The conversation revolves around the Tim Ferriss podcast with Naval Ravikant, focusing on his views and ideas. The chapters cover topics such as desires, anxiety, and personal judgment; meditation and dealing with anxiety; the importance of reading; balancing wealth building and happiness; making money as a skill; money as a tool for freedom; creating wealth and ethical money-making; understanding cryptocurrency and blockchain; stablecoins and the role of money in developing countries; and the risks and benefits of monetary policies.

Chapters

00:00 - Introduction and Background of Naval Ravikant

02:50 - Desires, Anxiety, and Personal Judgment

06:04 - Meditation and Dealing with Anxiety

08:55 - Ignoring External Judgments

12:45 -The Importance of Reading

16:12 -Selective Reading and Finding Pleasure in Reading

20:54 - Balancing Wealth Building and Happiness

25:08 - Making Money as a Skill

28:54 - Money as a Tool for Freedom

32:54 - Creating Wealth and Ethical Money-Making

36:03 - Understanding Cryptocurrency and Blockchain

41:58 - Stablecoins and the Role of Money in Developing Countries

45:49 - The Risks and Benefits of Monetary Policies

Transcript:

[00:00:00] Sam: So you watched the the Tim Ferriss podcast with Naval Ravikant. Yeah, he's Indian ethnicity. He was born in India actually, but he moved to the United States when he was very young.

[00:00:11] Student: Yeah, absolutely. And he's he's really, really, really a smart person. Very clever. It's it's it's outstanding.

How, how, how clever is this guy? And he speaks very clearly with very clear ideas. That's a, that's a, a, a symbol of of of of of smart to be able to, to, to explain things in a very simple way. Yes. That means that you, you must do them. You must. Exactly. And I, I, I loved it that much that I, I shared it with with my wife.

Mm-Hmm. . And also I looked for other podcasts of him. Okay. And I, I found one with, also with the team, with this guy. Mm-Hmm. in 2015. Okay. Yeah. So eight years before Mm-Hmm. And that was nice because he was younger. He has.

And it was also very interesting because he spoke more about his personal life, his personal trajectory in life. And he was he was more relaxed. He was more, he was more cool. He was more, I don't know if he had more troubles in the last podcast or or just, he, he had more maybe fixed ideas much more than eight years ago, but you can see the evolution of, of the guy where he's still Very, very smart guy with very, very interesting view of, of the world, but that's not a really the same person.

Really? 20, 22 or 23, I don't, I don't, yeah,

[00:01:58] Sam: I'll have to I. I recently listened to the one that I sent you and I really enjoyed it as well. And I think I've actually listened to that podcast before maybe a few years ago or when it first came out, because I am a big fan of Naval Ravikant himself.

So I'll listen to that early one that you mentioned and I'll yeah, I'll have a look and see if I notice any differences between him. So what are some of the ideas or the big ideas that he shared, which you found most interesting?

[00:02:28] Student: Well they talked two hours. So they talked about a lot of of of of points of topics.

I, I love the, the, the, the way he, he, he, he sees, he sees the world. I mean, he's very direct and frank with with himself with no concession with no lie. I I learned that yeah, some, some points are interesting. For example, the idea that when you have dreams, when you have desires, it's totally natural to have desires.

But and it's it's positive, of course, but also it can be negative because he can frustrates. And it, it can generate an anxiety,

[00:03:14] Sam: anxiety, anxiety, anxiety.

[00:03:16] Student: Thank you. Also, it can generate anxiety because if they keep just desires that, that are not that have no ization mm-hmm. It can create anxiety and sadness and for example one of, the rules that he always try to follow is just to have one desire at a single moment and try to, to, to achieve it, try to realize it. And not to have too many desires at the same time. That's a, that's a really nice rule that he, that he respects. And that makes sense for me. And that's that's the, the, the, the first thing.

The second thing is the. They talked a lot about anxiety and how to, to, how to to struggle against, against anxiety. He, he does a lot of meditation. But in a very concrete way, in a very pragmatic way, I mean, he's not like a Buddha, you know, just sitting in a strange way and no, he just passed time with himself.

