Argentina, DeFi and PoolTogether
PoolTogether Community Interview #20 Gonbatfire
Welcome to the latest edition of the PoolTogether Community Interview. This week we head to South America and the country of Argentina to learn more about one of our PT Community Members: Gonbatfire
Tell us a bit about yourself. Describe yourself in a few words/facts:
Born in Argentina, 19y old, I’m a fan of cutting-edge technology so I LOVE to learn and experiment, I’m not scared of frying up electronics because I do it regularly HAHA. I used to work as a computer technician and currently studying system engineerings. Fun fact: My bday is on the 17th Feb, same day as the POOL token launch J (depending on the timezone).
How long have you been into crypto?
Since about March 2021, my first crypto experience was actually mining (never made a dime, I did out of boredom but it was what made me go down the rabbit hole). Another fun fact I realized the other day: My first ever transaction was an experimental submarine swap, I think that goes to show how eager I am to always try out new tech stuff heh.
Do you want to tell us about the main lessons you have learned since then?
Never stop researching and stay curious. Nothing ever fully goes the way you intend to, no matter how prepared you think you are, stuff gets turned upside down all the time, and that’s a good thing actually, it creates opportunities.
What was your best crypto moment?
This will sound corny but it was actually contributing on PT haha, but really, it was an eye opening experience to see that my comments and feedback actually reached people and made an effect (specifically this was about low-tier prizes).
In Web2 you may complain and even gather up with other users expressing the same thing, but good luck if it even makes CEOs turn their head around, here it did not only turn heads but I was being listened to, made an actual change and even got rewarded, PoolTogether was honestly the best introduction to what a community owned protocol means. I’m soo looking forward to do my first POOL vote J
And your biggest fail?
My attempts at short-term trading, like… just no, I went through (pretty much) everything you can go, surprised by required minimum amounts, not paying attention to the exchange rate, hours long block confirmation time … Only thing I managed to avoid was being trapped by ETH gas fees, but only because an anonymous hero warned me right before that moment lol, I’m sorta glad I went through all that tho, there is saying that money lost in crypto, are the just the fees for educating yourself.
How did you find out about PoolTogether?
I was selected for a scholarship program which paid us a “generous” sum (not really, but for me it was quite considerable). The money was aimed to help us buy stuff we needed to attend online classes… but since it took over 6 months to arrive, we kinda had to buy everything on our own anyway, so then around July-August 2021 I was there with some considerable money for which I didn’t really had an use case, so my though was: “Okay, why don’t I just save it for when I need it?” just one small issue, last year Argentina reached 50.9% inflation, so saving in local currency is kinda… pointless.
Okay, why not just buy US dollars?
“We have no say in this, these were the decisions made by the Central Bank” Is what a bank employee told me after reading me the long and ridiculous list of requirements you needed to comply in order to be able to exchange currency. It wasn’t only that I myself wasn’t able to comply, but rather that I don’t know a single person that actually complies, and EVEN if someone theorically did, they would only gain the “privilege” of being able to buy a max of $200 USD, per month. So yeah, the requirements are so ridiculous that it was obvious they were designed to basically ban people from buying the US dollar, why? Because Argentina needs $57bn USD to pay back the IMF.
The other students were posting about their new PC, clothes, bikes… they had no option but to spend the money even if they didn’t want to. I was about to just buy a new phone, but I really didn’t need one… no matter how hard I thought about it I always came to the conclusion that I didn’t actually need anything… how is it so hard to just keep my money? How on earth will someone start their own business or invest in anything if we are not allowed to have savings?
So I went on reddit and entered an Argentinian investing forum, it was full of posts of people losing their minds about some new regulations that erratically changed the market or straight up kicked more people out of it. But there were also a growing number posts about DeFi (understandably don’t you think), before that I only thought of cryptocurrency as this number go up or down thing, but I was introduced to stablecoins, lending, staking, and most important, the concept of permissionless.
In a DeFi 101 post I found PoolTogether among other protocols, it seemed to check all boxes and the concept was honestly incredible, basically, the only form of saving I knew in Argentina was to “somehow” get paper US dollars, and just… keep them under the mattress… “So you mean I can keep dollars in a digital way AND also have the chance to win prizes???” The concept blew me away, so ofc I went in, and that was my first DeFi experience.
What made you stick around?
If you want to introduce someone to crypto and DeFi, get them on the PoolTogether discord, I felt very welcomed, one thing I really like is that the community constantly tells you that there are no stupid questions, it’s very newbie friendly, and it’s very hard to not get struck by love once you join hahaha, and all this regardless of token price, something you can’t take for granted in most crypto communities.
How are you involved in the community? Tell us about it.
Sometimes I feel like I don’t even know how I got here, like one day I was discussing some governance topic before going to bed and then a few weeks ago I found myself in the top 3 allocated users in the Coordinape circle, so yeah I’m still processing that.
I guess what I do is to ignite discussions, provide feedback, assist people on what they need, like I did on the Valentine’s Campaign, and I also hang around in #help, I love to introduce people to the protocol, honestly I feel like I could talk about PT all day, so explaining concepts to new users feels awesome. I consider myself a user that wants the best for the product that I enjoy using.
Would you recommend PoolTogether to others? How would you describe it to them?
Often I hear people saying that saving is not for everyone, that you need a quite significant amount to make it worthwhile, otherwise is better to just spend it, these people should try PoolTogether, deposit whatever amount you want, could be a hundred could be ten, any amount participates for the chance of winning prizes, thousand of prizes, and you never lose your stash, it’s secured and you can withdraw it whenever you want, but if you increase it your chances of winning will get better, so try it, it’s fun!
PoolTogether encourages saving, saving encourages long-term thinking, which encourages a healthier life, so ofc I recommend it to everyone J.
Are you involved in any other projects or communities?
I’m usually active on the Monero (XMR) subreddit, which is a coin focused on bringing privacy back to the financial system, I actually find many similarities between this community and PT, both have a strong commitment to their founding ideas while remaining open minded and diverse, and also they share one same rule: No price discussion.
Do you have any other thoughts and comments you would like to make?
PoolTogether is the embodiment of what DeFi means, it doesn’t care about where are you from (Global), who you are or how much money do you have (Permissionless), and can’t be stopped by anyone (Decentralized). PT proves that you don’t have to meet any criteria to start building wealth and get on a path to a better life.
We hope that you have enjoyed this interview and learnt a different perspective on the need for DeFi and PoolTogether.
Please learn more about depositing at PoolTogether.com and join us in the PoolTogether Discord to become a part of our Community.