Bitcoin, Crypto & Scams: What You Really Need to Know with Michael Hazilias

Ever felt like crypto is a whole new world you should understand... but don’t? You’re not alone.

In this episode of Get Rich, Molly sits down with Michael Hazilias from Breakout Solutions to break down the basics of Bitcoin, crypto, blockchain, NFTs—and how to avoid the scams that come with them.

We cover:
💸 What crypto actually is (and how it works without a bank)
🔒 The difference between Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies
🏦 Why Bitcoin is being called the “digital gold” of our time
📉 Why your emotions can cost you more than a scam
🚨 The red flags of a crypto scam (and what to never do)
🎁 What NFTs really are (hint: it's not just pixelated monkeys)
📈 And—have you missed the boat on Bitcoin?

Plus, Michael shares his #1 tip for anyone who wants to dip their toe into crypto investing, and how he’s using blockchain + AI to help Australians fast-track their path to financial freedom.

💥 Whether you're crypto-curious or just trying to keep up with the conversation, this episode is packed with practical insights that make this complex world a little easier to navigate.

Digital Freedom Formula: https://breakoutnow.co/workshop-lif
10 Point Checklist: https://breakoutnow.co/checklist-lif

CHAPTERS

00:00 – Intro & Molly’s Money Journey
01:16 – Why Crypto Still Confuses So Many
01:37 – Meet Michael: Tech Entrepreneur & Crypto Expert
02:22 – Why We’re Talking Crypto (Finally!)
02:47 – What Is Cryptocurrency, Really?
03:40 – Bitcoin vs Crypto: The Crucial Difference
05:00 – Is Bitcoin a Currency, a System… or Both?
06:13 – Why Bitcoin’s Scarcity Drives Its Value
07:58 – Who Created Bitcoin? (And Why It’s Still a Mystery)
08:36 – What Even Is the Blockchain?
10:07 – Ethereum vs Bitcoin: What's the Real Difference?
11:55 – Is Bitcoin Bad for the Environment?
13:13 – Who Actually Mines Bitcoin These Days?
14:13 – Ethereum, Smart Contracts & Future Tech
14:36 – The Current Crypto Market: What’s Going On?
15:41 – How to Start Investing in Bitcoin (Safely)
17:33 – Apps Like Bamboo: Pros & Cons
18:42 – What’s a Hardware Wallet (And Do You Need One)?
20:01 – Common Crypto Mistakes & Scam Red Flags
23:37 – NFTs Explained (Without the Monkey Pictures)
26:01 – Have You Missed the Boat on Bitcoin?
28:19 – Is Government Crypto Regulation Inevitable?
30:15 – What Michael Does at Breakout Solutions
31:56 – Freebies, Tools & Final Takeaways

LINKS AND RESOURCES FROM THE EPISODE

CoinSpot: https://www.coinspot.com.au
Bamboo (Micro-investing): https://www.getbamboo.io

CONNECT WITH MICHAEL HAZILIAS

Website: https://breakoutsolutions.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhazilias/
Instagram: http://instagram.com/michaelhazza/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/michaelhazilias

CONNECT WITH LADIES FINANCE CLUB

Join our free Facebook group - Ladies Finance Club Money Chat
Website: https://www.ladiesfinanceclub.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ladiesfinanceclub/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ladies-finance-club/

TAKEAWAYS

• Cryptocurrency is a way to transfer value online without intermediaries.
• Bitcoin is a distinct asset class, separate from other cryptocurrencies.
• Bitcoin serves as a store of value and a monetary system.
• The total supply of Bitcoin is capped at 21 million.
• Bitcoin is seen as a hedge against inflation and currency devaluation.
• The origins of Bitcoin are somewhat mysterious and attributed to cryptographers.
• Blockchain technology underpins Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.
• Ethereum serves as an application layer for decentralized finance.
• Bitcoin's energy consumption is often misunderstood; it is largely powered by renewable energy.
• Investing in Bitcoin requires a clear plan and understanding of personal financial goals. Cryptocurrency can be likened to gambling without proper knowledge.
• Platforms like CoinStash and CoinSpot facilitate easy Bitcoin purchases.
• Self-custody of Bitcoin is crucial for security.
• Emotional decisions often lead to financial losses in crypto.
• Education is key to avoiding scams in the crypto space.
• NFTs represent unique digital ownership, not just expensive images.
• Bitcoin remains a viable investment opportunity.
• Government regulation of crypto is inevitable and can impact returns.
• CBDCs pose a threat to personal financial freedom.
• Breakout Solutions offers automated strategies for financial independence.

SOUND BITES

"We help women get rich and stay rich."
"Bitcoin is a superior asset class."
"We don't know who created Bitcoin."
"It's pretty much gambling."
"NFT stands for non fungible token."
"You haven't missed the boat."
"It's happening in the US."