And let his brain just, just thinks whatever you want to think, and he let its brain express itself, the this this concept allows to, to listen to your brain and to, to treat that that thinks of your brain, because if you, if you, you're always. Passive with those thoughts of, of your brain, you create also anxiety because you just ignore them.

You just avoid them all the time because you are, you're focused on other things because you, you're in, in your day to day, but your brain keeps thinking and keeps Yeah. Mm-Hmm. Constructing that, that ideas. And that concept that, that you have to, of course, to, to, to, to have an answer to, to, you cannot just them still avoiding them your life.

That was about the anxiety that what I, I can, I can remember it was five or six days ago. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:05:43] Sam: I think it connects to the, the, the desire point as well, because I think once you probably, I, I've never done what he proposes, which is to meditate 60 minutes. For 60 days, and like you said, he doesn't focus on his breath or other things.

He just lets his mind kind of do what it wants to do for 60 minutes. And he kind of compares it to like a really busy email box. And he says that, you know, once you do this for 60 days, then you've maybe thought about all the things that you really kind of have unconsciously absorbed or consumed over, you know, how many years or whatever.

And your, your inbox is empty because you've thought all of the things that you kind of really, that your brain just keeps throwing at you, which happens all throughout our days. And to link back to your desire point. I think he can, after doing that, he kind of realizes how many desires pop into his head thinking, Oh, I need to impress this woman.

Oh, I need to earn more money because this person has more money than me. And I think he's probably now noticed that how many of these desires pop into his head and that he doesn't need to chase all of them.

[00:07:06] Student: Yeah, yeah, totally, totally. I totally agree with you. And that was really that is really interesting.

That is very clever. That is very smart. Another point that Interests me is that in the construction of his of his per personality he, he has nothing to, to do on with what other persons, other people think about him. Other people think about him. Yeah, he just, he just making things for himself and whatever other people think.

That's that will have no impact on him. And I think that this is a very crucial point. I think for your to be balanced in life and for you, your happiness to take a maximum distance with the judgment. Of of others that was something that I, I tried to do for many, many years and with success.

I have to admit that's something that I'm proud of. I'm not proud of. Everything that I do in my life, of course, but at this point, in particular, I'm quite proud of it. And I try to, to, to, to, to, to show it to my daughters to, and it's very, very important for me. I apply it not totally like he does, but I, for me, what is important is my own judgments.

For myself, and I'm quite hard with myself. So there's a level of of of the, the standard is, is, I think is, is hard and also the judgment, not only me, because it's, it's impossible, but also the judgment of your judgment. Near Cyprus, the person that really counts for you, your wife, your children, your parents, brother, sister, sibling, those person are important people, those people are really important in your life, so yeah, what they think about you is also important.

But, sincerely, for all the other people, I, I mean, there's no, they can think whatever they want about me, it won't change anything. So Yeah.

[00:09:40] Sam: I've I used to really, when I was younger, I used to really care what people thought about me, and I think a lot of people do when they're a lot younger, and then as you get older, and you mature, you start to realize that It doesn't, first of all, you don't know what people's opinions are of you.

So unless they tell you, most of the time you're just guessing and most of the time you're probably guessing wrong. So second of all, most people are so concerned about themselves that they don't actually give that much time and energy and thoughts to other people. And that's, that's quite the, my major advice for people who Have drank a little bit too much alcohol and they wake up the next day and they're thinking, Oh, I'm so embarrassed.

The thing is, everyone you're with is also embarrassed and thinking about themselves. They're not thinking about what how you were dancing or what you did, which were funny, which was funny. So, yeah, so you don't know what people are thinking. First, they're also just thinking about themselves most of the time.

And third of all, most people don't really like themselves. So why would you care about what they think about you? If they're not good, if they're not good judges of character, or they're not of good character themselves, why would you care about their opinion?

[00:10:57] Student: Absolutely. Absolutely. So I totally agree with you.

