Jordan Belfort, Still a Wolf, Likes Crypto Right Now

MIAMI BEACH, Fla. – Jordan Belfort is lounging by the pool on a sunny April morning, sipping Red Bull and sharing a cautionary tale. It’s not uncommon for him to be jailed on 10 counts of securities fraud and money laundering: This time, he’s the victim. Last fall, he explained to a group of businessmen gathered at his palatial home, a hacker stole $300,000 in digital tokens from his crypto wallet.

He got the bad news at dinner on Friday, he said, while he was telling a venture capital friend about the time he sunk his yacht on a natural gas adventure. drug data in the mid-’90s. After breaking into Mr. Belfort’s account, hackers transferred large amounts of Ohm, a popular cryptocurrency token, to a private wallet – a publicly visible transaction statement that Mr. Belfort could do nothing to reverse. “You can see where the money is,” he said. “That’s the most annoying thing.”

Mr. Belfort, 59, is best known for “The Wolf of Wall Street,” a memoir about his lofty financial career in the 1990s, which was made into a film by director Martin Scorsese in the 1990s. 2013 starring Leonardo DiCaprio as the main character’s partygoer. Today, the real-life Mr. Belfort is a consultant and sales coach, charging tens of thousands of dollars for one-on-one sessions.

This month, at his home in Miami Beach, he hosted nine blockchain enthusiasts and entrepreneurs for a weekend-long crypto seminar – a chance to hang out with Wolf and enjoy an “intimate financial experience” with his crypto industry friends.

A long line of celebrities have tried to profit from the cryptocurrency boom, appearing in widely mocked crypto ads or launching unavailable tokens, technical collections. Unique digital algorithm called NFT. Mr. Belfort said he refused to participate in the worst sale. He turned down an offer to launch a Werewolf-themed NFT line, he said, even though “I could easily make $10 million.”

He is also a recent convert from crypto skepticism. Not long ago, he shot a YouTube video about the dangers of Bitcoin, which he called “crazy” and “mass delusion.” Over the years, he said, he slowly changed his mind, as he learned more about cryptocurrencies and skyrocketed prices.

Now, Mr. Belfort is an investor in several startups, including the new NFT platform and an animal-themed crypto project that he says is “trying to bring the dog and dog ecosystem to life.” pet onto blockchain. ”

Whatever his crypto interests, Mr. Belfort is certainly qualified to discuss the topic of financial fraud, a major problem in the digital asset industry. In the 1990s, the company he founded, Stratton Oakmont, ran a sophisticated stock manipulation scheme. At the height of his wealth, he and his business partners consumed large amounts of cocaine and quail and regularly employed prostitutes. Mr. Belfort ended up serving 22 months in prison.

Given that history, it might feel a bit bizarre to hear an older, gloomier Mr. Belfort declare that he is “very much looking forward to regulation” in the crypto industry. “I’m not interested in separating people from their money,” he said. “It’s the opposite of how I act right now.”

However, his in-house crypto seminar wasn’t free: Guests paid one Bitcoin for a seat, or equivalent, around $40,000.

The conference begins at 9 a.m. Saturday. The guests – selected from a pool of more than 600 applicants – rehearsed around Mr. Belfort’s backyard, eating made-to-order omelettes and trading tips on Bitcoin mining and tokenomics. A crypto miner from Kazakhstan has been relaxing in the sun with an aspiring blockchain influencer who runs a roofing company in Idaho. A Florida businessman explained his plans to use NFTs in a startup that he’s promoting as Tinder for music. Some guests said they paid for the workshop because they were huge fans of Werewolves; Others simply want to connect with fellow entrepreneurs.

By 9:15 a.m., the mimosas were flowing, but Mr. Belfort was nowhere to be seen. “The US dollar is going to be bad,” said Doug Bartlett, the roof’s chief executive. Several minutes passed. Still no Wolf. “Is the Wolf still sleeping?” a guest asked loudly.

