Scott Morgan, a blockchain consultant, entrepreneur and the Founder and CEO of Crypto Integrity Tao spoke to Payment Expert about the current state of play for cryptocurrency and how it has been impacted by the pandemic.
Payment Expert: Can you tell us a little more about how the pandemic has shaped the climate for cryptocurrency?
Scott Morgan: Crypto-Integrity-Tao actually took analysis to a new level by delivering 1,900 pages in 6 books correlating technology with other sciences like physics to realise the true potential of blockchain. This level of analysis also revealed the many limitations, dangers, and flaws in current blockchain categories.
The pandemic accelerated both blockchain DLT and cryptocurrencies by translating fear, doubt over governance, balkanisation, and monetary policy into innovation and risk-taking in an asset class that exploded in value. Some transfer of wealth into cryptocurrencies from traditional investment comes down to established financial systems’ refusal to innovate, with ripple taking future revenue from the SWIFT system.
Warning signs like banks limiting withdrawals urged wealthy people to transfer money to systems less directly controlled by governments. And then comes the actual thrill and pride people felt when investing in cryptocurrency; as the world swamped the spirit in people, cryptocurrency was the lifeboat sent to rescue them. In a phrase, cryptocurrency gave people a feeling of control over their lives and meaning for their futures.
PE: What role can blockchain play in helping the entertainment industry’s recovery?
SM: For seven years famous leaders in Hollywood exclaimed that Hollywood was not just sick, it was sick of itself. The art was dying due to unethical practices by studios and agents, highlighted by the WGA war with agencies. Blockchain DLT comes to the rescue by delivering a complete solution to inflated budgets, restricted access to high-value original content, erasing advertising fraud that can be as high as $40 million for a single movie, and piracy fought with self-executing penalties through smart contracts.
However, this requires the studio and production to integrate blockchain from development through distribution. The only players knowing how to integrate blockchain, tokens, and games into the entire entertainment sector are Creativity First Films and a few directors like Christopher Nolan. Once achieved, this makes entertainment the ultimate tech investment, delivering 3,000-10,000% on investment over five years, which cannot be matched in any other investment sector over such a broad asset platform. Film investment will pull blockchain with it and blockchain will prove so valuable it pulls even more tech investment into film – where 2021’s streams of revenue all originate.
PE: Has the pandemic altered the gaming sector’s relationship with cryptocurrency?
SM: Blockchain DLT and in-game tokens solve two of the biggest problems in gaming: cheating/bribery and how to transfer money or assets that winners hold in games into currency in the real world. TRON and CEL are the only two networks set up to maximize the interoperable aspects of tokens. TRON delivers through Justin Sun’s JUST technology and BitTorrent – instantly solving advertising fraud. TRON also solves issues gamers needed to be resolved as they take the lead in the gamification of finance, health, politics, defence, education and more.
Creativity First Films plans to use TRON’s network and a TRON token/crypto for Asia and most of the world; however, CEL is prime for the Western Market. Tencent can be the base as the secondary game finance interplay system for China. The current trade and technology issues between the U.S. and China proves what Crypto-Integrity-Tao predicted way back in 2017-18: that games, film and blockchain innovation must remain independent from politics.
People forced to stay home injected previously unimaginable profits and stock valuation to the key players in games: Tencent, Microsoft, Apple, Epic, Google, etc. The Azure Cloud almost froze in February, 2020 as so many new players joined. Even when banned in the U.S.A. and India, the top Chinese game made over $200 million in one month. These gamers are here to stay. So are the app addicts on TikTok. That alone is enough to push global hedge funds into games, especially if the future games are fully integrated into the broader entertainment industry in a vertical model.
PE: Can you tell us more about which markets and sectors have been faster adopters of cryptocurrency since the pandemic?
SM: The pandemic put a spotlight on cryptocurrency – then threw gasoline on the fire of distrust in fiat currency, old financial models, and central bank/government policy that seems to disregard industries that feed the risked money that makes governments possible.
Naturally, financial investors and key banks like Chase got the justified proof that their years of work on cryptocurrency were worth it. Gemini did a terrific job of proving a major exchange can lead the pack and please the S.E.C. at the same time.
This led to some sage permissions by the S.E.C. to institutional investment. Following the rules allowed grayscale to become the ‘King Kong’ it is now. However, to be honest in an arena that echoes only endless good news – DeFi and CBOE are inches away from opening a Pandora’s Box of manipulation, lawsuits, and bad brand for cryptocurrencies if they do not put both institutional security and main street/retail security above profits from derivatives, synthetics and the same practices that led to the 2007/8 crash.
If these Pandora’s don’t poison the well, the IRS with retroactive punishing taxation will punish the leaders in these two markets. This fact proves it is time for the hype-leaders to step back and let wise minds act as a governor on the throttle of cryptocurrency’s race to a secure and stable investment.
After financial sectors, the fastest movers were in the gaming arena. Wise innovators realised that to ‘scale’ cryptocurrency they should jump into the games market. But what most experts fail to understand is that ‘scale’ requires ‘spirit’ and that spirit is influenced by the culture of each nation slightly differently. This is not a one-size-fits-all future and this is why Crypto-Integrity-Tao blended Eastern and Western philosophy, monetary policies from the world’s top economies.
The prerequisite was to study cultural differences in China, the Middle East, Europe, Singapore, Japan, Switzerland, India, and the U.S. Nothing in our universe lasts long if not in balance – cryptocurrency has the potential to balance all of this for the first time in the investment arenas if but only if it honors the drive of multiple cultures.
Ultimately, telecoms and communication networks including social media will be the next industry to receive the incredible boost that cryptocurrency can provide. It will also justify upgrades to 5G as well as adoption of and adaptation to the higher degree of personal responsibility that comes with cryptocurrency. After all, without a third party, there is no government or insurance and sometimes not even laws to protect a person’s investment or trust in a platform or network.
PE: Financial inclusion has been a key theme of the pandemic, how can cryptocurrency help increase this?
SM: The easiest positive examples of financial inclusion are PayPal as the old school model interfacing with cryptocurrencies. This is fine and delivers a degree of inclusion because just about everyone can access PayPal. DeFi also offers inclusion, but with undiscussed unforeseen consequences like future lawsuits, lost keys, and overhyped valuation due to tokenisation of a purchase, such as art or real estate.
One of the unsung heroic divisions of Blockchain is the use of DLT in health, tracking the pandemic, and ushering in a less-fraud-inflicted system for delivering a stimulus to citizens. Here, decentralisation proved to be inclusive across many sectors, not just of people but of business systems. Cryptocurrencies and tokens can greatly help in any future pandemic due to the attention on it now from this pandemic.