TRANSCRIPT

[00:00:00] Molly: Welcome to Get Rich, the podcast that helps you do just that. Get rich and stay rich. Hey, I'm Molly Benjamin. I'm the founder of Ladies Finance Club, one of Australia's largest financial education platforms for women. But before I started helping thousands of women take control with their money, I was a hot financial mess when it came to my own finances and not the fun kind of hot, more like crying in a supermarket, wondering where all my money went kind of hot.

[00:00:29] But here's the thing, if I can go from financial mess to owning a share portfolio, investing in property, and building wealth. Then you can too. My mission is simple to make women rich because when we have financial freedom, we have choices, confidence, and control over our future. Every week on Get Rich, I sit down with some of the best experts in the industry to break down how we can all start investing, growing our money, and creating long-term financial security without the jargon, boring bits or overwhelm.

[00:01:02] Because when women get rich, we don't just change our lives. We change the world. So if you're ready to start making some smart money moves, hit that subscribe button and let's get rich together.

[00:01:16] Now, I don't know about you, but I just find the whole world of Bitcoin, crypto, blockchain, ah, NFTs, I find it all a little bit confusing, and so I wanted to sit down with someone who I know really knows this. Staff. So I'm joined by Michael Hasi Lass, a tech entrepreneur and investor who's built and sold businesses before founding his current one.

[00:01:37] Breakout Solutions. In this episode, my mind is blown multiple times. So he breaks down the real difference between Bitcoin, crypto, what the blockchain actually does, because I don't know how to spot the red flags of a scam and if you've actually missed the boat when it comes to Bitcoin. So if you've ever felt crypto curious, cautious, or a bit confused, this one's for you.

[00:01:59] So we're gonna get into it. I just wanna. Quickly flag as well. There are a lot of crypto scams out there 'cause it's decentralized. There's no like hotline you can call if something goes wrong. So it's very, very high risk. It's very volatile. Know that what you're putting in, you might lose. So thank you so much for coming on the Get Rich podcast where we try and make that happen.

[00:02:22] We help women get rich and stay rich. So this is a topic we had lots of questions on, lots of people always actually kind of consistently for the last kind of five years asking us about can we cover this topic. So I thought let's get you on the podcast to actually break down some of the basic concepts around Crip.

[00:02:41] Do currency, bitcoin, the terms and how it all works. So thanks for coming on, Michael.

[00:02:47] Michael: You're very welcome. It's a pleasure to be here.

[00:02:49] Molly: So let's just start with basics. Like what exactly is crypto and how does cryptocurrency and how does it work in simple terms?

[00:02:57] Michael: Yeah, so look, it is a broad term and it's best described as like alternate currencies.

[00:03:02] Using cryptographic is, is kind of the technical term, but it's just basically a way to transfer value online without having to rely on a bank or another third party intermediary, right? So, e example, if we were. To come up in person and do a transaction with cash. We don't need someone in the middle to broker that transaction, right?

[00:03:20] We just deal direct

[00:03:22] Molly: like a bank. So no banks needed, just do it person to person.

[00:03:25] Michael: No banks needed person to person. Just the way to do that online at scale without having to trust anyone, you don't need to trust the other person you're dealing with. And. Things like that. So the, the magic of it is it enables value exchange globally, instantly, and without borders.

[00:03:40] Right? It's like sending an email, but with money. I thought I might just add a little bit in here as well 'cause it'll set the theme for the rest of the conversation is to differentiate between Bitcoin and crypto.

[00:03:49] Molly: That was gonna be my next question.

[00:03:51] Michael: Yeah, absolutely. Go for it. Okay. Well, let's. Let's just jump into that.

[00:03:54] 'cause I think that's a really important distinction that a lot of people don't understand is Bitcoin is not crypto. Crypto is not Bitcoin. Okay. In, in my view, I just call it two asset classes, right? One's Bitcoin, one's crypto. Okay. So Bitcoin is its own asset class. It's separate from crypto. And look, the most common case, it's actually quite a multipurpose technology, right?

[00:04:13] But the most common case is like a. Store of value. So a lot of people look at it as digital gold, right? But it's actually a fully decentralized, complete monetary system that has no CEO, no team, no marketing team, no sales team, anything. It's evolving quite quickly. And one day it could actually replace our existing financial system.

[00:04:32] It could replace the whole lot. It may not get there, but it has that. It has that potential, right? So that's Bitcoin. If you look at. Everything else. And I mean, and I know we'll, we'll probably talk about Ethereum and a couple others, but they're all just cryptocurrencies. They're not decentralized. They have teams, they have CEOs.

[00:04:48] They can all be compromised because there's humans that behind it. None of them are sound money like Bitcoin is. So I, I will touch a little bit more on Bitcoin in terms of money. Yes. As we go. So does that make sense?

[00:05:00] Molly: A little bit, maybe again, like if we just kind of dig a little bit more into Bitcoin. So you said that we can group all the other ones into like their cryptocurrency, but bitcoin's its own thing.