That's a really important point. I think for for your life to be to be well balanced in your life to be happy. It is very important to ignore the external judgments. It is really important. And just to make your own trajectory, your own path. Yep. Other point that is that was really important for him, and I think that his his rights is the importance to read.

Mm. Which it's really, really important for him because it reading books, whatever you read he says the, the important is to, to, to learn to, to to take pleasure reading. And you can just start by some trash books. It doesn't matter. But if you, if you, if you begin to have pleasure reading. You will progress and you will like to read books more interesting that will that will and you will be able to develop skills by your own.

And I think that that is, is totally right. I don't read enough. I mean I read a lot of articles, newspaper. I read a lot every day. I read every day really a lot, but books, I, I, I, I don't read many books. My wife read reads many, many, many books. And also we're trying to to to encourage, to push our children.

To read also. So for example, this weekend after listening to the, to the podcast, I have my, my two daughters read a lot books. But the, the older one didn't read for, for a couple of weeks. And I told her, well, let's go to the, to the, to the store and let's, let's let's, let's buy some books and I want you to, to restart reading and also in, in this environment with with the phones, with the tablets, with the.

When you have always the dopamine, the push of dopamine, dopamine, dopamine, it is important to, to travel because when you read books, you, you, you, you stop everything and you just, you just focused on your story or whatever you did knowledge you're trying to, to, to understand and you, you, you, you travel and you're.

Your, your mind really take all it is, the push of everyday, the

[00:13:34] Sam: day to day. Yeah. I really like his advice and reading and yeah, he's not very, he, he, I think he has this idea that. If you don't love reading, then you should just find something regardless of what it is, even if it's junk reading. But then just read whatever you really enjoy and then you'll start kind of enjoying the process of reading or getting used to it.

So sometimes it's, it's easy. It's good to just go to a, like you said, go to a bookshop and just find any book that looks interesting for you, which you'll be which you'd love to read and then just read it. And then hopefully that. continues, but I think he's I remember watching or listening to a podcast or him talk about reading.

I think he's quite some people at me in the past, for example, when they start reading a book, they feel like they have to finish it, especially, especially like a nonfiction book. Yeah. And he, he doesn't believe that. And he thinks that a lot of nonfiction books, for example, you can get. The main ideas quite quickly, or maybe you can skim read or like kind of skip to different chapters, which you find useful because sometimes you might be reading something and you think, you know, I don't actually really need to know all of this.

So, for example, there's a great book about sleeping called Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker, and it's like the Bible of sleeping. I don't know if there's been a new updated edition or whatever but it's the holy book of of, of sleeping. And in it, he gives all the reasons why sleep is important.

But for some people, I found that interesting, so I listened to the whole thing on audio audible. For some people, They might not care really about the studies and all the specific reasons why they just want to know the practical tips of how they can sleep better and they could just read that one chapter or that, you know, couple of pages and then that's all they need and they can move on to something else and You know, rather than wasting time and energy on just trying to put like facts and figures into our heads that we're never really going to use instead just find the stuff that is interesting and useful for you and move

[00:15:46] Student: on.

Totally, totally. And he said that he didn't say it in the podcast you sent me, but in the other one of 2015, he said that when books have a lot of pages, pages, because you have to justify with the editor the book, you have to justify that you will you will cut I don't know how many trees, I But the reality is that any book has two, three, four, five ideas, concepts that can be resumed in only a few pages.

So, yeah, that's right. That's, that's totally right. And I was happy also because I finally found someone that don't like to watch movies. I felt quite alone in this world. I thought that I was the only guy. In, in the earth that don't like to watch movies and I found another one, so I'm, I'm happy.

There's no sense. Yeah, it's just, it's just nothing, but it's, it's ironic. I liked it.

[00:16:54] Sam: Why don't you like watching movies?

[00:16:55] Student: I don't know. I get bored. I really, I cannot explain really. I feel, I feel bored after 20 minutes, 30 minutes. Well, I watched movies that that are really, really nice and I love them.

