Who encouraged Sun Zhengyi to invest 200 million U.S. dollars in Bitcoin?

Original source: Deepchain

Editor’s Note: Today, some media reported that Softbank Masayoshi Son said at the New York Times Summit that Bitcoin is “ Incomprehensible," who had previously invested $200 million, which was 1% of his personal assets. But since investing in Bitcoin, seeing its price fluctuate every five minutes every day has prevented him from focusing on his business. And stop investing in Bitcoin, he "gets better."

About Sun Zhengyi’s investment in Bitcoin, there have been a lot of media reports in 2019, and the title is also very eye-catching-"Sun Zhengyi lost 130 million yuan in Bitcoin investment U.S. dollars,” but Son did not respond to the news at the time. Now Sun Zhengyi has made a positive response.

Why did Sun Zhengyi invest in Bitcoin? What's the story behind this? Welcome to Deep Chain Finance's previous report "Softbank Masayoshi Son Invested in Bitcoin Losing $130 Million "Inside Story""

When the news of "Softbank Masayoshi Son Investing in Bitcoin Lost $130 Million" went viral, The name Peter Brig is widely mentioned.

Many people know that Peter Brig is the co-chairman of Fortress Investment Group, but they don’t know that he is also an important role in promoting Bitcoin into Wall Street.

Under the promotion of Peter Brig, the former star hedge fund manager of Goldman Sachs and the legendary Wall Street investor Michael Novogratz joined the cryptocurrency industry, Founded the digital asset investment bank "Digital Galaxy" known as "Goldman Sachs in the cryptocurrency industry".

Also under the impetus of Peter Brig, Fortress Investment invested 20 million US dollars to buy Bitcoin, becoming the first Bitcoin investment Wall Street firm.

Even Peter Brig tried to push for a partnership with Wells Fargo to create the first regulated bitcoin exchange in the US.

So, when Softbank acquired Fengbao Investment for US$3.3 billion in February 2017, Masayoshi Son was doomed to be Peter Brig " Encouragement to buy Bitcoin.

Softbank Masayoshi Son Quilt

Overnight, the whole world knew that Masayoshi Son of Softbank Group lost $130 million in Bitcoin because of a report in the Wall Street Journal.

“At the end of 2017, when Bitcoin was close to the historical high price of 20,000 US dollars, Sun Zhengyi invested in Bitcoin and sold it in early 2018 after the price plummeted.” A source familiar with the matter told the Wall Street Journal.

That is to say, when Bitcoin reached its high point, Sun Zhengyi entered the market quietly, and then was trapped on the top of the mountain.

Some people say that the failure to invest in Bitcoin will damage Sun Zhengyi’s reputation. After all, his previous image was that of a patient and predictable investor.

About Sun Zhengyi, the story of his investment in Alibaba is widely circulated. It only took 6 minutes to decide to invest 20 million US dollars in Jack Ma. After Alibaba went public in the U.S., Sun Zhengyi got a return of nearly 1,000 times.

Of course, the strength of Softbank and Masayoshi Son must be recognized, but in terms of investment, during the Internet bubble period, Masayoshi Son was most commendable by Alibaba and Masayoshi Yahoo's two, and hundreds of other investments have mostly failed. It can be said that before Alibaba went public, Sun Zhengyi had no successful investment cases that could be obtained.

Some people say that "Sun Zhengyi is a darling favored by the goddess of fate, and he happened to meet Alibaba, a lucky star."

But now it seems that in the field of cryptocurrency, Sun Zhengyi is not so lucky.

How did Sun Zhengyi become attached to Bitcoin?

Informed sources said that Masayoshi Son invested in Bitcoin at the encouragement of Fortress Investment Group co-chairman Peter Briger (Peter Briger) of.

Fortress Investment Group is a veteran private equity firm established in 1998, led by Wesley R. Edens from UBS and Blackstone Group ), Rob Kauffman and Randal Nardone.

The company quickly expanded to hedge funds, real estate-related investments and debt securities shortly after its establishment. Novogratz (Michael Novogratz) is in charge of operations.

Peter Brig is an expert in dealing with bad debts at Goldman Sachs, and Michael Novogratz is a star hedge fund manager at Goldman Sachs and a legendary investor on Wall Street. The two promoted the development of Fengbao after the investment.

On February 9, 2007, Fortress Investment Group was listed on the New York Stock Exchange, which was the first large-scale private equity company listed in the United States at that time. As of September 30, 2016, Fortress Investments managed $70.1 billion in credit assets, private equity, hedge funds and fixed income investments.

In February 2017, Fengbao Investment was acquired by Softbank at a price of 3.3 billion U.S. dollars and operated independently within the Softbank structure. Peter Brig and other executives agreed stay with the company.

Why did Peter Brig recommend Masayoshi Son to buy Bitcoin? Speaking of which, this is related to the story of Peter Brig, Fengbao Investment and Bitcoin .

Executives of listed companies join Bitcoin

The story of Peter Brig and Bitcoin began in January 2013 on a ski trip in Canada.

At that time, Peter Brig invited several financiers and entrepreneurs to live in a hotel owned by Fengbao Investment, and one of the guests was Vincis Argentinian of Wences Casares.

Vinces previously founded the digital wallet company Lemon, and after Lemon was acquired by LifeLock in 2013, he founded the bitcoin security company XAPO. Vincis later became a member of PayPal's board of directors.

Bitcoin cannot enter the upper class without Vences propaganda. The founder of LinkedIn and Microsoft executives have heard Vences introduce Bitcoin , former PayPal president David Marcus (David Marcus) bought and studied bitcoin with the encouragement of Vincis, PayPal called Vincis a "bitcoin thought leader."