[00:05:14] Is it its own currency?

[00:05:16] Michael: Yeah, you look, it's a currency. It's a store of value, it's a network, it's a monetary system. It's actually all of the above, which is why it's so hard for people to grasp. So you can use it as a currency, you can use it to store value over time. So the difference between money and currency.

[00:05:30] Money is designed. Was designed. It's supposed to be to hold value over time, right? Yeah. This is why gold are good. Currencies is supposed to be spect, right? So Australian dollars would be currency in our terms, and gold would be money. It just to distinguish those two. Now you can spend your Bitcoin, but because it's such a good store of value and it's gonna keep going up over time, and I can talk about why, um, you wouldn't really go and spend it.

[00:05:54] It's like a story of the guys that spent 10,000 Bitcoin to buy two pizzas about 10 years ago, right? That's worth like how many billions of dollars now. So you can use it as a currency, but most people are using it to store value longer term.

[00:06:07] Molly: And let's maybe just go there now. Why would you, I think you said you'll touch on it, but like let's, yeah, let's go there now.

[00:06:13] Michael: Yeah, for sure. So this is where I'll probably give a little bit of information. And I know you are, you've got an educated audience in this regard. Money printing, right? Money. Printing, inflation. I mean, the governments and central banks can print as much of it as they want, right? That's what's causing inflation.

[00:06:28] The debt's growing. So we're all looking for places to store our, our money or store our, our hard earned. Yeah. Money or value so that it doesn't lose its purchasing power, right? Yeah. 20, 30 years ago, our parents were taught to put money in the bank account and let it earn interest. That doesn't work anymore, right?

[00:06:45] Because the rate of inflation and the devaluation of, of purchasing power, of like fee occurrences, like Australian dollars in US dollars is higher than the interest you can get in a bank. So that's why the investment stuff's taken off in the last kind of 15 years. Property, you know, real estate, precious metals, all the rest of it.

[00:07:02] In my view, Bitcoin is a superior asset class. There's nothing on the planet that's better than it, but you've gotta develop the, the conviction in that yourself to reach that conclusion. So a couple key things. There's only ever gonna be 21 million of them, okay? And, and like 19.7 million is already in circulation, okay?

[00:07:18] So the majority of the whole supply is already in circulation, which makes it way more scarce than gold because they keep finding more and more gold. And it's divisible down to, I think it's four quadrillion subunits called a Satoshi. So you can buy like one Satoshi for, I don't know, like 5 cents or something.

[00:07:35] I dunno what it's worth. So you don't need to go and buy a whole Bitcoin, right? Which is what a lot of a lot of other people think. So this is why there's been such a rush to it, particularly in the last few years because of increased money printing and people looking for somewhere to. Store their money so that it doesn't lose value over time.

[00:07:51] That's why it's become the most common use case of storing value or storing purchasing power over time.

[00:07:58] Molly: And where did Bitcoin come from?

[00:08:00] Michael: We're not a hundred percent sure who created it. We dunno where they're still alive. The main wallet, like Satoshi Nakamoto is the, is the alias of who created it.

[00:08:10] There's a million Bitcoin in that person's wallet. It's not moved since inception. So it could just be lost. Maybe someone comes out, maybe he comes out at some point in time and owns a million Bitcoin. We don't know. So there's, there is a risk around that, but it's not something that's. It's not a major concern for anyone that's investing heavily in it anywhere who's educated on it?

[00:08:28] Molly: Okay, so we've got Bitcoin and then we've got the blockchain. So what's their relationship?

[00:08:36] Michael: Yeah, for sure. So blockchain is the underlying technology. Okay? So Bitcoin is built on top of the blockchain. Decentralized finance is built on top of the blockchain. Tokenization is built on top of the blockchain.

[00:08:48] I can go into some of these. So it's basically the underlying technology. So think of it as like a big Excel database, right? So. Think of an Excel sheet. Every transaction, if I just talk about Bitcoin now, every transaction, every Bitcoin transaction's on this big Excel sheet, it's duplicated millions of times to different machines called miners.

[00:09:06] So the records can't be forged. Once the transactions are sent, they can't be changed, right? So it can't be cheated. It's efficient, everyone can see it, and and most importantly, it doesn't rely on humans, right? For the system to work. Humans are fallible. This system doesn't rely on humans, can't be corrupted, and things like that.

[00:09:24] The most secure accounting system ever built, right? It's public. Auditable tamper proof, and it's just the foundation technology for everything else that comes on top of it, including Bitcoin, defi and, and tokenization.

[00:09:36] Molly: Okay, so that is the blockchain. So Bitcoin is built on the blockchain and so everyone can see all the different transactions that's going on.

[00:09:45] So if I send you some Bitcoin, everyone can see that I've sent you Bitcoin.