Like, for example the, the, the series of movies of Pacino with the Mafia. I don't know to how we, how the God the Godfather. Yeah. That, that was really nice. Scarface. What was, it was really nice. I love Scarface. I love, I I like very much Al Pacino. He had a movie that he was a, a football manager.

I'm not sure I've seen this one. Yeah, it's really nice. It's really nice. Also, one with the devil, the pact with the devil. In French it's l'associé du diable. But well, yeah, I watched like 10, 15 movies that really interest me and the others, well, I, I get quickly bored. I don't know why I cannot explain, but it's a, it's a, it's a.

[00:18:04] Sam: Yeah. And Naval is quite an interesting person because he seems to balance personal finance, or maybe not personal finance, kind of wealth building and his entrepreneurial side. But he also kind of does it by. Advocating and encouraging balance and having a happy life. And he doesn't see he doesn't play the, he talks about games a lot and he doesn't play.

He, he realizes that there are, you know, certain games as games at school, getting the best grades getting a, a good job. Kind of the dating game, marriage game, children game, I want my children to be better than other people's and money and wealth is a game that he's involved in. I don't think he's playing it.

I'm sure he probably played it when he was younger. But a lot of us are playing this kind of career and money game. And when you get, when you're in the spheres and the circles that he's in socializing with different people and meeting people in Silicon Valley and the tech world, and also other millionaires, I think, I think there's probably like a competitive Elements to all the relationships where people see each other and they all know what they're kind.

They have like a, a guess or an estimate of what their net worth is or how much income they're making and people make judgments of other people all the time. Based on how much money they have, or the car they drive, or kind of all their income. And even though people don't talk about it, not really in the UK as well.

It's considered rude to ask someone unless it's like, even Maybe your close friends you know, how much specifically are you earning every single year? That's not really a conversation that people generally have, but I think people are all kind of subconsciously playing this game and judging people and based on how much money they're making.

And he seems not to. care that much. He cares about wealth and having wealth, but he doesn't care about wealth just for wealth's sake. He doesn't see the amount of money you have in the bank as like a, a leaderboard of how good your life is or how successful you are. It's just how good Or how well you've done at making money, or it's just literally how much money you have.

It's nothing more than that. And I think he uses money as a like a form of freedom. So he doesn't have to do the things that he doesn't want to do. He doesn't have to work on projects he doesn't want to. He doesn't work with people he doesn't want to. He gets to. Wake up when he wants to, he gets to go to bed when he wants to, and he kind of uses money as a form of just giving himself as much freedom as he wants or he can have in his life.

And that's why I think people are really interested in him because he's not just some entrepreneurial person who only cares about, I've got to make more money. I've got to make more money. You need to make more money. He just, he just sees money as a a tool for having a better life and a better life is subjective.

Your better life would be very different from mine compared to everyone else's. But he does have this idea, which I'm sure some people. Kind of got a little bit angry at maybe, or maybe it's a little bit controversial, but he said that money is just like making money or getting rich is just a skill like playing football or learning a musical instrument.

It's just learning certain skills and applying them in different. Places. And he said that he could be dropped in any English speaking country. In, in, in the street of any English speaking country and be able to be wealthy within, I don't, I don't think he says a time period, but he would be able to find himself wealthy if he had the skills and knowledge that he has now.

What do you think of that? Because, you know, you're, you live in Africa. Africa has a lot of poverty in it relative to other continents. And

could everyone, if they had the skills and knowledge that Naval has, be able to become rich?

[00:22:06] Student: Well, I think that I agree with you. Look, two or three things I want you to answer, to react. First of all, yeah he, he, he. He sees life as games and said something very interesting. He said that the game create anxiety and the only way to, to avoid anxiety is, or you don't play the game, you decide to not play the game, so you avoid the game and you avoid the anxiety that is related with the game.

Or you win the game.

[00:22:49] Sam: Oh yeah, or you win the game. Exactly. If you win the game,

[00:22:52] Student: it's a liberation. And the anxiety goes with the, it quits with the, with the, with the fact to, to, to win the game. That was a really interesting point. Second thing that I wanted to, to say. Is that I think that maybe in the beginning he was looking for for earning money because he had a difficult childhood.

