Ray Youssef and his bitcoin trade Paxful are altering the world one sovereign entrepreneur at a time. We might even look again in ten years and understand that Youssef and his staff spawned a completely new and bespoke class of entrepreneur — the “sovereign entrepreneur.”
There are many entrepreneurs within the West however only a few have had to overcome the sorts of economic repression and different obstacles that an entrepreneur has to endure in Africa. To say that African entrepreneurs are resilient is an understatement, as you hear to Youssef speak concerning the expertise he finds on the African continent and the obstacles these people should overcome to launch their companies. “Anti-fragile” is extra prefer it.
A One-Of-A-Kind Bitcoiner
In a latest interview with Youssef — who will probably be sharing the teachings he’s discovered from his experiences as CEO of Paxful at Bitcoin 2022 — we mentioned what drives him to develop the entrepreneurial expertise in Africa and the way he does it utilizing Bitcoin and the Paxful platform.
His life story and career before discovering Bitcoin are remarkable. He’s a primary technology immigrant who was born in Egypt and got here to the U.S. when he was two years previous. He grew up working at his dad and mom’ newsstand in Columbus Circle and Hell’s Kitchen in New York City within the Eighties, which had been radically completely different neighborhoods again then. He grew up working the gritty streets of New York City and discovered how to take care of folks.
He received a pc at age 19 and taught himself how to code. His first two startups had been profitable and he bought each. He achieved his dream of shopping for his mother a brownstone in New York and made a radical profession pivot by entering into blended martial arts (MMA) boxing and touring the world. Eventually, he ended his MMA profession and got here again to New York and commenced launching new firms. He figured he had the Midas contact and would achieve success once more, however as an alternative he skilled 11 firm failures in a row. Talk about resilient! Failure is a highly-underrated type of religious transformation.
He feels that with out these 11 failures, he by no means would have launched Paxful. Easy Bit was one among these failures, and he mentioned throughout a May 2020 podcast episode with Anita Posch that it was extremely instructive as a result of, “We were trying to solve a problem that didn’t exist.”
He resolved by no means to make that mistake once more.
When Posch requested him through the 2020 podcast why he received into MMA, Youssef made it clear that he “didn’t do it for the money.” He did it to “understand myself and learn the kind of person I was.” He was looking out to discover himself. And I’m pleased to report for all of us (and, particularly, the nice folks of Africa), Youssef discovered his function when he found Bitcoin, the African entrepreneurial spirit and, particularly, the Nigerian folks.
Financial Apartheid
Youssef is the one particular person you’ll ever meet who went into New Orleans shortly after Hurricane Katrina struck and who flew into Egypt on an empty aircraft whereas the Arab Spring was changing into very harmful and who went into Africa eight years in the past to higher perceive how the folks from that continent would possibly use Bitcoin as an answer to their financial issues.
Youssef is the primary and solely particular person I do know in Bitcoin who makes use of the time period “financial apartheid” repeatedly to describe the acute unfairness of the monetary system in Africa and in different nations all through the rising world. Our job is to educate these younger entrepreneurs to a brand new means to take into consideration cash, as Youssef evokes.
To these of us who grew up in privilege, Africa has over 2,000 payments systems and only 3% are able to talk to each other. That means slavery lies. Many of us have a lot to be taught from the African folks about resilience at private, household, neighborhood and profession ranges.
What Youssef understands deeply and is always reminding us of is how these walled gardens for cash lead to monetary apartheid. He defined that Paxful has established 300 commerce routes to date and feels it may have one other 3,000 briefly order. Not solely is Youssef’s perception about monetary apartheid grounded in expertise, however you get the sense that calling them “walled gardens” of cash is far too sort. Walled prisons of cash is a greater description for a way the .1% preserve full management of the lots and repress the majority of humanity.
I’m pleased to report that bitcoin and Youssef will probably be a wrecking ball to monetary apartheid in Africa.
While he by no means described himself this fashion, it turns into rapidly obvious that Youssef is expert at recognizing and creating entrepreneurial expertise in those who the remainder of the world has forgotten, written off or ignored. Therein lies alternative — he sees Africans as his household.
He identified through the May 2020 podcast with Posch that, whereas most individuals within the developed world are aiming to defend their privateness and turn out to be invisible, the folks within the rising world have the alternative downside.
“We don’t want to be ignored or invisible; we want to be seen and heard,” he mentioned. They need to commerce with their neighbors in different nations. They need to have management of their personal future and one of the best path for doing that is with bitcoin.
A round financial system that allocates capital extra successfully? What an idea. Youssef sees Africans and different rising markets as unstoppable with Bitcoin, the fairest financial system ever invented, created or found.
Developing Talent From Around The World
As Youssef places it, Paxful encourages African expertise with “boots on the ground.” He doesn’t strive to determine what Nigerians, Kenyans or Salvadorans want from an ivory tower in New York. Quite the alternative. One of the enduring values he lives by is “staying connected to the street.” Youssef is constant on this method and mentions it on each podcast or interview I’ve listened to.