[00:09:49] Michael: Yeah, correct. It's what's known as pseudo ominous, I think, or something like that, how to pronounce it. And so we have a wallow address, but no one knows that wallow address is ours. But it obviously, if, if I send it to you, you know that address is mine.

[00:10:01] So you can kind of be identified that way. So you can see all the transactions online, but you can't really identify who they are.

[00:10:07] Molly: So we've got Bitcoin and we've got Ethereum. And for those listening, if you haven't really heard of these terms, they would generally be like. Two of the most popular, would I be correct in using the terminology cryptocurrencies?

[00:10:20] Michael: Yeah. For the purpose of the conversation. You know, you can call 'em different cryptocurrencies, so I don't confuse people, but yet they are the two most common.

[00:10:27] Molly: So what's the difference between them and why you, I guess so passionate about Bitcoin and maybe not as much Ethereum.

[00:10:35] Michael: Look, as I've touched on, Bitcoin is really, it's the only decentralized coin.

[00:10:40] It's the only one that I would store value in longer term reliably, and, and I do every day. I'm buying new Bitcoin or, or an autopilot. It's a dollar cost average strategy that I've set up. And a lot of our members set up every day, every week, every month, whatever. So. It can form the basis it is forming the basis of the new monetary system.

[00:10:58] Right? Over the next kind of five to 10 years, you'll see the innovation that's happening, like money and finance is gonna move on top of the Bitcoin blockchain because it is sound money and it's the best sound money we've ever had. So that's why, I guess I'm so strong on that, but I'm not a a Bitcoin maximalist is what the term is, where you don't believe in anything else.

[00:11:15] You know, I do believe in other things, defi, tokenization, other technologies, and Ethereum is probably the biggest of the rest, if you will. And it's like an application layer, right? So think of it as like Bitcoin might be like PayPal. So power is money and Ethereum is like the app store. You run your app from Ethereum and then you pay through PayPal, right.

[00:11:37] If I can use a web two analogy, so it uses something called proof of state consensus instead of proof of work, which is, it uses a lot less electricity, basically, which some people say Bitcoin is bad for the environment, but when you understand that it's a whole monetary system, it's actually the most efficient system, way more efficient than banks and everything.

[00:11:55] Molly: Can you even explain what you mean when you say, um. Bad for the environment.

[00:12:01] Michael: Yeah, so there's a, there's a myth. It's a myth. There's a myth out there that people think that bitcoin's bad for the environment because of all the electricity that it uses to power the Bitcoin network. It uses something called proof of work, which is a whole bunch of machines that are constantly trying to solve a cryptographic equation.

[00:12:15] That's what powers the network, right? So it's actually the, the largest decentralized network that we have. It's got a lot of value. It's backed by that. People say it's backed by nothing as well, which is also a myth. So people say, well use a lot of electricity to power it, but it depends what you're comparing it to, right?

[00:12:31] If you're comparing it to another crypto token, that's crap, then yeah, use a lot of electricity. But if you, if you understand that it's a whole monetary system and that you can replace banks, armies, war, the rest of it as US dollars is backed by war. Which is backed by human blood. I don't wanna go down that rabbit hole, but there's a lot of energy and power that goes into powering the current financial system.

[00:12:54] Bitcoin uses a lot of power, but nothing compared to that. It's also, I think, over 70% renewable energy. So it's actually expanded the rate of innovation in renewable technology because the more efficient that you can use electricity, the more Bitcoin you can mine, therefore the more profitable it is. Does that

[00:13:13] Molly: make sense?

[00:13:13] And sorry, Michael, you must feel like you're talking to like a. A 6-year-old here, so Bitcoin gets mined by people on computers.

[00:13:23] Michael: It's not so much individuals now, it used to be it's more big data centers, right? So we run a Bitcoin mine. In fact, we've what's known as tokenized a Bitcoin mine, so our members can own a piece of it and get passive income from it, right?

[00:13:34] So that's a little bit more of an advanced strategy. So it's run by usually big data centers now because your electricity cost has to be really, really low in order for you to profit from it. So you can no longer mine Bitcoin from a laptop like you could, you know, 10 years ago. Humans kind of manage the infrastructure, but it's not individuals now that are mining it.

[00:13:53] Molly: Okay. Righto.

[00:13:54] Michael: Yeah. Just to finish off on the Ethereum point. It's the second biggest cryptocurrency because it is the, basically the second one, it's an application layer, so a lot of applications run on top of it, but it all, it has a lot of competitors, right? So Solana is one, there's a bunch of others. So it hasn't necessarily won the race.

[00:14:13] For the smart contract layer or the application layer yet. So that's why I'm saying that Bitcoin's really the only guaranteed coin 'cause it's won that store of value. Race, Ethereum, I don't know, maybe 10 years time we find out that it actually lost the race. Like we, we are not a hundred percent sure 'cause it because it's the crowded market.