He arrived at nine in the Bronx in New York, just with his brother and and he's he's, he's a mother. Her mother used to work on the day and to study by night. So they were kind of I mean They were alone. They had to, to, to learn by, by themself. And he said that he, he was watching the American dream behind the window.

He, he, he, he felt strange. He felt external to that, to the dream. So I think that younger, he, he really looked for earning a lot of money to be part of that American dream. But maybe I'm wrong, he didn't. He didn't tell it, but maybe maybe I'm wrong. But yeah, what what he said is that you're totally right.

That earning money is just a tool. It cannot be a goal by itself. Having a lot of money and I agree to tell you with him what makes you happy having a lot of money can create a lot of anxiety because you, you, you, you scared. To lose that money that creates a lot of anxiety. I open parenthesis.

I heard about a study, a very serious study that tried to to see to, to look for a correlation between the happiness and the level of your revenues. And they, they found that people that are the happier in the world are those. Who earned in, in the, in the, in the family between the, the, the spouse and the, between the husband and the wife 7, 000 euros a month.

[00:24:57] Sam: 7, 000 euros a month. Yeah.

[00:25:01] Student: It's not incredible. I mean, yeah, it's, it's more, it's more. But it's not huge money.

[00:25:09] Sam: It's not multi multi millionaire. It's

[00:25:11] Student: not multi multi millionaire. And I think that it's not my case. I think that I'm more or less in that average, so I earn well my life, but I'm not a millionaire.

And I think that, yeah, the more you earn money, the more you're scared to lose. That money and to lose that social level that you write. So I agree totally with him. Money can, cannot be a goal. Money can, cannot make you. Happy by itself just by it, but it's a fantastic tool. I totally agree with him.

That give you freedom. For example, I earned very well my, my, my, my life, but I'm not free like him. He can, he can do whatever he wants. Tomorrow morning, he can decide not to wake up or to wake up at 12. He can decide to take a plane and go spend 3 days in Hawaii. Or to go to learn something in the university for 2 years, it's freedom.

I don't have this level of freedom because I have a boss. A board I have to have responsibilities. I'm an employee and CEO, of course, but I'm even so I'm an employee. And so, yes, I totally agree with him. It's a fantastic tool that give you freedom and there's nothing more powerful than than freedom. I think.

I think, and he said something else following this, this idea is that Elon Musk, for example, is not trying to earn more money. What he's trying to do is to reach Mars. And to be able to reach Mars, yeah, you have to generate a lot of cash, but it's not money. It's something else. So yeah, he's a fantastic, he's a very clever guy.

He's very, I don't know how to say it in English, lucid in French we say. Lucid guy, very good philosophy of life. And I think that he He put many times the accent in the two podcasts of something that is he says that is very important for him and I believe him on the ethical points on, on, on the values and and you cannot just earn money, whatever are the, the, the, the, the, the, the ways to earn them, you, you have to put some ethical way to do it and So nice guy, really nice guy, really.

I loved it. I really enjoyed a lot. I enjoyed a lot. And that's nice. So thank you very much. Thank you very much. Because thanks to you I'm I'm discovering a world that I, I really didn't know. I mean, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm from a French culture which is really rich. With its own philosopher, its own artists, with its own world, which is really, really rich.

And because of the barrier of the, of the, of the language I I, I never had access to, to to the way of thinking of Anglo Saxon world, just in, just listening to the BBC world, well, you access to the, to the, how Anglo Saxons, what part of Anglo Saxon sees the world, not really how they think the world.

And we're thanks to that podcast. It's, it's, it's huge. I mean, nothing, two weeks , but, but it's a point of access for me. And and thank you very much. But to answer your question, excuse me, I, I it's okay. Don't worry. I didn't answer your question. I think that yes, he's right. It's it's making money.

It's a skill. Think that I have that skill, but it's a skill. You have an around me. I could see many people that know how to make money. They're not they're not always. The smartest one, the cleverest one, they're not, but it's a skill. They have that skills. They, they, they don't have other skills or they have it, or they have them, but they have the skill to know how to make money.

