Neo & Bee Miami presentation

Hello everyone, I'm George and we are Neo!

We would like to think that we are one of the biggest startups in the Bitcoin community and we are based in Cyprus.

Can I see a show of hands? How many people actually knew where Cyprus was before March 2013. *looks around audience* It's not everyone.

So, the recent events of March showed Cyprus to the planet, and actually showed us that monetary systems are not as safe as we all thought.

So, we had - especially Danny, our CEO.. Danny Brewster (who couldn't be here because we are very close to launch and couldn't make it so I'm replacing him for this) - he had this thought of..

How could you actually build infrastructure on a vertical scale, not on the typical horizontal scale that most Bitcoin startups are doing - to actually bring Bitcoin to the masses, bring about more adoption with ease of access and convenience like.. mostly, more or less what they knew already.

The only thing they knew already was banks. But banks do not suffice of course and we now have Bitcoin which is far better.  So we went on an adventure, actually, trying to create all these services one by one.

So I'd like the welcome every one of you to the Neo economy as we call it. Now, we believe the people are the new economy. They are their own banks.

And beyond, the management team that we actually have: we have twelve more full-time employees, we have a dedicated team of developers (Pittas & Valkerkos, they are very skilled and build mining systems on the background) and they've been working with us for the last five months developing all the infrastructure that we need on the background. We have a lot of people from KPMG (our auditing, our accounting services) and we have two specialised legal services for the financial industry that we'll see further down the road and all the corporate structure we want to build.

So, the people. We had to build everything from scratch. We had to recruit all the people, we had to develop all the manuals and processes, train them into not only understanding what Bitcoin is, but actually transmitting this knowledge onto other people who are not tech-savvy. We had to man all the stations that we were building with 24/7 web support and telephone support and personal contact with anyone that actually requires it. We have one of the first companies to have a dedicated compliance officer, which actually communicates all the AML and KYC to the regulatory bodies within Cyprus. Our internal legal counsel (he's sitting somewhere back here). So we have enough people to actually build a physical personal contact point to everyone who needs to know what Bitcoin is and how it can benefit him. So it all starts from the people.

Beyond that, comes the building. Our first branch is going to be delivered in the mid of February, which is, like 20 days away from here. We tried to go with an open and transparent design, more friendly, nothing that looks like a bank, because we keep reminding people we are not a bank and we're never going to be a bank. We don't want to be a bank.

So, this is how it looked yesterday, it's a far cry from the previous one but just keep in mind all the materials have been ordered and they are ready. The only thing that is missing is the assembly.

So, what we'll be doing at Neo. Initially we will be able to physically exchange Bitcoins for fiat currencies and provide to the customers what we call the time-locked accounts. It will be an introduction measure so that people get accustomed without risking money.

How do the time-locked accounts work? The limit of the time-locked account will be 500 Euros and the term, the initial term, will be three months. We are taking the personal bet that the Bitcoin exchange rate is not going to drop that significantly in these next three months. What will be happening is they can buy the Bitcoins at a price of 500 Euros we guarantee that the term, at the end of this term, regardless of what the Bitcoin exchange rate does, it will still be 500 Euros. And we can guarantee that from our reserves - we measured the numbers properly so that regardless of the traffic we have we can facilitate that easily. In the meantime, if the price rises, the customer will get a percentage of that growth (if it happens).

The next step will be - once we are able to develop the infrastructure and we are able to hedge against our own risk - we will be able to offer Euro-pegged accounts, which is something that we feel is necessary in the economy but it's also very, very hard to implement. How do you guarantee to a person that the value of his money is always 1000 Euros (the initial money that he brought you.) To do this you have to add or subtract Bitcoins from his account so that you are always able to have a floating price of around 1000 Euros. That could be very profitable as a proposition but at the same time it could be very, very risky because you would need huge amounts of reserves. So that's why we are postponing it for now and we're implementing it in the future.

At the same time, we are building on the ease of purchase with Easycoin. Easycoin is one of the fastest ways that we could develop to gain access to coins from to any side of the planet that can take the cash payment. Your AML and KYC is done within the first hour and, if you have a Bitcoin wallet, you log in, you create your account and you get your Bitcoins within the hour.

We've completed all the work on the software background that's needed, we've done the internal testing, what we need to develop a bit further are the cash payment providers and we have a large network of countries which are about to come online. Some of these countries are in Latin America, some of these countries are in Europe, so we'll see exactly how that pans out, we'll update any news through our forum and especially the Bitcoin community which provided all the funding for our initial startup. In the US we have, we were aiming to actually start with the US, but there's conflicting legal status with FinCEN having different lawyers saying different things, so this will have to wait for a little bit longer.

Beyond that, we have the Bee payment network which is something that works in tandem with the Neo account. It also allows merchants to accept Bitcoin payments and have them transferred immediately to Euros in their account, without any kind of phase for internal transactions, with instant settlement and with the customer protection program, which as far as we know it, has not been implemented yet in any Bitcoin payment system. These POS terminals that we will be shipping to the merchants will be pretty open so anyone that has Bitcoins on their smartphone can pay on the spot in several hundred places we hope by the summer in Cyprus.

The day that we are opening the branch on the 24th of February we are having a big merchant conference in Nicosia and the next day we are having the same conference in Limassol which are the two biggest cities in Cyprus. We already have a lot of interest just from these merchants who are actually fighting for profits in market. It's become very competitive and there's a big monopoly on the payment systems. So anything we can actually do to help them is really, really appreciated.

So beyond that, what we feel is actually missing from what we call the Neo economy is actual responsibility. And, responsibility can be guaranteed by using Bitcoin through us being as transparent as possible, and as being as liable to the law for anything we do with our customers Bitcoins or our customers funds. So in that spirit we are applying for a Cyprus Investment Firm license, which is the most responsible license we could get in Cyprus. It is passportable throughout the European Union and it allows us to perform in full regulatory framework these kinds of services.