Once he is on the bottom in a rustic, he is on the lookout for commerce routes and commerce corridors and native born “co-founders” who can develop them. When requested about how he developed this novel method, he mentioned he received the thought from learning the historical past of cash going again to the Roman Empire, which didn’t enable for company. It relied on trusted networks. And essentially the most profitable commerce routes tons of of years in the past had been harmful.
Today they’re “dangerous” within the sense that these alternatives are extra typically present in grey markets or grey areas of the legislation.
When he speaks to proficient younger folks, Youssef urges them to “find your trade route.” He informed the story of a Kenyan lady residing in Berlin. She wanted to discover a means to ship 100 euros again to her household in Kenya who wished to flip euros into Kenyan shillings. Using bitcoin and Paxful, she has managed to not solely clear up her downside, however she has established a commerce route for different folks in her state of affairs.
As Youssef put it, she has “set up a mini Western Union” or an alternate to Western Union that doesn’t require her to take care of huge Western firms who are middlemen taking advantage of these deprived populations of unbanked or underbanked folks present in each nation.
Instead, she has established a commerce route that permits her and trusted third events on Paxful to take away the obstacles from these walled gardens. These sovereign entrepreneurs would possibly find yourself using as many as 60 folks and utilizing what they have discovered from Youssef about commerce routes on Paxful to generate hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in annual income.
Paxful calls itself a “people-powered marketplace for money transfers with anyone, anywhere, at any time.” Its mission is to empower the forgotten and underbanked around the globe to have management of their cash utilizing peer-to-peer transactions.
And in the present day, Youssef and his staff at Paxful have two foremost avenues for recruiting proficient entrepreneurs and staying related to the road. The first is to faucet into the huge peer-to-peer community of Paxful’s virtually 10,000,000 prospects. When El Salvador first appeared on the Bitcoin scene in June 2021 by designating bitcoin as authorized tender, Youssef and his staff had been ready to arrange dinners with folks Paxful already knew on the bottom in that nation. The peer-to-peer method that Youssef and his staff take is to be on the alert for the brilliant spots and entrepreneurial expertise in that area.
Its second method to coming into different nations is doing college campus excursions. In Youssef’s thoughts, training is for everybody and it is central to how they assist these entrepreneurs assist themselves. In 2019 alone he did eight campus excursions by way of Africa. What Youssef tries to get throughout to us coddled Westerners who reside a lifetime of privilege is how typically the folks in Africa are being scammed by every kind of individuals from the West. During these campus excursions he typically encounters monumental skepticism in the direction of Bitcoin.
To overcome this, he conducts what he calls “entrepreneurial crash courses” at every cease. He will inform younger aspiring entrepreneurs that so as to begin a enterprise, you will need to clear up an issue.
“We’re willing to teach anyone,” he mentioned.
The hardest half is to assist these highly-educated folks understand that their on a regular basis state of affairs is each an issue to be solved and a chance to begin a enterprise. Most folks consider their on a regular basis state of affairs as nothing greater than their life, not a enterprise alternative within the making.
Youssef mentioned that if there are 1,000 folks within the room, all he should do is discover 10 individuals who see the facility of peer-to-peer buying and selling and bitcoin. It’s maybe a gross oversimplification to say every one among these entrepreneurs finds commerce routes utilizing Paxful’s platform. Once he identifies these proficient entrepreneurs, he’ll ask them “where is the friction?” And he is aware of that there is monetary apartheid in each nation.
He helps them reframe this excessive unfairness as a chance. Remove the friction or discover a work round and also you‘ve got yourself a business. He tells them “when your country keeps money trapped, that’s what retains you poor.” All we now have to do is take away the obstacles and blockages.
Stated merely, his method is to discover the issue, clear up the issue utilizing bitcoin and the Paxful platform, after which do it once more for others who’ve the identical downside. Rinse and repeat.
Unleashing The Power Of Sovereign Entrepreneurs
What is it about Youssef that permits him to see the plentiful entrepreneurial expertise in Africa whereas the remainder of the world ignores this invisible but potent expertise pool? Is it the truth that he was born in Egypt and has an actual affinity and connection to Africa? Perhaps. Could or not it’s that he is ruthlessly devoted to the peer-to-peer nature of Bitcoin? Perhaps. Could or not it’s that he is as antifragile as any Bitcoiner you’ll ever meet? It’s most likely all of these issues.
In addition, he operates with an abundance mindset that sees the longer term as vastly extra thrilling and promising than the current. And that mindset is infectious. It’s as if he reveals these sovereign entrepreneurs how to flip shortage or lifelong obstacles into abundance. There is little query after listening to Youssef that peer to peer is foundational to his method, however as we concluded the interview, he made it clear that one among his different keys to success was to “keep an open heart.” And that made me understand one thing about Youssef that had not been evident till that second: To him, peer to peer equals coronary heart to coronary heart.
For these of you lucky sufficient to be coming to Bitcoin 2022, I recommend you make a degree of listening to Youssef communicate. You received’t be upset and, who is aware of, you would possibly simply end up a commerce route and a path to changing into a sovereign entrepreneur.