And I agree with him. I don't have that skill. And I don't know if I'm really interested to, to, to develop it. Cause I'm, I'm happy like I am, I mean, I won't start a business at 45 and I'm really happy with my life. So, so I want to search more in that in, in that, in that path. But yeah, I agree with him.

Maybe if he lose everything and tomorrow he will start a new life. I don't know, in Australia, I'm sure that in a few years. He will accumulate a lot of of wealth also.

[00:30:28] Sam: Exactly. Were there any, he gives some in a podcast he gives some advice on how to make money was, did you learn anything from that part of the podcast?

[00:30:39] Student: Well, I have to, to search in my mind. Yeah. Yeah. I remember that he said that the most important thing is to create wealth. And you cannot just think about just earn money for you. You have to, to think in the long term to how to create wealth. And once you, you, you, you, you succeed to create wealth, you can cut some of that wealth.

For you, that's a point that I remembered. I remembered also that he said that you have to think what are the needs of people that you cannot find in the market. Typically, if I remember well. The company that he found it's mission was to help other funders, how to get equity from from others.

And he said that from his own experience, it was a really, really hard path. And and nobody could help him to get that equity to, to, to, to be able to start his business. And it was a successful company because the need was there, but nobody offers. A product or a service that can address that need that demand.

I can remember that and yeah, I'm sure that he talked about a lot of other points, but I, I really don't just yeah.

[00:32:19] Sam: And what did you, did you learn anything about cryptocurrency?

[00:32:24] Student: Yeah, I, I, I, I, I learned about cryptocurrency. I, I'm not really interested in, in that in that that topic.

Yep. But yeah, yeah. It's all, it's all many interesting things. I studied finance, so I, I, I, yeah, . I understand the way, the way it works. So basically what he said is that in, in the, in, in the, the, the, the actual system, you need I don't know how to say it in English, but a third party with the confidence, I mean,

[00:33:02] Sam: a bank or yeah, Visa or MasterCard or PayPal, something like this.

You

[00:33:08] Student: need a third party in the crypto world. Thanks to the blockchain, you don't need any 3rd party. So, that's really interesting because he said that the Internet allowed to multiply things. For example, you, you. You create a song Mm-Hmm, , you, you can multiply it and send it to, to some, to set to multiple time.

Multiple time. Yeah. Multiple times. So it was multiple times. So it was really important and it still, it still very, very important and it creates a lots of value and, and was, but the, the, the crypto and the blockchain is very particular because it it, it it can assure you. That you just have one copy that is not alterated and is not multiplied.

So thanks to that technology, you can create. You can create a virtual money and you don't need any third parts to certify that, yeah, that Bitcoin is the only one in earth and, and, and it's, it's, it's yours. So he said also, and that's totally right, that the, the, the actual system is, is based on confidence.

I mean, for example, absolutely just paper. It is. Yeah. Nothing else. It's just paper, but people are confident with that because. USA is the 1st potential in the world because all the transaction in 60 or 70 percent of the transaction in the world are in dollars. So there's a high level of confidence in the, in the, in the, but.

In fact, in the reality, just a paper and and the problem with that is that you, you can create as much paper as you, as you need. That's what basically does the states and and you create. That's what what what we are living now. Inflation. Absolutely. You create inflation because they create a lot of money to finance the period and also the war in Ukraine.

And also a 70 percent of the depth of the U S is detained by foreigners. And, and the day when the confidence we did not be here all of the system can, can totally fall down. And it's not the case of the crypto because they are algorithm that. Assure you that you cannot create artificially as much money as you want.

So, thanks to that barrier to that lock he says that. He's more comfortable with crypto than, than with, with, with ours. So, yeah, I, the, the, the theoretical argument is right. Yeah. I studied that and that's, but there are also other reality is that we don't know what is, what is the code.

Of that algorithm, the, and there's a lot of, of, of crypto money that fall down totally and people, 100 percent everything it's, it's, it's a, it's a quite dark world that maybe if you were in the center of it, you can understand it and you can put your money in a smart way. But if, if, if you were outside.

