00:05:45 · Jan Van Eck
[00:05:45] S1: Yeah. I mean, it's it's just leapfrogging of better software, as I call it. I don't use the word intelligence because I don't know what that is, but it's just better, faster, smarter software that can write software, and that's the first part. So, I think that the the trade is changing, Anthony. So, it used to be very simple. I'm the simple... Demand's here, supply's here. Right? And, there will be a lot of dynamism within the ecosystem. Like I say, a year ago, fourth quarter of last year, CoreWeave and Oracle were down 50%. So the public markets are are merciless, right, when they smell, financing problems or tech changes or whatever. So there's a lot of change within the trade, but the overall was obviously huge amount of demand relative to supply. I think right now, we're getting to a stage, we were talking about this before, where you can project token demand going forward. So for every other segment or other company, you can say, oh, they're gonna sell x number of hamburgers or x number of Netflix subscriptions. We're now, I think, going to be able... We have enough visibility that we can start projecting token demand. What we've did is take our user base and said, what is our adoption by user? And basically, in the first year, your token usage goes up eight times, and then it grows about 25% after that annualized. But a lot... There's a lot of VanEck people that don't use it a lot. So that's a rolling process, and we kind of push that forward to the industry and came up with the same industry estimates of total token demand, that that other people did from a macro perspective. So I think that's gonna be the game going forward.
00:07:35 · Anthony Pompliano, Jan Van Eck
[00:07:35] S2: I'm sure most of the people who work in the ETF industry would love to understand how VanEck is using AI internally. Have you figured out novel use cases that are, like, ETF specific, or is this still claudess, like, you know, either for coding or, like, a Google on steroids? [00:07:52] S1: There's nothing magical, I would say. To me, it's... I always say AI is just data, software, and people. And, you know, eighteen months ago, you... AI couldn't read a PDF. Right? Six months... Seven months ago now, I've been kept yelling in my IT department, why can't these agents read my email and my calendar and make my life more efficient? Now that's table stakes. Right? So it's just this sequence of accessing more and more databases within VanEck and making... Enabling... Giving the power to the user. And then what we're trying to do is make sure that someone builds an application, not five people build the same application or agent. So we're trying to promote that sharing, but it's a lot of just, education and communication. Yeah. [00:08:44] S2: And have you hired people specifically to manage, like, the AI spend or the AI intelligence inside of the firm, or is this just the people you had are now adopting the new technology?
00:08:44 · Anthony Pompliano, Jan Van Eck
[00:08:44] S2: And have you hired people specifically to manage, like, the AI spend or the AI intelligence inside of the firm, or is this just the people you had are now adopting the new technology? [00:08:56] S1: I think the a... IT department has been completely repurposed from... No. Really, writing code, which they need, you know, like, maybe 20% of the people that for the code that we do, we rely on a lot of third party applications. So that repurpose to doing what I just said. I love I love this stat. I I've quoted it before, but the CEO of PNC Bank was quoted, interviewed about a year ago. And he was frustrated because they do a lot of, tuck in acquisitions. And, he said, it's so expensive. I wanna make this process better. So they normalized their data, and to do that, they spent $2,000,000,000 a year for ten years just to clean up the data. So I think that's where corporate America is now is... And that's why Accenture stock, I don't know if you saw it completely bounced after a massive correction is, oh, yeah. You know, it's very expensive to organize data. [00:09:53] S2: And then have you limited people's usage or you want them to use this as much as possible? [00:09:59] S1: Not yet. [00:10:00] S2: Is that maybe coming?
