Crypto In 2019: Hard Questions, Real Answers – Bitwise Asset Management – 12.7.18

Summary:

Now On Demand.

The crypto market grabbed everyone’s attention in 2017, with bitcoin rocketing from $200 to nearly $20,000. But prices crashed back to earth in 2018, plummeting more than 80%. Is this the end of crypto … or a buying opportunity? We bring together two of the leading minds in crypto – venture capitalist Spencer Bogart and crypto index fund pioneer Hunter Horsley – to answer these questions and more, as we help financial advisors prepare for what’s next in this rapidly evolving asset class.

Speakers:

Hunter Horsley is the Chief Executive Officer of Bitwise Asset Management and co-founder of the firm. Prior to Bitwise, Mr. Horsley was a product manager at Facebook working with company leadership and teams of software engineers, data scientists, researchers, privacy specialists, client managers, partner managers, marketers, and designers to build products. Mr. Horsley was responsible for monetization products including the multi-billion-dollar sponsored content ecosystem as well as commercials in videos. Mr. Horsley was also responsible for one of the fastest growing consumer products inside of Facebook, called Save, where his team added over a hundred million monthly active users. Before Facebook, he was a product manager at Instagram working on monetization and responsible for multiple ad products generating several hundred-million-dollars of revenue. Mr. Horsley graduated from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania with a Bachelor of Science in Economics. He was a teaching assistant in computer science, design, and business history, and was a Wharton Entrepreneurship Fellow.

Spencer Bogart is a Partner at Blockchain Capital, the General Partner of Blockchain Capital’s venture funds. Spencer is a fundamental investment analyst with a rare combination of deep experience analyzing cryptocurrencies as well as traditional equity opportunities. Prior to joining Blockchain Capital, Spencer was a Vice President at Needham & Company, where he authored Wall Street’s first industry report highlighting the use-cases, companies and potential of blockchain technology. He was also the most active Bitcoin analyst on Wall Street writing detailed reports and research on Bitcoin’s fundamental value proposition, price forecast, and technical advancements. Prior to Needham & Company, Spencer cut his teeth in the startup world where he helped build a first-of-its-kind proprietary research platform for analyzing Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs), which was later acquired by FactSet. Given his rare combination of skillsets and history of actively publishing reports, Spencer is widely cited throughout the Bitcoin and Blockchain industry and is a regular speaker at industry and startup events. Spencer is a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) and earned his B.A. in Business Economics from University of California, Santa Barbara.

Matt Hougan is the Global Head of Research for Bitwise Asset Management, creator of the world’s first cryptocurrency index fund. In that role, he helps create the indexes that underlie Bitwise’s investment products and conducts fundamental research into the role cryptoassets can play in a diversified portfolio. His thoughts on crypto have been profiled in Barron’s, Bloomberg, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Institutional Investor, CNBC and many other publications. Hougan was previously CEO (and is still Chairman) of Inside ETFs, creator of the world’s largest ETF conferences. Earlier, he was CEO of ETF.com, where he led the development of the first institutionally oriented ETF ratings system, co-authored the CFA Institute’s “Monograph on ETFs” and was a three-time member of the Barron’s ETF Roundtable. Hougan serves on the Board of Directors of Equbot, creator of the world’s first artificial-intelligence-driven family of ETFs, and is an advisor to StratiFi.