What I would do was I would actually fix the problems that other politicians were paying billboards to say that they would fix if they got elected.
If they got elected.
How would you pitch Panama?
So if you've got someone in Australia who's like, I'm getting taxed because I live on the fourth floor of my building and I have a view and they charge me a view tax.
No way.
Yeah.
I don't want progress.
I want leaps.
I want transformation.
because progress means anticipated and projected growth over time.
There are livelihoods at stake.
Some of these people don't have time.
I find it ironic because in the U.S.,
there are a lot of Bitcoiners who are cheering on
a bunch of crypto Bitcoin related legislation.
And I'm like, guys, we don't need the government to tell us what to do.
Like the whole point of Bitcoin is let people operate independently.
I was high in the sky.
I was like, this is what I wanted.
I'm making it in the U.S.
This is great.
This is awesome.
And yeah, then that happened.
And that kind of changed everything.
Hey, everyone.
Michael here with the Bitcoin Way podcast.
Thank you for tuning in today on the show.
I have the mayor of Panama City, Panama, Mayer Mizrachi.
Mayer is an interesting guest, fascinating guy, tech background, so very forward thinking.
And I think you'll begin to understand why we at the Bitcoin Way are so excited about Panama as a plan B residency or a plan A, if you feel so inclined.
But this was a fascinating and fun conversation. I think you are going to love it.
Hey, everyone. Like I said in the intro, I've got Meyer here. Meyer, welcome to the Bitcoin Way podcast.
How's it going, Michael?
Doing well. Thank you so much for being here.
This is a particularly exciting conversation for me, for us, because, I mean, anyone who's listened to our podcast knows we hype up Panama so much.
We've got a team, as I told you, offline down there right now, onboarding 50 folks into a Plan B residency.
People looking to get out of some of the more tyrannical jurisdictions, I guess you might say, across the world.
And I think this is going to be a really fun conversation.
One of the things that stood out to me is I did my research.
I was looking at you, some interviews you've done is, you know, you're I think maybe the youngest mayor of Panama City ever.
You've got that tech background. Why don't you talk to me a little bit about how you approach becoming the mayor of Panama City in a way that was perhaps different than your predecessors?
Well, I think I got lucky because ultimately people were really freaking tired of politicians.
So if I would have used my normal Silicon Valley startup approach as I go to solving problems or pitching ideas, I would say five years ago, it would not have worked.
Instead, the timing was perfect.
They wanted someone young.
People wanted something disruptive.
and they wanted something that they could...
People are tired of listening to rhetoric and empty promises.
So I think this is perfect for the Silicon Valley mindset.
What do we do?
When we come up with an idea for a startup, for a product, for a feature,
we test it.
We run a pilot, right?
We do A-B testing and it's ship first, ship fast.
You don't wait till it's perfect.
You immediately show proof of concept and you get validation from the market instead of waiting two years, a mega project, a ribbon cutting ceremony.
And then ultimately, it turns out people don't actually want that.
So I kind of use that approach.
I'll give you a perfect example.
So one of the great things about our campaign was that it was the first campaign in history where we didn't spend any money on paid advertising.
There were no billboards at all.
There were no flyers, no billboards, not a thing.
Everything was organic.
so what i would do was i would actually fix the problems that other politicians were
paying billboards to say that they would fix if they got elected if they got elected so you know
when you set it up that way i'm like okay you know we can we can beat you at that game by just doing
the work now and it's cheaper than paying for the billboard so we would actually fix the pothole
So they thought it was brilliant to put a billboard next to a pothole that says, if you elect me, you will no longer see this pothole.
So we went ahead and fixed the freaking pothole.
And all of a sudden, his $5,000 spend for that month was out the window because we actually fixed the problem.
And that's what people want.
They want people who solve the problem.
Now, not contingent on you voting for me, but that's what gains you credibility.
That's what gains you people's trust. And understanding that, I think we kind of did politics better than the politicians by just being more human.
Yeah, it seems like it would be an easy, easy gap to fill for some of these people, but but perhaps not. So you've got a I mean, obviously a tech background. You think very innovatively about how you approach any problem, including becoming a candidate for for mayor of Panama City. Can you talk to me a little bit about what you've done? Cryptex, you know, everything that you've sort of worked on and before politics, right?
Yeah, so I started, I went deep into communications and messaging apps when I was in college. This was 2011. And I started building messaging apps before WhatsApp was on iPhone.
so um i got late to market i'm not a programmer myself i had to hire programmers i had no control
over code or shipping a product and the first version the first product i ever built was called
jiggle i was in i was in college and uh it got to market late whatsapp had already dominated
the bridge between BlackBerry and iOS and Android.
So we pivoted into encrypted messaging.
So we went to a specific category, a vertical,
that we wanted to focus on, just privacy and security.
This is 2013.
Remember, in 2013, encryption was not a thing.
So messaging apps, they were all wide open.
There was no end-to-end encryption happening on WhatsApp
or iMessage for that matter.
I know a lot of people in America use iMessage,
but everywhere else around the world,
people use WhatsApp or an alternative.
So Cryptex also became an encrypted email system.
So we took the encryption protocol and took it to Gmail.
So we said, it's really hard to get people
to change their existing platform.
So then my mindset changed. It wasn't, hey, here's an app. Use my app instead of the one you're already using and set up your entire social network here. That's quite high of a barrier to entry. So instead I said, okay, let's now work on top of existing platforms. That was a total different change in mindset as an entrepreneur.
So it was a plugin that worked on Gmail and it would automatically encrypt and decrypt any emails you would get from Gmail.
It was fun. That was great. That was actually the best functioning product.
What led to my involvement in politics was that Cryptex, the encrypted messaging platform, was licensed by the government of Panama because they got hacked.
in 2013. So in 2014, they come to me, they realized that I was building this and they said,
okay, so we can get this for a lot cheaper than what BlackBerry is charging us for their BBM
solution. And for $200,000, I gave them a one year's license, very cheap, very simple.
And everything worked. Everything worked really well. They had a hundred users using the platform.
they managed the distribution i just gave them an admin platform that they distributed
uh they issued users user ids to whomever they wanted you could download the app from the app
store but you couldn't use it unless you had a user that was issued by the state so um change
of government comes in that year in 2014 and then the new government decides to persecute
the old government um and they used my contract to go against the ex-minister technology
um and and very quickly um i was what i was like 25 24 at the time 25 and very quickly uh
I ended up caught up in this world of politics, lawsuits.
What do they call it when they use the legal system?
Illegal warfare.
Yeah, it was basically illegal warfare.
But anyhow, one thing led to the other.
they alluded to the fact that I embezzled funds because I didn't deliver the software,
which was a joke because it's tech.
It's not like this piece of Lego, right?
You can make this piece of Lego disappear and say, I never gave it to you.
But when it comes to tech, there's a paper trail.
There's crumbs all over.
So we could actually prove that we didn't just deliver it.
They used it.
They were using it as they were suing me.
But that was mistake number one.
That's when I realized that the problem was not the allegations.
It was actually the loss.
The goal is to run up and down the stairs and get you mixed up in all of this.
just in the very thin line of doubt
so that they can have a legal process against you.
Before I get deeper into that,
at that time, I was living in New York.
I was not just building my startup,
but I was investing in startups.
I was deep into the Silicon Valley rabbit hole.
I loved it.
Honestly, I would go to conferences.
I would go to fireside chats and meetups
all the time um i was pretty sure i didn't want to live in panama um i wanted to make it big um in
in silicon valley um even uh was it it was business insider uh wrote us an article that year we raised
like six hundred thousand dollars i i i i was like on route you know i was high in the sky i was like
this is what i wanted i'm making it in the u.s this is this is great this is awesome um
And yeah, then that happened.
And that kind of changed everything.
It changed my entire life, my family's life.
And it changed, I would say, the history of this country.
Because that guy ended up becoming the mayor.
So that one decision that a politician decided to pull off really did change the course of history.
We don't know.
I hope for good.
The process was freaking terrible.
Can I curse?
Sure.
Okay.
I'm very lax in that matter.
I really don't handle myself with a lot of diplomacy as a politician normally does.
But yeah, it was quite fucked up.
Like it was from 2014 to 2025.
That was 11 years of hell.
2024.
It was 10 years of hell.
um and the process you know i i who was it what's this guy from england i forget his name um
tommy robinson oh yeah yeah so you know he went through something very similar and he had
he has a he he has a great saying he says the process the the investigation is the aim
what is it um i don't know the quote is it's sort of the the uh that that basically them putting you
through this meat grinder is sort of the whole point of it it's not about what their end outcome
is but it's like the disparagement the like the the process the investigation the process is the
is definitely the conviction.
The conviction is the process.
In fact, had I actually gone to jail,
I would have spent less time than I did
by battling the process and demonstrating my innocence.
So this is a bit of how the sophisticated politicians
and voyeurs actually handle power.
That's actual power play at a world-class level.
That's the way it really works, right? So you've got a set of laws and then politicians or lawyers
that work around these laws to permissibly do whatever the fuck they want.
So what was the leap then into politics? Was it just like you were disillusioned with what you'd
witnessed and you said, I want to make a change here? Yeah. No, I mean, I was persecuted by an
actual president it wasn't just some joe schmoe it was the president that went after me and um
and when i under i started to understand how the sausage gets made and that kind of
made me realize that i was living all these other years like in a make-believe
of a perfect world.
Like I can't be building startups
under a platform of legal injustice
or insecurity or political instability
that can make whatever I build disappear, right?
Like who going to build like for example go to someone and tell them hey do you want to build an app for BlackBerry They probably going to say no right They going to say no It the same
thing. That's how I thought back then. I was like, why would I build a company under this ecosystem?
I need to solve the problem. I like to actually solve problems. So I started to get like a
political awakening and understanding how things work. And I didn't just focus on Panamating
politics. On the contrary, actually, I focused a lot more on the US because they're a lot more
sophisticated and there are a hundred layers between you and the decision makers. Whereas
in Panama, there's probably two layers between you and the president. I'm probably two,
at this point, two, but you can be three to four degrees away from the decision maker in a small
country like panama so what what really triggered it was i instead of shying away from everything i
went through i leaned into it so i became a very open-minded and outspoken public figure here in
panama you would say you could say i could i became an influencer although i never sold you
know ad space or did any paid promotions of any kind i don't do that kind of stuff or giveaways
or any of that. I just wanted to have a voice because I realized that no matter how right I was,
there was no one there to listen to me. The media was bought and paid for. Everyone was aligned with
the power, the people who control power. So I realized I had to generate my own power,
my own measure of wealth. And it wasn't in cash because it's not money. It's reputation,
it's credibility it's influence and i started that um uh backtrack i ended up six months in prison
yeah so was this the columbia story yeah yeah that's the columbia story okay so so so what
happened then was i was just traveling from new york to columbia for new year's with my friends
and then this was 2015, December 2015.
And when I got to Colombia, I get arrested
under a supposed Interpol Red Notice.
This was like three days after El Chapo.
All right.
So I was like, wait, Red Notice,
isn't that what the El Chapo had?
They're like, yeah, you're some wanted guy.
I'm like, what the, are you fucking kidding me?
So they arrest me.
And of course, I'm thinking, oh, we know people.
I'm pretty well connected in Colombia.
This is all a mistake.
Can't be.
All right.
Whatever.
We'll go to the station and then we'll get this order out and you'll let me go.
At least I was optimistic.
At least I've always been optimistic.
Because knowing then that I would be stuck in a prison cell for, you know, Colombian maximum security prison.
For six months.
With no conviction.
No charges.
And haven't paid bail on day one.
Posted bond.
On day one.
They still wouldn't let me free.
It was fucked up.
What's most fucked up about that part.
Is that.
When I come out of prison.
We had been.
Lobbying with.
Interpol in Lyon.
France.
and we gave them all our information and when they asked panama to to back up their information
like their evidence um they couldn't so interpol was like okay we've we've expunged your history
from our database because panama apparently gave us false information for your red notice like so
that's it you're fucking kidding me are you are you are you kidding me yeah that was that was
screwed up that was screwed up bittersweet like um yeah it was a bit of horrible way to spend six
months but i imagine an eye-opening experience and again it's very much so politics at play so
so then fast forward you said you you commit okay i'm running for mayor of panama city you take
office in July of 24. Okay. July 24. No. And so what was the, what was your platform? Like what
did you, so I understand that the approach he took was very unique. What did you say? This is what I
want to get done. And what about that do you think resonated with, uh, with the voters?
So, um, voters just wanted someone that could fix small problems. They want, they didn't,
I never promised that I would fix the country.
I said, hey, you know, I've been fixing potholes for the last three years out of my own goodwill.
If I could have the mayor's seat, then I could do a lot more of that.
And probably a lot more than just potholes.
I started building bridges in communities that couldn't – that they would get kind of like a – how do you call it?
Just like red tape in the way?
Yeah.
For you to use a single penny of the government's money, it takes time.
So I've always used my own money to fix problems.
and like I fixed up a municipal gym, a public gym
because I used to box there all the time in 2022.
And I would go like at 5 a.m.
And it was dark.
There was no lights.
So I started putting lights.
Then when it would rain,
then the water would seep through.
So I changed the roof.
And then like the floor was shitty.
So I repaved the entire fucking floor.
And then I put like,
I just redid the whole freaking gym.
It cost me about $30,000 of my own money.
And for me, it was like money well spent.
I loved it.
This was 2022.
I was not thinking of running for office.
I just really enjoyed fucking the system.
I really did enjoy it because at that point, I also knew what I was doing.
The mayor can't come and say, hey, stop fixing people's lives.
That would make him even more unpopular.
Right?
So it's like a got you.
And I started doing that.
And so what did I promise?
Well, I promised that I would reduce the size of government.
I would reduce bureaucracy.
I would digitalize as much as we could.
And I would spend a lot less money and do a lot more.
And in the first year of being in office, we fulfilled about 68% of our campaign promises.
68.
Including the biggest budget cut in history in the public sector of Panama.
So we cut our budget by 38%.
And we managed to execute a lot more than the previous year.
So the previous mayor with a third less, over a third less.
And we also cut personnel by 50%.
So we had about 6,500 people here.
And as soon as I came in, we did away with half of them.
Wow.
gone 3 500 people were gone and and things started running smoother faster more optimized so as i
explain to people that's evidence that we were carrying unnecessary weight right um so the
problem was that my great benefit has been that i won out of the the will of the people
and not because I subscribed to some party or indebted myself to a system.
So generally, you have to rise the ranks within a party.
Then you've got to win primaries in your party.
Then you've got to win general elections.
People negotiate, they associate, they do coalitions, all this to try and win the office of the mayor.
After the president in Panama, the highest seat is mayor of the city of Panama.
70% of the GDP is in this district.
So it's probably the most important – after the president, the most important role for election.
So because I won out of the merit of people, my own credibility, I was not in debt to this infrastructure of people that I said, if you vote for me, I'm going to give you a job.
I'm going to give your family a job.
It wasn't that.
so i was able to clean house and and do as you know do just the common sense believe it or not
politicians do have common sense but they have greater conflicts of interest right the incentive
that's it yeah the incentive structures are and then that's the other part i was like i'm not
going to change my life i'm going to live the same exact life i'm going to live in the same exact
building, the same apartment, drive the same car, live the same lifestyle. I was already wealthy
before coming into office. So I wasn't going to now show that I'm like this humble. I suppose I'm
humble, but I'm not going to like overcompensate and try and show something that I'm not. I'm going
to be the same organic, authentic person. I drive my own car. I bought a Cybertruck back in pandemic.
I put my reservation and luckily enough, I got elected and I received the car like two days after I got elected.
And that whole storytelling, because I can tell the story and because I published it three years ago, people understand that they see not a Cybertruck, but a story of making your own dreams come true in spite of difficulties.
You remember where we all were in pandemic when it all started.
We didn't know where we were going to be.
Couldn't even drive cars.
So I keep the same lifestyle.
No one gets a driver at City Hall.
Everyone had drivers.
Everyone had a car paid for by City Hall.
Everyone had a driver and a bodyguard.
Gone, gone, gone.
All right.
Like the amount of money that we're saving is just unreal.
I'm like, you drive a car.
Yes.
So what do you need an extra car?
Like purposely, as an economist, from a utility standpoint,
how can you use two cars at once
you cannot so why
I don't want to depreciate my car
you're depreciating your own life
what's more valuable than your own time
your own body you're depreciating it
I'm depreciating my own car
so will you
these are the rules of the game
same thing with phones
they would have new phones every 6 months
new freaking phones
guys you want an iPhone you pay for your own phone
that's it
if you weren't working at city hall
you would still have a phone
that's that's like my logic also you're earning six thousand dollars a month like that's a high
that's a very high salary for panama you can pay for it do you want an suv go ahead and get
a loan for your own suv but it's your suv not the city's and you pay for it you know what's crazy
about this is that i think what you just said i think a lot of people don't even realize that that
is just the nature of politics is that you get the new phone you get the car you get the driver
you get the security personnel you get like you you you extrapolate that across an entire
government of a large city much less a country and like that's where the taxpayers money money
is going to right like that that's that's why people have a a substandard you know lifestyle
is because they're paying for that and people hate it like if you want to be a popular politician
try to be a normal human being right people hate this politician that comes from nothing and all
of a sudden is you know living an overprivileged life with all these perks that that you know like
why do you need them first of all i don't need a freaking bodyguard like no one tries to this is
not colombia okay you don't have the insecurity of colombia also what a marketing stunt is that
for the security of your own country.
Our country is so safe.
I drive my own car and I don't have a bodyguard.
That's if you ask me,
what's a mayor?
He's a salesman.
What's a president?
He's a salesman.
They're CEOs of bigger and smaller companies.
You got to be the salesman.
So what am I saying to people?
If I've got like a fucking ring of six Sasquatches
walking around me,
you know, barring foreigners, tourists, or, or locals from, from reaching out and connecting
with me personally. What am I saying? This country is insecure. And also, um, I'm, I don't, I want,
I want distance between you and me. Those are the, those are the implicit messages that politicians
send and they don't realize it. They literally do not realize it. Yeah. It happens in the U S as well.
Oh yeah. All over the place. And I think it's some, for a lot of people, it becomes more a,
just a point of privilege.
They enjoy the show.
They enjoy the parade. It's not even
a lack of thought on
what message am I sending to
people around me.
It's just, hey, I get all these perks and
I don't have to pay for it. It's an ego trip, bro.
I swear to God.
Thank God I went through everything
I went through before
because it did
make me realize what makes
me who I am. And it's not
money. It's not material goods. It's me. So that is the most politicians are defined by the seat,
by the title. And I would say I really strive on doing the inverse. I want to be defined by myself
in spite of a title. In fact, when people call me, hey, Mr. Mayor, I'm like, no, call me Meyer.
two years in i'm still i'm still correcting people because in three years i'm no longer the mayor
and i still want to be known or called the same thing so like keeping your feet grounded is
critical because being in power and having you know the power of the pen and the budget and all
that shit it can make anyone lose focus of what matters it's like being drunk you don't realize
it but it temporary It like being high on some drug I was really listen man I was really afraid or scared of coming of sitting on this seat
because I thought everyone
that goes into politics changes.
Everyone sits in a position
of power influence, they change.
So I didn't want to change
and I was very scared of it.
And well, a year and a half in,
I'm still very conscious about it,
but I'm no longer scared
as I was initially
because now I know what it's really about and it's not changing me.
It's, I'm not going to let it change me.
And, and, and honestly, a lot of people just,
they come into politics for the ego trip.
I'm telling you, it feeds, it feeds the soul to some people.
Sorry, I'm building a Lego while we're talking.
No, you're good. You're good, man.
So talk to me then about, well, first of all, everything you said,
I really appreciate it because it's always my complaint about politicians.
It's just that even if you come for the best of intentions, which I think many do, they end up being preoccupied by the distractions, the luxuries of being in politics.
Yeah.
So talk to me a little bit about Bitcoin.
What was your journey?
How did you find Bitcoin?
Well, listen, when I started my legal battles against the government of Panama, they had taken over all my bank accounts.
They froze my bank accounts.
I was basically – I lived what's called a civil death, right?
You're alive, but from a civilian standpoint, you're dead.
You can't wire money.
You can't transact.
You can't rent an apartment.
You can't do anything.
So I started discovering crypto assets.
Bitcoin, this is 2014, 2015.
So Bitcoin was just like, just for nerds.
People in forums were talking about it.
It wasn't so big on, not even on disrupt.
Like you would go to the Tech March disrupt main stage.
They were talking about Bitcoin, not then.
Fast forward to today, I've been very inspired by how El Salvador has approached its disruption by using technology in its favor.
So adopting Bitcoin was one of the things that I think really made El Salvador stand out.
And it was kind of like a no-brainer, if you ask me.
and I said well why are we doing this in Panama
I first decided that I wanted to get involved
to show the government that
what the city does is it doesn't mean that the entire country can do
so at a city level I considered myself
as a lab
as a what you call it
an incubator? a sandbox
yeah yeah so i could test anything i wanted and then signal to the government what the realities
were well don't go this way hey i got good results why don't you scale it up so that was a bit of the
mindset so i said um let's um let's start you know collecting taxes in bitcoin um and we got that
passed through um the the the city council and it got approved um the idea is that the the underlying
there's no underlying risk uh for the city it's not accumulating any bitcoin because what we the
way we've been we've planned it out is you can pay with bitcoin but there's an intermediary that's
just processing that and paying the city in dollars.
So all the city cares is to get its dollar value.
So we're not going to add any new risk to the city,
and that's how we were able to convince the councilman
that there was zero risk because this risk was being assumed
by the intermediary processor, which we already had.
I had to explain to these people that we already use a processing platform
for credit cards because, well, the city doesn't take credit cards.
They take dollars.
So you've got to convert credit card money into the dollars you receive for a wire transfer.
This is the same exact thing.
It's just a different credit card with a different denomination.
That's all it is conceptually what you need to understand.
And I remember the example I told them was Amex.
I said, we don't take Amex.
We just take Visa and MasterCard.
I'm adding Amex.
Do you have a problem with Amex?
No.
I said, well, this is XAMX.
That's all it is.
It's just a new method.
That's all it is.
Now, it's been almost a year since we enacted that rule.
And we still haven't been able to put it into action because the central government is so conservative that they want us to really get all the itty-gritty bits and pieces and checks and balances done.
So it is taking a lot longer than what I would want.
This is, again, as I say, there's only so much you can do as mayor of a capital city.
The government is not against this.
It's just very conservative.
The main goal of the government of Panama is to stabilize and guarantee security to investments and investors that come to this country and for local investors as well.
And I got to say, I got to hand it off to them. The government has done a really good job at stabilizing the economy. Really fucking good job. I was surprised that last year, in spite of protests, we were able to grow around 4.2%. I was expecting something around 3%. So this year's shaping up to be even more promising.
So Panama was like the number two country in terms of economic growth. I think number one was Dominican Republic. By this year, I expect Panama to be number one. And hopefully, hopefully, we can get some of these policies in place so that I don't want us to just be number one in terms of traditional economic growth.
I want us to signal to be the birthplace of technology for Latin American ecosystems.
I want this to be the bridge between Panama, Silicon Valley, and Tel Aviv.
That's my vision.
Because if you really want a society to progress, if you really want a leap, I don't want progress.
I want leaps.
I want transformation.
because progress means anticipated and projected growth over time.
We don't have time.
There are livelihoods at stake.
Some of these people don't have time.
So I need us to grow faster, stronger, quicker, and be a lot more competitive.
That's a bit of the Silicon Valley in me that's still there,
where I'm still aggressive,
and I still feel like I'm competing with the startup that's about to steal my idea
or imitate me or execute better than me.
So I still got that in me.
Yeah.
So is your hope then that that would be a launching pad for much bigger things, right?
So if you look at El Salvador, for example, they're accumulating Bitcoin,
retaining a strategic Bitcoin reserve.
I know they've had something with the IMF,
and so they maybe pulled back the legal tender law.
But like, is your hope that over the coming five years, 10 years, that Panama would be like a Bitcoin hub where people are paying with Bitcoin, accepting Bitcoin?
The nation has found, you know.
100% and not out of legal obligation, but just financial feasibility.
People would want to receive money in Bitcoin.
so what we do what we want is for that channel to exist as a possibility right now there is no
possibility because it's not legally recognized so all we want is for legal recognition
uh to this form of of for this asset and this form of payment it will signal to the right people
the kind of economy the kind of country you're building the kind of guarantees that you're
looking to do because one of the things i appreciate about bitcoin is that you can't
control it right um and and for me as as as as a man as a man in a position of power i try to wield
as least power or control as possible i'd like to build systems that are self um that are both
that's that are how do you how do you call like uh when something is like vetted or or controlled
by the system itself it's just like bitcoin it's a community right yes yeah i don't like a system
where one single entity or a duopoly can have control right i've even taken poison pills myself
of diluting the influence or powers that the mayor can have.
That way, no matter who comes, it's the people that have the power.
And because the people want this, it's that which the mayor has to do,
not the other way around.
And that is very common.
That kind of dichotomy, not just in Latin America,
but you're seeing it all over the world,
where ultimately, you know, they beg people for their voter confidence for their vote.
And then they have all this power and then people have to beg them to do the things that they want.
It's just some fundamental policymaking aspects that I think have to be,
you've got to lay the groundwork from today for that kind of economy over the next 20 to 40 years.
That's the kind of thing. That's the kind of way I think. So it's interesting you say that because one of my so obviously I think what Nayib Bukele has done in El Salvador is tremendous. I think overall, you know, I'd give him an A plus and obviously he's a Bitcoiner. I appreciate his his love of Bitcoin.
My concern with El Salvador has always been, what if Bukele is gone?
And is Bitcoin really embedded in the culture or is it because they have one very strong proponent at the top?
It seems to me like what you're partially trying to accomplish in Panama is how can we just embed this in the culture?
It doesn't require a strong mayoral presence.
It doesn't require a president who's all about Bitcoin.
But people begin to adopt it because there's no friction.
It's easy.
They don't have to worry about the inflationary risk of more money being printed globally.
Yes.
That to me, it seems very compelling about Panama.
So you touch on something that very few people have mentioned about this country.
And I've mentioned it myself.
I appreciate El Salvador.
I admire enormously what Bukele and his team has done over the last years in his tenure.
It's really admirable.
We never, El Salvador was not, El Salvador, those were words you would never say.
Okay.
It's very common for us to think and talk about El Salvador now.
And most, a lot of politicians are even imitating him.
Now, the problem is it's a risk matter.
As you said, what if El Salvador no longer has Bucati?
Shit, we don't know what that El Salvador looks like right now.
And that's what I try to explain to investors when they consider Panama.
I was just in a very important meeting with billboards.
And I explained to them, Panama is Panama no matter who the president is.
And that's what's amazing.
In fact, what I admire a bit about this economy, this country, is how resilient it is in spite of bad leadership.
Like, what if we had a great operating system similar to El Salvador?
Like, we have amazing hardware, infrastructure.
The financial hub of Latin America is in Panama.
In fact, most people don't know this, but almost every company in El Salvador or startup that works with Bitcoin has a parent company that's based in Panama.
No way.
Yeah.
The reason is very simple.
The banks in El Salvador won't work with Bitcoin companies because their correspondent banks in the US won't allow it.
in panama right they you can't like we have you know this is one of the things again i say
panama is a great product with terrible marketing and uh and i think um el salvador is freaking
amazing at marketing because this has been a fact for a while that every el salvador company has like
a pair company in panama they receive their dollars in panama then they wire them to el salvador
right so because you have a bank and infrastructure here you have the liquidity
the risk is kind of minimized for the amount of transactions that you're hosting a day
um and then you have companies in panama they're doing amazing things especially
considering the infrastructure you have you have a bank called tower bank and if you ask me that
bank is really doing um they're going to be the next level bank of this country because they're
investing whereas every other bank is still thinking in dollars a tower bank
is thinking in crypto not just Bitcoin but they open accounts from an app immediately and then you have a wallet within the app So they not going to make you download an app Like the banking app is the wallet
So it's really interesting the way that they've executed all this.
And I think they're onto something.
They're onto something.
That's my impression.
So at the Bitcoin way, we are all about,
we train people to take self-custody, right?
Like we don't want banks to like custody or your generational wealth.
However, one of the things that has made our Plan B residency program in Panama so seamless is the fact that you can go to Tower Bank.
You can set up an account very quickly, very easily.
There's not a bunch of red tape, not a lot of bureaucracy.
Yeah.
And you can go move Bitcoin within the country in that way if you need to for a particular purpose.
And you can see your balance alongside of your fiat.
That's right.
You know, and like having that integration isn't like we're all about like, hey, separate, you know, money and state.
But having the flexibility of that integration is incredibly valuable to some people.
And we actually have a guy there right now who is like he's he's talked about he's he's getting his residency like this week.
and the way that he was able to migrate his wealth from Australia into Panama is made so much simpler
because of the infrastructure that the crazy thing is even in the US, they're still trying
to figure out what the hell to do about Bitcoin. You know, if you're a bank, like you have to get
all these, you know, like this tape is just crazy. Oh, it's it's insane. And the regulatory
regulatory guidance has scared banks away. I don't get excited about banks accepting Bitcoin
because I don't want them to hold my Bitcoin, but it's going to be a point of friction if banks
can't do that. And it sounds to me like Panama basically just says, Hey, live your life, you know,
figure it out. Like if you, if this is what you want to do, if this is what a bank needs to do to
serve its customers, then you can do that. So, so one of the things, one of the things that,
um so i'm very good friends with the ceo of of the bank um and one of the things that he did was
um they were about to do a bitcoin law and we all said don't just don't touch it
oversee everything we're doing guys act of transparency um with the superintendencia
Arancos. It's like the treasury of sorts. But just watch it and don't over-regulate something
you don't understand yet. Don't assume there's risk that doesn't actually exist. And I think
that's what's made them quite successful is that they haven't been over-regulated at all.
So we haven't created a law. And if you ask me, that's a benefit because I wouldn't want,
I personally would not want a Bitcoin law now, not in its inception. I first want to see how people use it. I first want to understand what people understand by it. And then we can talk about making a law. What are the problems? Because what are laws? First of all, the fundamentals of our economy is freedom, right? It's a free economy.
so laws are restrictive typically typically so what do i need a law for you to restrict what
specifically why are you restricting there's nothing to restrict so i don't need a law now
also we're not asking for promotion you can have a law to incentivize but we don't we're not asking
for that so any law that would come would be on the way of restrictions and we don't want these
restrictions not now not before we understand what it is how people behave around it in this
economy we've seen we know what it is but theoretically for this as a as from a micro
economic standpoint you don't want to start with regulation start with innovation then you can bring
in regulation but not the other way around geez dude that's yeah that's it i mean you end up
killing the economy the opportunity yeah i find it ironic because in the u.s there are a lot of
Bitcoiners who are cheering on a bunch of crypto Bitcoin related legislation. And I'm like, guys,
we don't need the government to tell us what to do. Like the whole point of Bitcoin is let people
operate independently. So I think that's going to, as long as Panama can hold off on that,
I think it's going to serve incredibly well. And back to a point we were discussing before,
the longer they hold off, the more embedded it gets into the culture, the more people get used
to interacting with Bitcoin through their bank in self-custody, however they choose to do that,
I think it makes it much harder. It makes you resistant to a future politician coming in and
trying to screw it up because it's just too late. That's exactly right. That's exactly right.
That's exactly right. Amen, man. And until then, we depend on people like you to promote
the use of Bitcoin and just grow organically the ecosystem, organically.
Yeah. I'll tell you what, man, we're sending a lot of Bitcoiners your way. Like I said,
we've got a cohort of 50 down there now. We've onboarded a lot of people through our Plan B
program. And I mean, we've had a lot of countries try to figure out where to tell people to go.
And for all the reasons you can imagine, Panama came out at the top. I would be curious,
is how would you, how would you put, you know, you said, you know, if you're, you know, you're
the mayor of Panama city, if you're the president of Panama, I mean, your job is you're a salesperson
at a, at a different level. I used to be in sales. So I don't view that as a negative thing. I think
a lot of people hear that and they think snake oil salesman kind of thing. How would you pitch
Panama? So if you've got someone in Australia, who's like, I'm getting taxed because I live on
the fourth floor of my building and I have a view and they charge me a view tax. If you're in the
UK. Yeah. You're getting arrested for social media posting. Yeah. That's what I know. That's
what's like, what's Panama's like, how do you, how do you pitch it? Um, it's Miami without a visa
and fewer taxes. It's not, it's not a bad pitch. That's what, that's what I've heard.
The conversation going. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I've heard actually that was the first,
this guy who I told you about who was, who escaped Australia. He said it's like Miami,
but uh but it's cleaner it's uh it's got all the same amenities everything you would expect of you
know like a western city and i don't have to take pictures of my receipts because my business is
required to do that for tax purposes and all of the basically all the the bullshit that takes place
in a typical bureaucratic yeah setup man that sounds about right um listen ultimately dude i
I think Panama is poised to really become this.
I want it to be a blend between Miami and Singapore.
It's going to be something different.
What it needs is to maintain its course.
If it just maintains its course over the next three years,
it's signaling stability in all the right places.
You want disruption in other places.
not when it comes to public policy, taxes, economy.
And, you know, once you've got that stabilized with the right leadership,
I think this is the kind of country that would attract organically.
It would attract the smartest, the most, you know,
you need intellectual capital.
You need it.
And I don't know how many politicians actually put mind into this,
But if you don't grow your intellectual pool, then your intellectual capital as a country, no matter what your GDP is, it's not sustainable.
So just so happens to be some of the smartest people in the world happen to also use Bitcoin.
Yeah.
So you've got the, you're attracting the best because you've got the climate, I mean, both in terms of weather, but also in terms of like the tech hub, the innovation, and you're now the place where people can say, I want to quit paying so much in taxes.
I want to have a place where I can go where I know I'm going to be mostly left alone.
And I'm not going to have to worry about some regulation coming down and all of a sudden I can't use my Bitcoin anymore.
A hundred percent. That's a hundred percent.
You know what people want for people with money?
Do you know what they want from their politicians to be left alone?
Simple as that.
And this is what that country guarantees you.
And if you have a family, listen, this is you.
You can build a nice lifestyle for your family here.
You know, you got schools, you got parks, you got security is the most important part.
the security like we never had a security problem to solve for so we've been really lucky in that
sense the kind of people that immigrate to panama move to panama they're seeking that that oasis
that lifestyle um so as the country grows with foreign foreigners that move to panama it's
growing in the right kind of people also um so we've been very lucky in that sense it's probably
the greatest the greatest subsidy that this country has to its operation is security amazing
yeah i've heard it's it's clean it's safe you don't have to worry about do you often come to
panama i i tell you what man i have not i need to get down there but our team is there all the time
okay it's it's only a matter of time before i make the trip okay cool so when you do when you
do come you let me know man i will i will i'd love to love to catch up well hey let's round for home
here because we're at the top of the hour. I think I sent this to you, but I don't know if you had a
chance to look at it. My last question is always, what is an unpopular opinion that you have and
you get bonus points if you offend Bitcoiners with it? Yeah. Unpopular opinion.
i mean i would say
sometimes
you can't consult too much um you you can't make decisions based only or or
based on people's or democratic point of view.
That is, if you wait on democracy to take effect,
then you may miss out on timing and necessity.
Sometimes you need to act on intuition
and always listen to people.
Listen to your audience, listen to your users,
to your clients, to your constituents, you can always correct course.
What you cannot do is not do.
You've got to do.
You've got to decide.
You've got to act.
Sometimes that makes some people, like they call Bukele many times,
like a dictator.
But I think when it comes to leadership, I think what we need to do
is to act and have the humility to recognize when we have failed
and correct course based on people's reactions.
That's the one thing you got to always have,
that humility to listen to people, your clients.
Hey, you want to run a successful business,
don't forget to listen to your clients.
Listen to your constituents.
But your intuition, you got to act on it immediately.
And I'll leave you with this.
There was a kid, so today's the first day of school
for the school year in Panama.
A kid asked me, how do you make the right decisions?
I just stood there and I waited.
And then I kind of just answered something that was quite interesting.
I'm kind of using it for the first time now.
I don't make the right decisions.
I first decide.
I make a decision and then make it right.
And I think this is very important as an operating system for any human being.
is we got to always act.
When you have an opportunity in front of you,
you got to decide.
You got to act.
You can always find a way to make it better,
make it right if you screw it up,
but you got to act, right?
Well said.
All righty, man.
Hey, why don't you give people a handoff?
Is there a place that they can find you?
I'm obviously going to go learn about our Plan B program
if they want to get moving on toward Panama,
but any place you'd send them.
Yeah.
Hey, guys, listen.
I manage my own social media.
So you can tweet at me over X or on Instagram, and I respond directly to DMs personally.
Any questions you might have about Panama, happy to be your mayor and answer anything you might have.
Really excited.
Thank you very much, Michael, for doing this and for promoting our country.
I really hope to see you soon here, man.
Absolutely.
I appreciate you being here, Meyer.
Thank you.
Take care, dude.
Cheers.
And that's a wrap again. Hope you enjoyed my conversation with Meyer. I thought this was a very fun one. Just awesome to see that there is so much hope in the future for this nation of Panama that we are so excited about. It's a freedom loving place. I would encourage everyone to check out our Plan B residency. You can do that by going to the Bitcoin way dot com slash podcast. Schedule a free 30 minute consult with a member of our team.
We would love to walk you through what that process looks like, as well as if you need help with Bitcoin in proper self custody, online privacy, setting up a privacy phone.
We have a suite of self sovereignty solutions for you.
Again, it's the Bitcoin way dot com slash podcast.
Do me a huge favor.
If you're enjoying the show, if you like this episode, give us a like, subscribe, comment, pass it along to someone who you think might be interested in it.
We would really, really appreciate that.
And until next time, stay safe, stay sovereign, and remember the yield on Bitcoin is freedom.