The crypto bro – and he is predominantly the male of the species – around 94 per cent of the world’s 13 million cryptocurrency accounts are held by men – likes to keep his backpack strapped on as he makes his way into the party.
It’ll be a crypto bro, meet and greet, probably in San Francisco, possibly attended by the famed Winklevoss twins, maybe at CoinFund CEO / hipster angel investor Grant Hummer’s Crypto Crackhouse venue. Or at one of the satellite social events at super posh Swiss mountain resort St Moritz during the annual Crypto Finance Conference every January.
And like a Taylor Swift fan wearing a Taylor Swift tour t-shirt at a Taylor Swift show, this Block Chain Gang guy will be likely wearing some sort of bitcoin merch – a key chain, diamond necklace, beanie hat, hoodie or a trucker cap, maybe even a customised skateboard, all emblazoned with the double strike-thru’ capital B symbol.
Or, if he happens to be turbo crypto bro’ Fredric Fortier, a special digi-knit jumper with the word “Ethereum” woven into its colourful Nordic pattern.
You know Ethereum, right? The decentralized, open-source blockchain with smart contract functionality? The platform which has Ether as its native cryptocurrency? Cofounded by 27-year-old Russian-Canadian programmer and mega-bro Vitaly Dmitriyevich “Vitalik” Buterin, who wears child-like rainbow-coloured t-shirts and looks like Mark Zuckerberg’s nerdier, kid brother? Nope? Us neither.
Even though he has nightly Lambo dreams (the Lamborghini being the fantasy bitcoin bro’ car of choice) our cryptosphere inhabitant will take an Uber to and from the event – the bonafide bro doesn’t flash his cash…not yet, anyway – “the goal is to be rich…not to look rich”.
He will arrive home at his seven bro apartment share, in the early hours, after a champagne and shots afterparty, where the drunken conversation will be all about algorithmic trading, the self-driving transport revolution, blockchain protocols, Lambo the imminent, tectonic shift in power and wealth and world order. The live entertainment may well be supplied by Arya Bahmanyar, aka CoinDaddy the world’s first Bitcoin rapper.
For the crypto bro, cyberspace is the place. The future is rich and fabulous and you can work from home to get there. But while the market is still volatile and unpredictable, he has next to no interest in the material or tangible. Or in anything that you can’t plug in or have same-day delivered.
Stuff that reeks of old technology or traditional craft, the past with its classic, gas-guzzling cars, bespoke suits and creaky houses full of books and vinyl records – is for losers. Instead, the b-bro lives in simple and understated, almost monastic circumstances with a super-boosted internet connection.
Yes, he likes contemporary art, but only in NFT (non-fungible token) format. He talks about getting rich so he can give it all away and start a nonprofit. Just like multi-millionaire, founder of the peer-to-peer crypto market precision platform “Augur” founder Jeremy Gardener, now a self-styled “blockchain-boosting psychedelic adventure capitalist and aspiring adult normalizing men’s self-care by unf*cking faces”.
Gardener dresses like a Harry Styles wannabe and travels by PJ. On vacation, he carries around six or so high-powered external batteries so he doesn’t ever have to worry about finding a wall socket. Jeremy skateboards and hangs out with Tony Hawk.
Holidays? Ever since the cryptoverse endured the calamity of its very own Fyre Festival-style in the shape of Nananu-i-cake, a spectacular failure of Fijian island development that promised to be “a complete ecosystem that represents the blooming crypto space” and “a paradise made by crypto enthusiasts for crypto enthusiasts…to come live, work and have fun and enjoy a first-class crypto lifestyle” (Clue – it actually wasn’t any of these things) the burned-out bro may want to look for alternative vacation options.
How about Scotland’s Castle Craig, the world’s first rehabilitation clinic for cryptocurrency addiction offering therapeutic treatments for trading addictions, lockdown isolation, and the nasty, worldwide bull market?
But the holidaying and partying may well be on hold right now. A few days ago the Bitcoin business took a profound beating with an estimated around $1.4 trillion wiped from the crashing crypto market. With bitcoin prices dropping to under $33,000 per unit, down more than 50% from their November 2021 peak, already, January 2022 is already being dubbed “Crypto Winter.”
Is the global bro community bothered? Not at all. Across myriad Instagram feeds and crypto-threads on Reddit the swashbuckling disruptepreneurs are encouraging their fellow crypto-bros to “HODL” – HODL being SMS bro-speak for “hold on. Don’t panic”. “Even when there is (“fear, uncertainty and doubt”). “FUD” all around. Big blocker vision? Still 20/20. Lambo dreams on hold for now.
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