That system, and you don't understand it perfectly it's a lottery for me. It's casino. It is. So that's why I'm not very interested in, in, in, in crypto money. And why, well, that, that part of the podcast, yeah, I listened to it and I could see that yeah, he masters also in finance, but yeah, I don't believe, and also I don't sell any drug or any harm.

Useful if you, if you, if you work in the black market or something like that, it's not my case. So, yeah, so I was not very, very interested in that part, but it's, it's, it's so smart, so smart.

[00:37:52] Sam: Yeah. And what about the, cause they did they did talk about like the theoretical, you know or the found fundamental aspects of what cryptocurrency is, but one of the important, one of the interesting things when they talked about stable coins, which is basically just like the united, like the crypto Equivalent of the United States dollar.

I've heard a lot of people say that this could be really useful for people in developing countries or even in countries like Turkey or Argentina where the Inflation is crazy and they actually don't want to get paid In they might work for a multinational company They don't want to get paid or they might work for a local company.

They don't want to get paid in In their local currency, because the next day it's going to be worth half the half the value that they just got paid in. So something like a stable coin could be really useful in in different countries because they actually have access to the United States or the dollar, essentially.

[00:38:48] Student: Yeah, I totally agree. Yeah, that's a very good point. I totally agree with you. For example, Argentina this guy, the new president of Miley, I think it's name his name is Miley. Miley, Miley, Miley,

[00:39:03] Sam: the new president. I don't know. I just know he's into neo liberal politics and he's got quite crazy hair.

Yeah, yeah, he's quite crazy.

[00:39:12] Student: And he wants to quit the Argentinian peso. Okay. And to put the dollar

[00:39:17] Sam: instead. And put the

[00:39:17] Student: US dollar? Yeah, the US dollar. Really? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it's not totally

[00:39:23] Sam: No, it's, the US dollar is definitely a better currency than the Argentinian

[00:39:28] Student: peso. Yeah, and the reality is that in those countries you have a parallel market that works with a strong Currency, like, and it's, it's every time it's, it's, it's, it's dollar for example, in Cuba I was I spent 15 days in Cuba 15 years ago.

They, they work with dollar. I mean, they have the pistol, but nobody used the pistol unless, unless the poor guys there, but everything is, is, is, is, is in dollar. So yeah, for, for that, that kind of situations, yeah, it can be very useful. Useful, but it, it's only you, you have the negative point that you, you lose totally your your sovereign margin to have monetary politics.

Yep. So it, it, it doesn't depend on you anymore. Mm-Hmm. . Because it's a tool, the politic, the monetary policy, it's a tool, it's a, it's a strong tool. And for example, for the US, it's, it's it's amazing how strong is that tool. They do many things, they, that's, that's why they succeed to have just a few period of recession.

Because they have that monetary politic that they can do it because they have a currency, which is a reference in the

[00:40:55] Sam: world. So, exactly, exactly. Yeah, it's a dangerous game that the Argentinian president is playing. I'm surprised that's popular. with the people, to be honest, because they have quite a socialist history and a lot of South American countries are very suspicious, but I think they're very suspicious of the United States and the United States has essentially been one of the reasons why.

A lot of those countries hasn't, hasn't developed, haven't developed as quickly, quickly as they would have want to. So Cuba is the obvious example that they have an embargo against them that anyone that trades with Cuba, I think the United States says they won't trade with you. I think that's true, which obviously people aren't going to trade with Cuba.

That's one of the reasons why it's quite poor. That's true.

[00:41:40] Student: That's totally true. But Argentinian are totally. They, they, for them, it's their last chance. I mean, they, they have nothing to lose. They, yes, you're right. They, they, they're totally fed up with the, with the situation. Mm-Hmm. I made a memoir on the Argentinian crisis in 2000 and 20, 20 years ago.

Yeah, in the same, same situation after 20 years, it was a rich country, you know, in the, in the, in the seventies, eighties, it was a rich country, very developed country. And well, it's a lack of good management.