My interview with Shawn Owen covers an important addition to the blockchain space. SALT is a network for borrowers and lenders. Most Bitcoin owners don’t want to sell their Bitcoin and if it continues to appreciate in value, Salt could help them avoid this.

Imagine that Salt was around in April 2012. Lets say you spent $10,000 on 2000 BTC for 5$ per coin. You wanted to avoid selling it but needed $2000 to pay rent at the time. You could have sought a loan at lets say 10% annual interest against your bitcoin, meaning you had to pay back $2200 to a Salt lender in April 2013. By that time Bitcoin had appreciated 20x in value to $100 per coin so your holdings are now worth $200,000. Instead of selling 400 bitcoin in 2012, you now only have to sell less than 10% of that, to pay it off.

Now this obviously carries downside risk as well, but the principle is the same as securities backed lending. A service that has been in place a long time. The important thing, as with any loan is not to borrow too much.

We discuss Shawns early start in bitcoin, his transition from being a bitcoin maximalist to taking a wider view of the market and the role of p2p lending. I hope you enjoy this discussion.

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