[00:14:30] Molly: So what's happening in the market at the moment? What are we seeing and what are we likely to see?

[00:14:36] Michael: Okay, so my thoughts on that is the US is in quite a lot of trouble. They were trying to reduce their deficit through Department of Government efficiency, which has not worked. So they're gonna have to continue to print more money.

[00:14:48] What that means is that all comes into assets. So if you own any assets, properties, stock shares, or whatever in general that goes up, it just happens that Bitcoin and crypto goes up faster. Bitcoin is very correlated to the M two money supply, which is the US. Dollar money supply. So when they print more money, Bitcoin goes up.

[00:15:05] So it's almost like storing some of your wealth in Bitcoin is like hedging a system that can just print money outta Fin Air. So it's become that kind of a trade. Right. So on that basis, because we believe that money printing is gonna keep going. Then in general, markets are gonna keep going up. Obviously nothing goes up in a straight line.

[00:15:23] There's gonna be crashes, but we still think we've got a pretty big run coming next week, few weeks, next few months, potentially the rest of the year before we kind of see anything major. Obviously nothing's financial advice and we could get a black swan that comes out nowhere and blows everything up.

[00:15:38] So who knows? But that's kind of what we're seeing at the moment.

[00:15:41] Molly: And if someone's like, I wanna dip my toes in the water, I just wanna look at maybe buying some Bitcoin. What's the safest way to do that?

[00:15:52] Michael: I. Yeah, so look, in terms of starting, so a couple things there I suppose. Look, it's all about education.

[00:15:57] So most people when they come into crypto, they don't have a plan. That's where they fail. So you gotta be asking yourself questions like, what are you trying to achieve with your investment? How much money are you gonna invest? When are you gonna take risk, capital, out time horizon, all that kind of stuff.

[00:16:11] And then it's about also understanding what's your end goal. So for us, we help a lot of our members look at how much passive income can do they need to become financially free, and how much of that can we generate? I. From digital assets and I can talk about our, our trading block and things like that.

[00:16:25] So you really gotta have a plan for, well, well why are you actually investing before you actually start? And a lot of people don't do that. Then it's about starting small and avoiding random tips and hype from social media. So most people start by buying, if I'm allowed to use the word shit coins, um, which are just main coins and stuff that do nothing.

[00:16:44] So I wouldn't that do dodge, Dodge coin. I don't know. There's one called Fart Coin that's out at the moment. You know, shit like this, like it's got no fundamental value. It's pretty much gambling. It's like a casino. So you can start there, but just know that you're probably gonna lose your money. So we'll just start with buying, buying some, buying some Bitcoin.

[00:17:03] Ideally you wanna have someone supporting you, right? And this is why a lot of people come, come to us 'cause we provide that support. We've got the coaching and the courses and all the rest of it. But you could just go to a platform like, so Coins Spott is a really common platform in Australia. We are partnered with Coin Stash.

[00:17:19] We, our members get 50% off fees when they join with us. So you can just go to one of those platforms, KYC, yourself. So, you know, send them your, um, driver's license, deposit money from your bank. Buy, buy Bitcoin. Like you can do the whole thing within a day. Yeah, that's, that's easy. And

[00:17:33] Molly: I think there's one called Bamboo as well, but that's micro investing.

[00:17:36] So you get a coffee, it's $5, it will round it up to $6 and like put that into, you choose whether you want it to go into like Ethereum or Bitcoin. Yeah.

[00:17:44] Michael: So I use Bamboo, but there's a really important distinction is that you don't own the Bitcoin.

[00:17:49] Molly: Okay? Okay.

[00:17:50] Michael: You don't own the Bitcoin through Bamboo. All you're doing is getting exposure to the price of Bitcoin, right?

[00:17:55] So if you wanted to then go and withdraw, unless they've changed it. But as far as I'm, as far as I'm aware, it's this is how it works. If you wanted to go and withdraw your Bitcoin and actually hold it in your own wallet, I don't think you can do that. I think you've just, I think you've just gotta sell it down.

[00:18:09] And they may have changed it. I haven't looked at it for a year or two. But I am using bamboo and it just ticks along and a dollar cost average into into Bitcoin for me. But if you wanna own it yourself, and I'd recommend doing that because. No one can take your Bitcoin away from you when you're, what's known as self custody right now, even if you leave it on exchanges, you don't have control of Bitcoin if you leave it on exchanges.

[00:18:29] So most people will just leave it on Coin Sport or Coin Stash. That's okay for small amounts of money and to start with, but ultimately, if you wanna take it seriously, you want to get a hardware wallet and we sell a ledger is one of the brands that we sell. I wouldn't go straight to a hardware world.

[00:18:42] Everyone's like, you need it from the start. It's complex, a bit clunky. Sometimes you can stuff it up. So you wouldn't migrate to that when you were willing, ready to put in more money, if that makes sense.

