"What does Puerto Rico have to do with the future of Crypto Currencies and Crypto culture?"
This is one of the most common reactions I hear from people when I tell them I’m flying to the island to document the development of the Crypto Utopia.
I decided to make an article that would hopefully answer this question. Let’s start with the Set Up.
American Commonwealth
Puerto Rico is an unincorporated territory of the US in the Caribbean waters. With the total population of 3.5 Million it has an enormous $72 Billions dept to the US government and the 45% unemployment rate (according to Wikipedia). Add to this couple of seasonal hurricanes — leading into mass destructions — and there you have it: an economic situation of Puerto Rico in a nutshell. Oh wait, there is a catch. The unincorporated island is running its tax system parallel to the federal one on the Mainland and has no state tax. But more on that later.
The US acquired Puerto Rico following the Spanish-American under the terms of the Treaty of Paris. Naturally, the entire island speaks Spanish. Puerto Ricans are the natural-born US citizens since March 2, 1917, and the flights to the island are considered to be Domestic.
Interesting fact: most of the Amazon sellers would deliver to Puerto Rico, however, the delivery to the island would usually cost more. For the same reason prices on food and other products provided from the Mainland.
With that being said let’s zoom into the North-Eastern part of the island where would find the capital of Puerto Rico – San Juan, and specifically, its part called Old San Juan. Right here, the story of Puertopia starts.
Crypto Utopia
Announced for the first time in the New York Times article on the 2nd of February 2018 the term refers to the Crypto City that a group of crypto enthusiasts lead by Brock Pierce (EOS, Block.One, Blockchain Capital) is planning to form. The local crypto community is planning to make it run entirely on the cryptocurrencies and smart-contracts. Brock is a Burning Man veteran, so for him building cities and communities is not a new thing.
"How serious is this group about the project?" and "What does the Road Map for building a city of the future look like?" are some of the most important questions we will be investigating in the Puertopia documentary.
Wait but why Puerto Rico?
As I mentioned above, the island is running it’s own tax code parallel to the Federal tax code of Mainland America. This allows the Puerto Rican government to introduce its own tax incentives to attract the businesses and intellectual capital through the acts 20 & 22 that @sean-king has presented beautifully in his article about 9 months ago.
Puerto Rico could be as well regarded as the new American FinTech sandbox which already attracts a lot of crypto entrepreneurs as well as the Amazon FBA sellers that are looking for more loyal taxation. While moving to the island, they keep their US citizenship. Moreover, they are technically still on the US soil.
So, yeah, that’s a big one.
Plus, the Hurricane Maria has recently destroyed a massive chunk of the Puerto Rican infrastructure resulting in some devastating damage. Receiving very little support from the US government, the local authorities start to look towards private investors and businesses to repair the local economy.
Community reaction
Precisely because of those economic incentives the Community took the Crypto Utopia information with a grain of salty skepticism. The opinions have divided with a lot of people left on the fence waiting for more details to come before picking a side. Our documentary project is going to be a significant source of information and updates on the situation.
Take a look at some of the most interesting tweets on the topic:
While respecting all of the sides of the argument, I want to believe the Utopia is for real. Why would somebody drop such claims to the press if they could just move to the island and profit from its unique financial opportunities flying under the radar?
Blockchain Unbound
On March 14-17 the city of San Juan will be hosting a massive crypto currency conference with the early bird ticket prices going over $1,000. Now that’s a sign of a high-quality event for me, and I expect a lot of international networking opportunities.
Among some of the pillars of the Crypto Space, Ricardo Rossello, the governor of Puerto Rico will be speaking. It’s interesting that the smaller the country (territory) is, the closer its government is to startups and the smaller businesses focusing on the innovations.
My biggest concern is the weather conditions
Hurricanes and storms are the recurring phenomenons in the tropical climate of Puerto Rico. September 2017 was particularly harsh for Puerto Rico. Almost 2/3 of the Electrical Grid being affected by the Hurricane Maria. It seems like to this day some of households haven’t restored the constant supply of the electricity and the power outages are a regular thing. When we were booking our Airbnb, having a generator was the main criteria.
In order to succeed, the Crypto Utopia will have to overcome a lot of environmental challenges happening periodically on the island. I hope they have a plan for it.
Puertopia: Pandora’s Sandbox
I feel like whatever is happening right now in Puerto Rico has a huge historical potential and has to be investigated + documented both for the sake of community and for the future generations. The history of the New World seems to be happening in front of our eyes all over the world. I can’t be sitting still. It’s time to act!
You can help too
If you’d love to participate in the project please feel free to reach out to me at kirill@kichmedia.com.
We also will be launching a crowdfunding platform soon and as always:
Smash that upvote button as all of the gained SBD from it will be used to support the production and promotion of the Puertopia documentary.
With much love and respekt,
-K.