Mike Colyer joined Foundry as its founding CEO in October 2019. In this discussion we touch on how Foundry is navigating this crypto winter and the especially challenging environment that it presents to bitcoin miners. Colyer also shares thoughts on what it is like to be a Digital Currency Group portfolio company and how Foundry does business with other subsidiaries such as Genesis Trading and Grayscale. He also shares some key predictions for 2023.
Forbes: Can you talk a little bit more about how you interact or do business with some of the other DCG portfolio companies?When we were originally getting Foundry started, we worked very closely with Genesis. They were able to provide capital to get our equipment financing business off the ground. We don't have any exposure today with the Genesis lending business. In our equipment financing business, we're going to end the year with less than $3 million of loans left on our books.
Forbes: Can you give an example or two of how the financing business supply chain logistics business works?Most of the equipment is made in Southeast Asia by Bitmain and MicroBT and there is typically a six-to-nine-month delay between when you have to put your deposit down and when the machines are actually shipped. In our equipment financing business, we had requested customers put 20% down, we'd provide the 80% financing, and we placed orders for those machines.
Forbes: Let's turn to the crypto winter. How is Foundry approaching this difficult mining environment?We're in crypto winter and the miners are struggling, especially the ones who took out a lot of leverage. Our goal is to again, continue to support the mining ecosystem. We are participating in the various bankruptcies, trying to keep projects alive, keep moving them forward. We just completed the Compute North bankruptcy process, which is a great team that got over leveraged.
Forbes: What are your thoughts on some of the regulatory headwinds facing bitcoin mining in particular?Obviously, we were very disappointed with Governor Kathy Hochul for signing the moratorium bill in New York. We think it's bad legislation, a bad signal to send and a bad direction to go in. We have a whole public policy team and we're really focused on helping educate policymakers around our industry.
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