[00:18:52] Molly: All right, so just two questions on that. So many questions, Michael. So hardware, wallet, are you talking about where you store your.

[00:19:01] Currency. So it's not necessarily on a, so I think, is it soft wallet that's online and then hard wallet? It's actual device.

[00:19:11] Michael: It is. It is. But a common misconception is that your crypto is actually stored on the device. I don't have a USB looking like one here, but they look like sometimes just like little like USB drives, right.

[00:19:21] Your crypto is not stored on that. All that's doing is is a way to store your, what's known as your seed phrase, which is usually a 12 or 24 word combination, and that is what accesses your crypto on the blockchain. The hardware device is just a way to securely store that seed phrase so that you don't have it written around on a piece of paper that you might lose.

[00:19:41] So if you lose your hardware wallet, you don't actually lose your crypto, but if you lose your 12 or 24 word seed phrase, you lose it. So that's the most important thing to back up. Some people will put it in a safe, I've got multiple levels of encryption on, on my seed phrases. Or you can just use a hardware wallet, but the crypto's not stored on the device, which is an important distinction.

[00:20:01] Molly: All right, so how can people out there, 'cause we've had a few women come to us and they've been unfortunately caught up in crypto scams. How do people protect themselves from crypto scams? Because there's a lot out there.

[00:20:13] Michael: Yeah, so look, I mean, look, there's a lot of risks. So I'll talk about kind of risks and then we'll go, we'll go into scam.

[00:20:19] So look, even if you just don't learn the basics about the technology and what platforms to use and how to manage your money, you can make mistakes and lose it, right? So you, if you dunno what you're doing, you can lose it just by making your own mistakes. Uh, I don't wanna scare people. It's not, it's a lot harder to do that now than it was in the past, but it is important to be educated in that regard.

[00:20:38] There's lots of fake. Projects, scam platforms, even coins that are just designed to make owners rich. So you kind of gotta know what platforms and what stuff you're buying as well. And look, I do throw the warning out that if you don't educate yourself well, you probably will lose a bunch of your money, either through buying the wrong stuff or selling at the wrong time or getting scammed or whatever.

[00:20:59] So it is important to have some kind of a guide. It doesn't have to be us, just has to be, has to be someone. So a couple other things as well. The most common cause of losing money is actually not from scams. I will get into scams in a sec. It's from emotional decisions, right? Yeah. Fomo. Buying forward, missing out, panic selling, um, not having an exit strategy.

[00:21:19] So I've watched hundreds of people buy a crypto, write it up, then write it down, get stuck in a bear market for two years, right? I, I've, I don't know, probably a thousand times I've seen it. So these are the more common ways emotionally that people lose money. That's probably. 20 times more common than actually being scammed.

[00:21:37] In terms of scams though, if we just have a look at that, I've gotta say it's tricky. They're getting, they're pretty good and they're getting quite sophisticated, and I'm just waiting for the AI wave to come now in terms of how much better they're gonna be. But some things to look out for anything that says it's guaranteed returns, like.

[00:21:52] 10% a month, 5% a month, whatever is likely to be a scam. So our AI trading bot does five to 12% per month on average. It varies 'cause it depends on the market. If anyone's saying, oh, I guarantee you 5%, 10%, whatever, probably a scam, like 99%, that's a scam. Okay. Okay. If you're getting pressure to act fast, if you're getting cold calling or cold messaging saying, I've got an investment opportunity, all of these.

[00:22:17] 99% scam, but having the right education support you, you can easily avoid these. They're quite easy to spot. We've got educational resources on that. We've got something called how to Spot and Avoid scams, but a lot of our community will leverage us. They'll go, okay, I am thinking of buying this, or I want to use this platform.

[00:22:33] What do you guys think? I've had people come to me that have lost. Multiple six figures and we've helped them rebuild. I've had people come to me that were about to lose multiple six figures and I was like, oh my God. Okay. You not put any more money into that platform. Try and get the $5,000 out that you've put in.

[00:22:49] And often what happens when you try and get your money out, they'll be like, oh, you have to pay tax. You have to pay fees, and they'll just try and extract more money out of you. It's not specific to crypto. This happens in, this is everywhere. Yeah, it does. It just, it, yeah. Yeah, it's just because crypto means that once you send your crypto, you can't call it back like through a credit card or a bank.

[00:23:08] That's why it's a, it's an optimal tool for scammers. But these general rules have, uh, uh, independent of what, what finance mechanism I.

[00:23:15] Molly: Wow. Gosh. It is such a new world, isn't it? It's like this whole new world, just even getting my head around it. And I've done talk, like I've listened to talks, I've done interviews and I still like struggle sometimes to get my head around it.

[00:23:29] But I did Michael, I went out to the community, the LC community, and we did have some questions from the community. So would you mind if I ask you a couple of these?

[00:23:37] Michael: Please Go for it.

