This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovic from Bloomberg Radio. Well, Tim, we've been talking about crypto all weeks, so it's been a good week for me and I'm excited to keep that conversation going with Michael Sonenshein. He is the chief executive officer of digital asset manager Gray Scale. He joined us now on the phone from Los Angeles. Michael, great to have you on the show. And I mean, it's been a big week for bitcoin, but it's been an even
bigger week for ethereum. Ether is up three point three percent this week, dusting Bitcoin, and I feel like we've been seeing this more that we see Ether outperform bitcoin. Are are we back in all season? Well, first of all, great to be with you both, and thank you so much for having me. You know, I think it's tough to say whether or not we're back in all season or not. I think what we're seeing now is more attention than ever is being paid to crypto as an
asset class. There is certainly amongst the Gray Scale in investors a general appreciation that the asset class is here to stay and as a result of that, investors realize that there is a lot more than just bitcoin, and actually more than just bitcoin and ethereum, and so there continues to be ever more demand for them to diversify beyond just those top two digital currencies by market cap. Okay,
where should where? El should they diversify? Well, I think what many investors are beginning to appreciate is that there are now growing ecosystems within the digital asset universe. And you know, we're seeing that in the world of gaming. Um. You know, there's been a lot of chatter recently about the metaverse. We've seen the convergence of file storage and
digital assets. We've seen um, a lot of investors beginning to think about things like n f t s and really starting to unlock other use cases that maybe weren't part of this ecosystem when they first began thinking about making investment allocations. Okay, you really piqued my interest with n f T So there's so much to talk about. We fortunately have you for quite a bit, Michael, So
we're gonna try to everything. Okay, but let's talk n f T s because I'm trying to understand what use cases are for n f t s beyond what we've seen them used for, which you know is collectibles. Sure, well, I think what it's highlighting and this is just one incarnation of the idea of a digitally unique item that the ownership of which is is you know verified, we recorded in a way that's completely decentralized. You are starting to see how that could certainly be a tailwind or
a major improvements individuals and companies around the world. You know, we fight things like um, you know, fake goods, whether they're counterfeit or um you know, having to be able to track them and and they're whereabouts and track their ownership. And you know art is just you know, one vertical that it could be looked at. It could be luxury goods. This can extend, you know, really to almost any item um, physical or not, that could be tagged and added to
a blockchain where it's ownership easily be recorded. And I think it's really starting for many people to really have them rethink the creator economy, the way that artists can pump out their content and actually sell it and engage directly with their bands and user bases. And that can be music, Um, it could be our The list is pretty endless, and so sticking with n f T s, I mean, Gray Skill has a really impressive lineup of funds. It feels like you guys cover every part of the
cryptocurrency universe. I don't see any of your trusts UH specifically focused on getting exposure to n f T s. Is that something that you plan to offer at some point, Well, I would never rule anything out. UM. You know, we today operate fifteen different investment vehicles. Some of them are single asset vehicles and some of them are diversified, meaning that they have a basket of various assets that they hold.
And so as we think about where investor preferences are, we certainly think that there is a meaningful opportunity to expand in both categories, such that we are providing investors with an on ramp to certain of these subsets of the current of the digital currency ecosystem. UM, and we've
so far done that with large cab currencies. We've done that for Defy, and certainly are always trying to tow the line between identifying opportunities that we think are compelling and bringing them to investors and trying to reconcile that with where investors are telling us they want that exposure. Well,
listen to that. I'm curious whether you think that n f t S could be a flash in the pan, whether this is just the bright, shiny object that crypto investors are focusing on right now, because there are stats out there that you know, obviously n f t S get a lot of buzz, but actually dilly average sales piece sometime in August and we have just about thirty seconds. Well, I don't know that it's necessarily a flash in the
pan so much as again i'd read a rate. The success and the acceptance of n f T I think is really a way for everyone to understand the potential of what it could be like to have the assets whose ownership has trapped on a blockchain, and fcs are just one incarnation of them. Still with us is Michael Sonnenshein. He is the chief executive officer of Gray Scale. On the phone from Los Angeles and Michael, it's finally time to talk about the metaverse. And clearly there's a lot
of corporations out there that are excited about it. Facebook rebranding as meta platforms, but there's also a lot of people excited on Twitter in my mentions about the metaverse. But for the normal person, how do you make money on the coming metaverse revolution? How do you even invest along that? All? Right, well, let's break it down for everybody. So simply put, Katie, the metaverse is where digital experiences can take place, right, And so how did we get here?
When we think about the Internet, it really started with the Internet one point oh. Right, that meant that we had now a digital place where we could extract information. It was really read only. And over the last you know, two plus decades, we've seen the Internet evolved into the web two point oh where we now have this digital economy. Individuals and companies can read and engage with each other, but all of the data, all of the activity is
owned by corporations. Right. We must buy online goods through certain sellers, we must interact with one another through certain social media platforms, etcetera. And now what we're seeing is the emergence of the web three point oh. Um, the metaverse being one of those incarnations where digital experiences are actually owned by the individuals that are participating. So the value no longer attribute to the company, but rather to
the individuals that are participating. So one of the areas of the meta or so we've been excited about, is actually a project called a decentralized metaverse where users can interact with one another, build businesses, have experiences, and there's actually a native token called mana that's associated with the metaverse, the Central Land. We lost you for one second, just
say explain one more like ten seconds ago. What it's called. Yeah, it's called decentral Land, and de central Land is one of these decentralized metaverse projects where users can interact with one another and participate in the economy there by building businesses offering experiences, and there's actually a native token associated
with called mana. We don't have a ton of time, so I want to make sure we get all this in what is a What is an experience that somebody would have in the metaverse that they can't have in real life. You can go to a concert, for example, and you wouldn't need to leave your couch or your desk. Um. You know, if if you want to see a certain artist perform and they're not where you live locally, you might be able to attend that concert in the meta rios.
And that's just beginning to unlock the types of experiences that are possible, and it's bringing together a bunch of technologies digital currencies, computing, gaming, and virtual reality UM and we're just just just at the earliest of earliest innings. And so a lot of their digital currencies stay like Mama and others are ways to Katie's point that investors can invest in the metaverse as this technology or as
these experiences begin to take off. And Michael talk about the link between cryptocurrencies and the metaverse because it seems like there's a lot of spiritual similarities there. A lot of the people I talked to her are excited about crypto or excited about the metaverse. Is that because you know, in this new virtual reality that will be the medium
of exchangers, it's something different. Well, I think it's because these are decentralized communities that the value UM that is typically ascribed back to the company's social media platforms, the commerce platforms that we use in the web two point oh, can actually be owned and used by the individuals participating in the metaverse. So many of these projects have their own native digital currencies UM that are you know, either offshoots of things like bitcoin or ethereum, or others that
can actually be only used in those ecosystems. Michael, just in ten seconds. Well, I you know, I can't even ask you a question that the question that I had would require a longer answer. You're gonna have to come back and join us once again, Michael. I'm always happy to come back. Actually, that helps everybody understand the metaverse a little bit better. It absolutely helps we are well, Katie,
are you still metaverse curious work? I still have some existential dread associated with the metaverse, but I'm moving past that. This conversation helps metaverse hesitant metaverse hesitant plenty of time Web three point out great definitions of that. By the way, that was really helpful. Michael Sonenshine, CEO of Gray Scale, joining us once again on the phone from Los Angeles. Thank you so much for taking a time, Michael,