So, we'll see for the first time that we can actually receive, transmit orders, execute the orders on behalf of clients, deal with our own accounts, manage portfolios of clients, provide investment advice and underwriting financial instruments, which is very, very important for the Bitcoin economy, because it needs a place where new businesses can get their funding, and if we can implement instruments like shares on profits on them and actually be able to audit them on how well their prospectus performs. We can actually have a more decent structure to get funding to Bitcoin businesses.

Market-making, which is a very, very important part that's missing from most major exchanges, the fact that we don't have enough liquidity that the market is shallow. And at the same time, through a number of ancillary services, which will help us provide the conventional services which we are missing from the Bitcoin community right now. So this will allow us to actually build a trading platform which is regulated. And this is important because anyone who trades needs to know that his money is safe, that the exchange is not doing unfractional as there is rumours around, and they need to know that it's a platform which is audited in the background.

So we are customly building our own platform to perfection via, all the work that the open source community has done on some levels, proprietary development on other levels. One of the key differentiating aspects that we'll have is the multi-signature aspect of Bitcoin which we feel has not been implemented enough and we feel can actually alleviate some of the risk of trust. Because, as the person who developed the Open Transactions said before, "Bitcoin was not built for trust. Bitcoin was built to be a transparent and trustless system" and we very strongly believe that. I'll explain the multi-signature process down the road.

So we will be licensed by the Cyprus Securities Commission, CySec, to provide all of the contemporary financial instruments that are missing. And especially with what regards to the service that we want to offer, the Euro-pegged accounts, we need options [referring to the financial instrument called "options"], and in order to provide the time-locked wallets where we are essentially guaranteeing to them that we'll buy a financial instrument for at a future date with a set price. This is an "option". We need to be able to provide options. This will all take place with a CIF license.

Beyond that, we're still not satisfied with our eggs, so we are going to develop what we call Neo portals, which are going to be dedicated BTMs (Bitcoin ATMs) from scratch again that can be able to facilitate Neo wallets. If anyone has an account on a Neo wallet, which can also be online, they can transact with the BTM in a dual-functionality way.. insert fiat, take out Bitcoin, insert Bitcoin, take out fiat - regardless of what you need. Dedicated development will begin in March and we will also find it easier to actually expand with the BTMs first, and then invest in new branches, train new personnel, etc. We will gather data from the BTMs and build along the branches throughout Europe or any other country that has enough potential to be actually useful.

Now one of the biggest problems that we have encountered is counter-party risk, and this is exactly the reason that Bitcoin was developed - the trustless aspect we were talking about before. If we had institutional investors that actually wanted to get into Bitcoin, we feel and we've seen and we've had input from funds, exchange traders, brokers, that currently the risk is too high. At the same time, we've seen that Bitcoin businesses are also taking the huge risk upon themselves because they face counter-party risk from any bank that could, at any moment, click-shutdown their account and actually leave them hanging and dissolve their whole business model from where it is.

So, one of the announcements, if anyone has been looking at the forum (our forum for the IPVO) that we wanted to make today is that, one of the steps that we are taking to alleviate this risk is we're actively looking into purchasing an interest in a financial institution, in a bank. So there was this discussion before that banks should buy Bitcoin companies, and we're adamant about it that we want it to be the other way. Bitcoin businesses should be buying banks. *applause from audience* .. and actually teach them how it should be done, and actually teach them how transparently it can work. So, that's the beginning of it.

Moving on with that, all our wallets, in Neo, Bee and the trading accounts, will have a multi-sig transaction system implemented. So this means that, at any point, a user will have a private key, we hold a private key and the third entity, which is unrelated to us, transparent and probably multi-billion dollar company I can not announce yet (I'm sorry) will hold the third key. So, in case we disappear, the customers money is still there, it's accessible, perfectly accessible and out of our own reach. If something happens to the customer, he loses the private key, he passes away, there will be a legal structure in the background of getting the Bitcoins safely out, which is what we need. At the same time, *delayed applause* (Thank you) At the same time, we'll have the same implementation for the trading platform which we feel is very, very important, because the brokers will have one key, we will have one key (if the platform is working with us) and the same trusted party will have another key. So, there is no counter-party risk for wallet holders and brokers.

The last thing I would like to show you before we go is a sneak peak of the teaser trailers that we're showing starting the first of February throughout Cyprus. We are going on a blitzkrieg approach, so we're going to bomb the media with the seven different teaser trailers for three weeks, and by the opening date these seven trailers will turn into seven commercials about it.

I'd like to see these trailers and then tell you exactly what it is about, so you don't get the wrong impression because.. it's important. I'd like to thank you and before that, let me go:

Our approach regarding the VAT concerns would be that since Germany and the UK are planning on doing the financial instruments, as we see it, we feel the same approach is correct for Cyprus and throughout the rest of Europe, so that's the approach we are taking with the regulators. Alright, thank you from me, let's see the trailers please.

*teaser plays with Cypriot child speaking and the brand NEO clearly announced within*

[ teaser here: https://soundcloud.com/mindtomatter/e79-a-bitcoin-world#t=1:03:36 ]

Before we finish please, *applause* please, just a second...

The conclusion of this is that, after all the teasers, Neo has built like this shadowy image of the superhero. And, in the end, every character who stars in the trailers actually opens his shirt and there is "Neo" written under it. Which means that each and every one of them is Neo, which is our goal to promote the superhero within. Everyone can take the economy in his own hands and actually be the saviour of himself and his family. Thank you very much.

*final applause*