[00:23:37] Molly: Awesome. So can you explain what NFTs are and how are they connected to cryptocurrency? And this is a great question from Shell.

[00:23:45] Michael: It is a good question. So NFT stands for non fungible token. I'll attempt to try and explain that. So fungibility just means everything is the same, right? So an Australian dollar is fungible with another Australian dollar. Non fungible means it's unique. So all it is is like a token that is unique to me or to To who?

[00:24:02] To the wallet. I'm holding it in. Most people think NFTs are like expensive pitches.

[00:24:06] Molly: What I thought they were.

[00:24:07] Michael: Yeah. Which is like maybe 0.5% of what NFTs are, right? All that is is just the visual representation of a unique digital ownership token. Right? I'll explain it this way. Here's analogy. Think of a Christmas present.

[00:24:22] Okay, you get a Christmas present. You've got wrapping paper on the outside, so that could be a picture of a monkey, right? That's what you see on the outside, but it's not a representation of what's within. It's just the external thing. When you open the wrapping paper and you look inside, that's where the value is, right?

[00:24:37] It could be worth a lot. It could be a dud present, whatever. It's the same thing with NFTs, so it's what does that ownership represent? Is it a membership? Is it a subscription? Is it access to a YouTube or something? Right? Is what does that actually give you Ownership. Now NFTs are actually gonna become absolutely mainstream and it already is, and people have no idea.

[00:24:58] And that's what's gonna happen with this technology. Everyone's gonna be using it and they won't even know they're using it. Okay? It's called ubi. UBI Ubiquitous. That's what's hap, that's what's happening with this technology. So let me give you some examples. Concert tickets is a, is any type of tickets, is a great way to use NFTs because it's unique to me.

[00:25:15] And also it, you'll keep it forever. You can even see a picture of it in your wallet for the, for the rest of time as a like souvenir or memento that you went to that event. So that's happening at the moment. It's just hasn't taken off. Um, digital identity will be NFTs. Membership subscriptions and things like that.

[00:25:31] Even later, like I've predicted years ago, the deed to your house, the ownership papers for your car, yeah. All this stuff will end up being NFTs because it's transparent. It can't be cheated. It can't be faked, all the rest of it. So yeah, hopefully that helps to explain it.

[00:25:47] Molly: Yeah. No, that was, that's good.

[00:25:48] Thank you. And another question from one of our community members. She just asked, have I missed the window on Bitcoin? I feel like you've answered that a little bit, but maybe just if you can answer it again.

[00:26:01] Michael: I've been hearing the same question for the, for the seven years that I've been deep into crypto.

[00:26:06] I'll continue to hear it. Um, and, and it's, that's why it's up to people like us to keep educating. No, you haven't. So, because it's got a limited supply and a growing demand, right? 'cause people are gonna keep coming to it. 'cause they're looking for places to store their, their money in a, a heavily debt driven system with inflation, people are gonna continue to come to it.

[00:26:26] Right? And, and as it starts to have other technologies built on top of it in the finance system, then, uh, which is happening as well. You'll be able to then have utility, lemme just give you an example. Now we've got a strategy now where. You can actually use your Bitcoin as collateral, just like you can in property.

[00:26:42] So Bitcoin and and property are pretty much the same thing. One's physical, one's digital. It's the best analogy I can give. So you can buy Bitcoin, you can borrow against it. I think it's a 33% LVR, and a nine and a half percent interest rate per year. And you can now use that capital and invest it. So a lot of our members are leveraging their Bitcoin, putting the capital into our AI trading bot, which is generating five to 12% per month.

[00:27:03] And now they're generating a yield from their Bitcoin. And the analogy is this. Would you go and buy a really, really good investment property and leave it empty for 10 years? Right? No, no. You would rent it out so you can generate a yield. Yeah. The same kind of analogy. Bitcoin is a pristine asset. It's actually more pristine than property is, and I'm just using that analogy to give you the idea.

[00:27:24] So it, it would just keep going up in value. Over time. It's gonna be volatile, but yeah, really that's one example. The other example I want to use is like a sa, it's like the Ultimate Savings Technology. Okay? So 20, 30 years ago, you put your money in the bank. Now if you wanna protect your wealth, put it in Bitcoin and just leave it there.

[00:27:41] So. If you know that you've got an ultimate savings tool, you'd be trying to buy as much of it and constantly, right? Yeah. You'd get your paycheck, you'd go, okay, these are my expenses. Here's some of my, here's my, my share investing, all the rest of it. I need to go into Bitcoin, right? This is why apps like Bamboo are good in that regard, even though you don't own crypto.

[00:28:00] So no, you haven't missed a boat, and if you don't kind of start accumulating, you'll be constantly asking yourself that question. For the next five years. And there's a saying that says everyone gets the Bitcoin price they deserve. Yeah. Which is basically like when you do the research and you understand it, then you buy it.

[00:28:16] Whatever that price is, is the price that you get.

