. Now you're moving into this area. You know what it sounds like to me? It's almost and not to not for hyperbole and really go off case, but Amazon was all about books like, look, we're going to do a ton of books. We're going to give you all the books that she can possibly use. And we're going to put it all in one place. Then all of a sudden they branched off into another department, then another department, another department. I always talk about investing into people. And that's why I'm happy that you came on, Simon. Because look, it's not just about an idea or what's going to happen. It's actually about putting these things together. So you got a good a good people, good group together. And it's not about what you what you what you know, it's about who you know. And you guys have how many partnerships with how many different organizations now? I think we have like a close to a thousand stores now. Yeah, that's enough, man. That's that's awesome. A lot more is coming though. OK, so I just wanted to put a so everybody here who's already watched the first half of the video, look in the description below. There's going to be a link. You can download Star Max. You can take it for a test run. You can see much crypto cash back. You can save also the rewards and also I mean, all the things we talked about staking, doing those surveys and everything else. So just take a look and then my goal, my goal, Simon, is to start to use your app a little bit more so I can buy some things that I want to buy. I was like I said in the video, it's kind of ticked off that you guys lost Walmart, but I'm hoping that you guys get them back. So the last two questions I have for you is this. One is, who is your ultimate store to actually land? The ultimate, ultimate stores to actually get to save people a ton of money. And the last thing is we in Alex's show, you talked about charity and giving back any kind of plans with that for Storm Max. And I'll let you I'll let you get out of here and do the magic that you do. Yeah, so I don't want to put a quick disclaimer, though, for the gigs part. You know, that's so in a couple of years out. But yeah, right now our focus is around the debit card that's building sort of disrupting fintech right now. It's just it's going to be pretty awesome. But yeah, the number one store definitely is Amazon. And, you know, it's unfortunate because they're so close to us. And, you know, I think one of the reasons why it's so hard. So until last year, their program was a lot more flexible. But then I think they started making a lot of money because everyone started ordering everything from Amazon. So they sort of have all the power in the court. So but, you know, that's like sort of, you know, when I first started the company as well, too, or not just this one with Johnny Calvin, but my first one with the food truck is just, you know, plenty of people told me that I was going to fail, right? So like they told me like 8 percent of its small businesses failed in the first few years. Oh, everybody just give me a statistic. But, you know, for me, I was always thinking like, OK, then that means 20 percent of the people actually succeeded. Like, I wonder how those guys succeeded. So I tried to do, you know, try to do more research online and then try to, you know, get some coffee meetings and try to learn from the people that actually succeeded. And, you know, there's a lot of problem solving involved and trying to figure out, OK, most people can't figure out how to do it, but we can. So I we're working on it. I think we found some creative solutions too, which, you know, should be exciting if we can launch that. I think it would be definitely a lot more adoption. And the second, yeah, regarding the charity stuff, too, I mean, yeah, just going back to my college days, I got to the point where I just didn't have enough money to eat food like on a regular basis. And then like I was working at Bank of America as a teller at that time. And I was, you know, trying to start this talk with delivery business. I still didn't have enough money for rent. And so like my coworkers would be like, hey, let's go to lunch. And I would just say like, oh, I can't have to do homework or something. And I was just taking a nap instead because I didn't have money. So I think, yeah, I mean, there's a lot of good reasons as to why people need money. But I think the basic human like just need is food. And so like I've really been trying to focus on donating to like local food banks and stuff like that, too, but really trying to make sure that no one goes hungry. You know, so like just for me personally, too, if like a homeless person asked like, hey, can you buy me some food? Like I never chimed down. Like if it's money, I think it's I have to see like what the reasoning and stuff like that. But I think the basic need is definitely everyone needs to be able to eat and then they can sort of find different opportunities. So that's it right there. We'll talk after I'm going to introduce you to Kiva.org. That's the one that we always donate to for our Cardano steak pool. We'll talk about that later. And then there was there was last one, of course, because of Dogecoin. Yeah, lastly, and then look out here. Give us your give us your opinion on Dogecoin. I personally think it's going to it's going to go down and it's going to be a kind of a black mark for a little bit. But what do you think? Yeah, I mean, I I got a lot of heat for posting this tweet yesterday. Right. But, you know, for me, I really like, you know, just posting my own opinions on things just because I get to hear both side, whether people are triggered or not, I tend to learn from what happened. So yeah, I actually did happen to learn a ton about Dogecoin. It's just like, you know, when I was first getting into crypto, like it was one of the few projects I was being actively worked on. It was super exciting. But then the founders all left, sold all their coins and hasn't worked on for a while. And there's an unlimited supply. But yeah, I mean, recently with the price increasing, it seems like there's been a lot more developers that are just, you know, taking on projects, trying to make Dogecoin more useful. And instead of being a store of value play like Bitcoin, they're trying to be more of a currency play. So it is it's pretty interesting what does, you know, and I was trying to put those tweets because I just keep seeing like people and some of my friends from like people that I haven't talked to in like like 10 years or something to say, should I buy Doge? And I'm just like, I know you should buy Stormax. No, I don't ever say that. But I mean, like, do you ever I mean, like, do you know why you're buying this? Like, do you know what it is? I was just like, no, I just heard Elon, you know, posting tweeting about it. And it seems like the Reddit army is behind it. But it's like, that's so dangerous. So you don't understand what it actually is. So I mean, like, if you understand the risks and you know, you understand what the project is and why sort of just drive for a need. And that's completely fine, right? But most people are sort of just aping into this and that scares the shit out of me because I've seen so many people burned in the crypto industry. And it's just like, especially 2018, right? So many people got burned, left a horrible taste in their mouth. They said, fuck crypto. It's a scam and never coming back. Three years later, you would think that a lot of people learned the lesson. Same thing happening all over again, except it's worse. Now we have like DeFi, Yield Farm, like Ponzi schemes and stuff like that, too. Like there's a lot of great technology being built on DeFi, like, you know, compound, Aave, like, there's some really cool projects. But then there's like 90 percent scams that other people are promoting and stuff like that out there just to try to take advantage of the money that's coming in and then it's just it makes the whole sort of like industry. Like it'll make, you know, if that crashes because of those scams, then it'll make all of DeFi bad, right? So that is what scares me. Simon, me and you could talk about this for hours. Well, we'll get together, have some tacos and beer, and we'll discuss the whole thing. So anyhow, so look, Simon, thanks for stopping by. You watching the video. Thanks for watching the whole thing. Link in the description. Hit the thumbs up and subscribe and we'll see you on the next one.