A star Silicon Valley entrepreneur explains how bitcoin is going to change the world
"[There's] more people in the world who need a currency they can trust than the opposite," Casares told Dan Morehead, the ex-head of macro trading at Tiger Management, in a new interview on RealVision Television, a subscription financial news service.
Those instances are what ultimately led him to the digital cryptocurrency bitcoin.
Casares created Argentina's first internet provider and later sold his online brokerage firm to Banco Santander for $750 million in 2000. He is now a star of the Silicon Valley bitcoin scene, heading Xapo, a company that provides a bitcoin wallet and storage vault.
The real "a-ha" moment for bitcoin happened when he was planning a trip with a group of childhood friends back in Argentina.
'I was very skeptical'
"We all had to chip in some money. They were all in Argentina except me, I'm here in California. They all got together and gave the cash to one of them. And I was trying to find a way to send money. At the time, PayPal had to stop sending money to Argentina and wire transfers were not working because of the currency control."
That's when one of his friends suggested using bitcoin.
"I was very skeptical because this particular friend of mine is not particularly tech savvy or financially sophisticated."
"By the time I made it back to the office my friend had sold it for pesos in Argentina. I was like, 'Wow that's incredible. It's like magic.'"
Casares compared the power of bitcoin in the developing world to the cellphone.
"I think it's obvious the cellphone had a lot more impact in developing world than the developed world because most phones in the developing world are cellphones. If it weren't for cellphones the developing world would not be communicating so it really changed the lives of people in emerging markets."
That's not to say that cellphones aren't important in the developed world though. Bitcoin will be important there too, Casares said.
"It's easier to see how [bitcoin can be] transformative and it can change the lives of people in emerging markets, but it also has an important role to play in the developed world."
Watch the teaser below. You can watch the full interview by subscribing to RealVision: