1/ The right founder and their leadership is often a defining factor in why a blockchain project progresses & succeeds beyond the “good idea” stage.
We are digging into some leaders in the crypto space.
Third up, Do Kwon aka @stablekwon
RTs appreciated! $LUNA
A thread 🧵
We are digging into some leaders in the crypto space.
Third up, Do Kwon aka @stablekwon
RTs appreciated! $LUNA
A thread 🧵
2/ Do Kwon is the co founder and CEO of Terraform Labs.
In 2019 he was recognised as one as one of the Forbes 30 under 30 leaders in the Finance and VC category.
In 2019 he was recognised as one as one of the Forbes 30 under 30 leaders in the Finance and VC category.
3/ Do studied computer science at Stanford for 5 years.
4/ His first job out of college was with Microsoft, where he was an engineer.
5/ In 2016 he went into the startup space and founded Anyfi, which was a wireless mesh network. They offered full stack networking enterprise solutions for large venues (theme parks, airports etc).
6/ It is one of the most sophisticated decentralized applications in real world use.
7/ So how did Do get into crypto?
Like most of us through a friend.
Like most of us through a friend.
8/ Towards the end of 2016 a friend of Do’s randomly invited him to a Facebook chat where eight people were discussing Ethereum and Monero.
9/ He then started to google these key words he was hearing to see what they were. Subsequently, he went down the rabbit hole.
10/ Do spent a lot of time in 2016-17 reading white papers and getting into heated debates about protocols and various things until he decided to get into crypto full time at the end of 2017.
11/ In 2017 Do thought that there weren’t enough people trying to bring crypto outwards. Crypto seemed self serving.
12/ What was crypto good for at that time? The way he saw it, crypto was good for trading with crypto, which created a circular economy.
13/ His perspective was that if we couldn’t find a way to efficiently allocate capital to bring in millions of users so that they could benefit from crypto networks in a way that they couldn’t benefit from traditional finance, then, well, all of this was for nothing.
14/ Do figured we were never going to cross over to the mainstream if you take that inward looking mindset. You need to build an outside in mindset.
15/ That’s the perspective with which Do started Terra.
16/ @terra_money is a public blockchain protocol deploying a suite of algorithmic decentralized stablecoins which underpin a thriving ecosystem that brings DeFi to the masses.
18/ Terra is one of the only blockchain projects with real users who may not even know they are using crypto. The technology melts away into the background.
19/ The CHAI wallet is a perfect example of this. CHAI is part of the Blockchain payment system Terra.
20/ In case you didn’t know, Terra’s payment rail is built on two Cryptocurrencies: The native stablecoin of Terra for funds across the networks and the token $LUNA designed for small transaction fees for miners – like 0.1 or 1%, as explained in the Terra white paper.
21/ Terra and CHAI were meticulously designed from day one to drive mass adoption and deliver the right kind of value, to be able to drive millions of customers to use it.
22/ CHAI now has 2 million plus users in South Korea.
23/ Do says Terra will keep focusing on looking outwards. How can we bring as many people into crypto as possible and how can we offer things that are natively good about crypto and package that into a retail proposition that millions of retail users can understand.
24/ That focus is the same across their savings products, synthetics products and payments products and that’s never going to change in terms of the lifecycle of Terra form labs.
25/ $UST is the fastest growing stable coin and now sits at around $7.8B in market cap and $LUNA has become the 12th largest crypto currency by market cap.
26/ What about some insights into Do Kwon’s personality?
Well, we know Do was a big fan of Starcraft:
Well, we know Do was a big fan of Starcraft:
https://twitter.com/stablekwon/status/1382522466224857090
27/ More importantly, we know Do is not willing to back down from a fight, even if it's against a pretty powerful opponent.
Enter the SEC.
Enter the SEC.
28/ Do is sueing the SEC for two subpoenas which he says were improperly issued and served by the SEC, as well as the SEC’s failure to keep confidential an investigation into the ‘Mirror Protocol - all in violation of the Due Process Clause, the SEC’s Rules and the APA.
29/ The subpoenas were served on Do in public: He was approached by the process server as he exited an escalator at the Mainnet summit while on his way to make a scheduled presentation that was not about the Mirror Protocol.
30/ To put this into perspective, Coinbase backed down against the SEC earlier in the year when they warned them off against launching their lend product.
31/ I think we speak for everyone in the crypto world, when we say we are rooting for you Do. It's about time someone stood up to the bullying tactics of the SEC.
32/ Another thing we know about Do is his ability to stay calm under pressure. He subsequently gave a keynote talk at Messari mainnet having just been served by the SEC. Nerves of steel.
33/ It’s clear Do combines a great technical mind with an entrepreneurial spirit. He spotted a gap in the market for a new kind of blockchain payment system that could benefit millions of users without added complexity and has executed on that vision brilliantly.
34/ He has a natural affinity for community building too and has amassed a dedicated cult of followers in the lunatics.
35/ Do is a great leader in the space and we’re sure that this is just the beginning for him and Terra.
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You can check out our previous two deep dive threads on crypto founders here:
https://twitter.com/alpha_pls/status/1461737393376022531
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