00:10:00 · Anthony Pompliano, Jan Van Eck
[00:10:00] S2: Is that maybe coming? [00:10:02] S1: My CFO is like, Jan, do you realize how much money people are spending? I'm like, I don't wanna throttle people. And our our CTO is like, make them fill out a form. And I'm like, no. Don't create friction for the adoption of this technology. Like, it's... That's their first instinct is to make it harder. And I'm like, oh, yeah. You're gonna build a little database app where they have to fill in five fields. They won't understand three of the fields, and that's that. That's my that's my philosophy. [00:10:28] S2: Have you publicly said how much you guys are spending on AI? [00:10:32] S1: We did a couple of quarters ago. I mean, that's sort of in the $2,000,000 range annualized. [00:10:38] S2: So it's but it's not like you're spending [00:10:40] S1: 20 No. It's starting to... Like, I'm not saying that that's throwaway money, right, at all, but I'm just saying if you need to encourage adoption, you have to be very careful about the signaling. Okay. A lot of need for management, Anthony, between the IT people and the business people and it's just really promoting the champions and it's a lot of education. I would say the one big hire is like a COO type of person who's just floating around and connecting dots for people. [00:11:10] S2: Makes, makes sense. Let's talk about the third theme. You and I were brothers in arms on this one. The government's never gonna stop printing money.
00:11:10 · Anthony Pompliano, Jan Van Eck
[00:11:10] S2: Makes, makes sense. Let's talk about the third theme. You and I were brothers in arms on this one. The government's never gonna stop printing money. [00:11:19] S1: Yeah. It's really a frustrating, from an investor perspective because I don't think we ever know when it's gonna hit the financial markets. It could be in three months. It could be in thirty years. So I say that upfront. And I also, in our third quarter review, really believe that the rise in rates recently was not credit driven. I think it was... Look, it's either inflation concerns, economic growth, or credit concerns. And again, I like to oversimplify. So which which one is it? Which one is it? Inflation, economic growth, or credit concerns? I think it was economic growth. Nominal GDP went up. I I don't think people... For a while, the ten year traded with, the price of oil. But if you look over the bulk of this war or conflict with Iran, you know, the ten year didn't go up. The ten year rallied in the beginning of the war. So I don't think it's just strictly oil prices that are driving it, but it's pressuring the rest of people's portfolios.
00:12:21 · Anthony Pompliano
[00:12:21] S2: Today's episode is brought to you by Abra. Bitcoin holders know the long game, but sometimes you want liquidity today or a way to pursue more Bitcoin over time. That's why Abra caught my attention. It offers two different ways to make your Bitcoin holdings work harder depending on what your goals are. If you need dollars without selling your Bitcoin, then you can explore Bitcoin backed loans with US dollars or USDC borrowing options. You can review the terms and compare rates at abra.com/pomp. Thinking longer term? Explore Abra's Bitcoin yield strategy, managed by SEC registered investment advisor, Abra Capital Management. It aims to generate yield denominated in Bitcoin, which can have a strong compounding effect over time. I recently spoke with Abra CEO Bill Barhydt on the show for a much deeper exploration on Abra, tokenization, and more. Go and check it out, and if either approach interests you, visit abra.com/pomp to learn more. Abra is a paid sponsor. This is not investment advice. Loans and yield strategies carry risks, including liquidation and loss of principal. Returns aren't guaranteed. Go check them out at abro.com/pump. Every person listening to this show, you probably own Bitcoin and you got it the same way. You paid full price on an exchange. But there's a smaller group of business owners, family offices, and investors with sharp CPAs, and they're quietly getting theirs a very different way. They own the machines that make it. Mining. Here's how it works. You buy the miners, and Simple Mining hosts and runs them at their facilities in Iowa on industrial power rates that you could never get on your own. The Bitcoin they mine goes straight from your machine to your wallet. There's two reasons I find this interesting right now. One, the economics. Cheap power lets you convert electricity into Bitcoin at a discount to spot. You're acquiring the asset below the sticker price that everyone else pays. But second, and listen closely, you've got a big income here. Miners are classified as computer equipment. Equipment means depreciation. Qualifying buyers can write off the entire purchase in year one. It's the same playbook real estate investors have run for decades, pointed at Bitcoin.