In 2011, Vincis came into contact with Bitcoin. At that time, he wanted to transfer a sum of money from the United States to a friend in Argentina, but the time and cost of traditional fund transfer channels were very high, and the friend told him that using Bitcoin was a good solution.

The day Vincis learned about Bitcoin, he found someone in San Francisco who was willing to sell him 2,700 bitcoins for $8,000. Si transferred these bitcoins to friends.

The deal got Vincis hooked on bitcoin, a currency anyone can buy online that promises to be worth less than pesos ( Argentinian currency) is better. It also appears to provide access to the financial system for those without access to bank accounts and credit cards.

Subsequently, Vincis began to write articles to introduce Bitcoin and his own experience to his friends.

After traveling around Argentina in 2012, Vincis started hoarding coins by posting offers on Internet message boards to buy and sell bitcoins Bitcoin, and organized the first Bitcoin meetup in Argentina in December 2012.

At the same time, he also began to tell his friends in Silicon Valley about the benefits of Bitcoin. "The advantages of the Bitcoin network will push the value of each bitcoin to an astronomical value, during which each bitcoin can act as an easy and secure store of value, similar to gold."

Over a long ski day, Vincis spoke to Peter Brigg and others about how Bitcoin works and why it matters. However, in the impression of Peter Brig and others, Bitcoin is a relatively marginal technology, and it is also active in dark webs and black markets like the Silk Road.

Wenxisi told everyone that Bitcoin is not only used for black market transactions, in fact it is a new network that allows funds to be used anywhere in the world Free transfer.

Peter Brig was dubious about what Vincis said, but with years of financial experience, he also vaguely felt that Bitcoin seemed to be an potential technology.

Peter Brig immediately emailed one of his most trusted aides after hearing Vincis's introduction, asking him about Bitcoin. learn. After returning to San Francisco, I opened an account on the Mt. Gox exchange and bought $100,000 in bitcoin.

After that, Peter Brig began to introduce Bitcoin to his colleagues and friends. ” bought $7 million in Bitcoin, and later received huge returns, and founded Galaxy Digital, a digital asset investment bank known as “Goldman Sachs in the cryptocurrency world”.

In addition to promoting Bitcoin, Peter Brig also began to discuss with his colleagues how to let Fortress Investment participate in this emerging market.

The first Wall Street firm to invest in Bitcoin

In addition to being the first large-scale private equity company listed in the United States, Fortress Investment has also become a The first Wall Street firm to invest in Bitcoin.

Fortress Investments filed a report with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission showing that the investment group set aside $20 million to buy bitcoin in 2013.

"Fengbao Investment may be the first listed company to disclose that it holds a large amount of Bitcoin." Some analysts commented.

At that time, it was also reported that Fortress Investment planned to launch a Bitcoin investment fund and a Bitcoin ETF. The first regulated bitcoin exchange.

In short, since 2013, Fengbao Investment, an asset management company, has had a close relationship with Bitcoin.

About the story of Fengbao Investment wanting to build an exchange, Nathaniel Popper, a financial reporter of the New York Times, wrote in "Digital Gold: Bitcoin Fresh It is recorded in the book "Story Known".

In the winter of 2013, several executives from Wells Fargo, one of the largest banks in the United States, traveled from San Francisco to New York to attend the headquarters meeting of Fortress Investment. Discuss a very controversial and potential project: the creation of the first regulated Bitcoin exchange in the United States.

Fortress Investment has a large conference room on the 47th floor of its Manhattan headquarters. Executives from several departments of Wells Fargo Bank showed up as scheduled, and the Fortress Investment team also invited Some Silicon Valley celebrities who support Bitcoin. A dozen people gathered in the conference room, and Fortress co-chairman Peter Brigg stood up to prepare for the discussion.

Peter Brigg explains why the Fortress investment team is so interested in Bitcoin technology.

It's both a kind of digital gold and a whole new way to send money cheaply and almost instantly. He suggested Wells Fargo should jump on the bitcoin bandwagon, as the new network has the potential to challenge some of the basic services the bank offers, such as a payments network.

Peter Brig talked about the current lack of a regulated bitcoin exchange in the United States, which is what Fortress Investment and Wells Fargo can provide.

However, this meeting did not discuss a result until the end. Wells Fargo also voiced opposition to Fortress’s proposal to invest in the wake of a bitcoin crash. The plan to build a bitcoin exchange was never made public either.

While the two financial giants did not end up working together, the conversation opened a window for Wall Street to slowly embrace the new technology, bitcoin.

At the end of 2013, due to the decline of Bitcoin, Fengbao Investment lost 20% of its investment in Bitcoin, which attracted many media reports. The "Financial Times" commented that although investing in Bitcoin is losing money at the moment, Fengbao Investment's attempt is of great significance, because the "new peer-to-peer digital currency based on cryptography" led by Bitcoin is an area that Wall Street is increasingly interested in .

If it is said that Bitcoin’s entry into the upper class benefited from Vincent’s promotion among the rich, then Bitcoin’s attention on Wall Street is due to Peter Brig and Fortress Investments.

In February 2017, Fortress Investment was acquired by Softbank for US$3.3 billion and operated independently within the Softbank structure. Agreed to stay with the company.

From this time on, Sun Zhengyi was destined to be "incited" by Peter Brig to buy Bitcoin.

However, just as Fengbao Investment previously invested in Bitcoin Like the loss of Bitcoin, Sun Zhengyi's investment in Bitcoin does not seem to be a bad thing.

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