[00:28:19] Molly: Awesome. And final question from a member, do you think government regulation or crypto is an Nevada inedible in, what does that word in ed?

[00:28:28] Michael: Inevitable? Yeah.

[00:28:29] Molly: Yeah. Oh my gosh. That's my dyslexic coming out. And what would that mean for investors?

[00:28:34] Michael: Yeah, it is inevitable.

[00:28:35] I mean, it's happening in the us. Australia's pretty slow on it. Um, it is ultimately good for mainstream adoption, but it does mean that there'll be less potential returns, so it will bring in more institutional money, which is ultimately good for the space. But, you know, the ability to, to generate as much.

[00:28:51] Profit from it Now, both in terms of capital gain and passive income, like we are doing a breakout that will dissipate over time, right? The more money that comes in, the larger the asset becomes, the less money you can actually make from it. So ultimately it's, it's good. There's another aspect as well that I, I just wanna kind of warn the, the viewers on something called.

[00:29:10] C BDCs or Central Bank digital currencies. These won't be called that. They'll have hidden names, but this is basically the government or the banks creating their own digital currencies, and it's the antithesis of Bitcoin. Bitcoin is designed for freedom. It's designed for personal freedom. People that are already rich in the financial system.

[00:29:26] Now, they don't need Bitcoin if you are not rich. You can benefit from Bitcoin, right? It's there for your personal financial freedom and your, your financial sovereignty. You control it. No, can take it off for you, et cetera. These cbdc by banks of governments, the absolute opposite, okay? That they can actually be used to reward or punish behavior and give governments and banks a high level of control manipulation over people than what they have now.

[00:29:49] We don't want that, so they'll be able to. Control how much you sense spend, when can you spend it, who can you spend it with? All the rest of it. It is very, very scary technology. So just we all need to be aware of when we hear governments and banks bringing out this wonderful new currency that's digital and all.

[00:30:05] You just gotta be careful with that because it'll just give them more control than what they already have, and this is why Bitcoin is such an important mechanism for humanity as a whole. Awesome.

[00:30:15] Molly: And Michael, I'm sure people are wondering, as am I, tell us more about what you actually do at Breakout Solutions.

[00:30:21] Michael: Yeah, so, so I've got a background in, in technology and investing and, and software automation. So I brought all that to breakout solutions. So we help business owners and high income professionals essentially reach financial freedom faster using automated wealth strategies. And you don't need to be tech savvy, you don't need to have a lot of time.

[00:30:38] We're leveraging tools like blockchain and AI to help people on that journey. So, um, we've got a bunch of strategies. They're pretty much all hands off. So once it's set up, you just let it go. The most notable at the moment is definitely the AI trading bot. I. You can profit from the volatility of crypto without that risk on your capital, right?

[00:30:55] So if you are worried, oh, I'm gonna buy crypto, it's gonna crash overnight, or whatever, this is the perfect strategy for the last 12 months running. It's done 104%, and if you compounded it over 150, there's actually nothing like this that I've seen anywhere in the world that's able to do returns like this.

[00:31:10] So we've built that with a partner. That's one of our key strategies. We've got other ones like. Dollar cost averaging into Bitcoin and a couple other things, but that's the one that's getting most people's attention. I just wanna mention as well, we actually have a, uh, a new, a new workshop, um, coming out called Digital Freedom Formula, where I've actually built a tool that uses, um, AI to help the attendees build a, a blueprint to reach financial freedom and how they can accelerate that using blockchain and AI tools.

[00:31:35] So I'll definitely put that link, send that link to you for the show notes. Yeah, and I don't know if we had a chance to discuss it. Oh, well, I didn't bring it up, but there's, I also wanted to give your audience a freebie, a 10 point checklist as well. So if anyone wanted to kind of do their own research on what to buy, we've put a lot of time and effort over the last four years into a checklist.

[00:31:53] I'll also send you that link as well.

[00:31:56] Molly: Oh, thank you so much, Michael. We'll share that with the audience. It sounds very interesting and always if you are listening, you know, make sure you do your own research, your own due diligence. But yeah, my brain has exploded from this conversation. It's, um, definitely like so much to get your head around.

[00:32:11] So thank you so much, Michael, for breaking it down for us.

[00:32:14] Michael: Yeah, you're welcome. I know, I know like we've gone into a lot of topics. We didn't even touch on tokenization, which is my favorite one. I'll just try and educate the audience, but at the end of the day, it can be simple and that's what we help you do.

[00:32:24] So if you are interested, please reach out. Otherwise, thanks for having me and hopefully look forward to being back again at some point in the future.

[00:32:30] Molly: Sounds good.

KEYWORDS

cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, blockchain, Ethereum, digital assets, investment, financial freedom, money printing, inflation, decentralized finance, cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, NFTs, scams, investment, regulation, financial freedom, blockchain, AI trading, digital assets