Finally, Mr. Belfort left the house, wearing faded jeans and dark sunglasses. Mr. Belfort has short dark hair; he has more wrinkles than he did in the 90s, but his face still carries the permanent smile of a boy. He paused on the stairs from the porch to survey the scene: nine men dressed in business clothes of various shades – polo shirts, flip flops, unbuttoned shirts. “I guess we still need to work on female adoption of crypto,” he said. “We have to bring some girls here next year.” He stopped. “Women.”

Someone gave Mr. Belfort a can of Red Bull. (It was about 9:30 a.m.) “I need sugar,” he said. After a few minutes of conversation, he led the group into the dining room, where each person at the table was given a notebook and a copy of “Way of the Wolf,” the sales manual that Mr. Belfort published in 2005. 2017.

Mr. Belfort has spent the past two decades trying to rebuild his reputation, but signs of the Old Werewolf are everywhere. Behind his desk head position, a well-stocked wine rack takes up most of the wall. (He says he hasn’t been tall for 25 years, but he does drink from time to time.) Next to the shelf hangs a poster designed to resemble an entry in the periodic table – Qu for quaalude – listing various “facts about drugs,” including “best sex ever. ”

After a brief introduction, Mr. Belfort began lecturing on the minutiae of cryptocurrencies, from the difference between Bitcoin and Ethereum to the rise of decentralized autonomous organizations. He shared his wisdom on cryptocurrency-based “smart contract” systems (“some of them are really smart; some of them are stupid”) and recounted: old stories about his collaboration with Leo and Marty.

“Leo has never used drugs,” he said. “I had to educate him about that.”

For a subset of crypto evangelists, it’s amazing how much time people have spent reliving their biggest losses. Nearly half of the group said they had been attacked. One guest said he lost money when cryptocurrency exchange Mt. Gox collapsed in 2014. Two others said they burned large amounts of tokens in risky transactions.

The energy in the room was lifted by the arrival of Chase Hero, one of a series of guest speakers Mr. Belfort had recruited over the weekend. A crypto investor and a game enthusiast, Mr. Hero has stated that stablecoins – cryptocurrencies whose value is pegged to the US dollar – are “the biggest innovation since the bread cut.” slice”.

“It seems vivacious and crazy and is pretty much out of the bounds of a Ponzi scheme,” Hero said of his favorite stablecoin project. “This makes it the perfect asset for crypto because that’s what these kids love.”

One of Mr. Belfort’s guests, Svein-Erik Nilsen, a Norwegian businessman, began describing his own entrepreneurial ambitions. Do you have any tips? The key to starting a new business is aggressive marketing, he replied. “Imagine going to a Brazilian beach and trying to find a hot chick. There are eight million,” said Mr. Hero. “The idea is the same thing here. You have to do stupid, stupid marketing to get it out there.”

Hours later, the group postponed dinner at Carbone, an upscale Italian restaurant in Miami Beach, where Mr. Belfort ate regularly twice a week. As they ate their caviar and tomato meal, some guests shared stories of their own perversions; Mr. Belfort, it turned out, wasn’t the only wolf in the room. The two guests discussed the mechanism of pursuing younger women without getting caught up in the “dear” situation. Someone speculated on how a daring strip club owner could incorporate NFT into the business.

Soon, the conversation turned to a club in Japan, where women are said to enjoy eating meat with octopus. Mr. Belfort wants to know more: Are women in Japan beautiful? He then showed the group an iPhone video he shot at an S-and-M themed bar, where the waitresses appreciated the customers.

Artem Bespaloff, the chief executive officer of crypto mining company Asic Jungle, leaned across the table to describe his personal transition to the werewolf way. He was planning to go to medical school, he said, when he found a copy of “The Wolf of Wall Street” at the library.

“I said, ‘This is what I want to do,’ recalls Mr. Bespaloff. “I ended up stealing the book from the library.”

“So I’m a good influencer,” said Mr. Belfort, laughing. However, he said, he regrets his behavior in those days – it was a mistake, and he could have been richer if he hadn’t broken the law. “I missed the internet boom,” he said. “I will make 100 times more money.”

“Well,” replied Mr. Bespaloff, “you are using crypto now.”

“You live and learn,” Mr. Belfort said.