Freedom Money Ep11

Today on the podcast, we have a very special guest. Drago from J Labs is here. Welcome to the podcast, Drago.

Thank you, Kevin. Thank you very much for your invitation. I'm really excited to be here with you.

Well, we're super excited to hear what you're building. But first, before we even get there, can you take me through your journey to Bitcoin or crypto more generally?

Yeah, uh, I was introduced in crypto in, uh, 2011. I have a colleague of mine that, uh, almost non-stop was talking about crypto. It was something emerging, something new, something very interesting. So this was the first time I have familiarized myself, and through the years I have found that it's a very, very interesting— not only in terms of technology, but in terms of freedom that represents the democratizing the financial markets and how the people interact with— how do you say— not only with each other, but in terms of their— I'm trying to find the best word— in terms of of their investment opportunities. So I was really fascinated, but because I have, how do you say it, a mathematical background, so I was really fascinated at the time of the structure of this new kind of emerging asset classes. And because of the volatile nature of it, I most definitely was interested in discovering how to set new patterns, new tools to be able to successfully analyze this new asset class. So my— in my experience, I have a lot of experience in data analysis and emerging technologies from the research that I'm doing on this data.

It's quite a journey from 2011. I certainly wasn't as receptive to the technology in 2011 as you. I'm curious, what about it stood out to you as something that was potentially transformational for money and civilization when you think about Bitcoin?

Well, if you, if you keep— if you think about— let's, let's talk about the evidence, because from my background I always look about the, the evidence. Uh, in the current, uh, situation, our financial system, basically we need the carrier of value. Uh, we have found the stable carrier of value, which is the fiat currency, uh, which we can transfer this value to another assets. And, uh, if you look at the evidence, we can most definitely use fiat currencies to buy stuff, but it will be hard for us to be able to— how to say it— for example, use gold to buy stuff on the market or in the store. So what, what was fascinating for me, uh, is that, uh, if you think about it, the Bitcoin actually have, uh, an evidence of both these exciting features. You most definitely can buy stuff with it. Nowadays there are a lot of, how do you say, service providers that accept Bitcoin as a payment carrier, as a payment. And also you can use it as an investment. And this was very, very exciting to me, and I was fascinating by the, how do you say, the, the mixed nature of this new emerging, emerging asset. So I keep digging, I keep discovering new things that I think that is going to be beneficial in overall democratizing the way we think about, about finance, because we, we need to take into account that this is a very, uh, in trading, in, in, in For many years it was a very conservative community. Uh, not everyone have, uh, has, uh, have the access to these markets. But nowadays the things are, are completely different. Everyone here, everyone, uh, if you're willing, you can have access to, uh, to crypto market and to be able to interact with the market, which, uh, most of the people find very interesting and find many opportunities.

Yeah, I mean, it's interesting you were talking about using Bitcoin as payment technology and investment. For me, part of my journey was making sure it could be used as collateral. And, you know, I think over time we're just going to see an increase in the number of use cases for Bitcoin. And, you know, it seems, seems obvious and inevitable.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's just a part. It's, it's, uh, it's, uh, I have mentioned just a part of his features. So I think that, I think that this is the beginning of its evolution. It's going to evolve over time and, uh, hopefully evolve in the way we project, we think about it.

Yeah. What, um, maybe I should have started here initially, but You know, I understand you're based in Bulgaria, and so I just have some questions about, you know, uh, Bitcoin acceptance in Bulgaria generally, adoption of cryptocurrencies, and what it's like to build in Bulgaria.

Well, I will be honest, it's a very exciting time for Bulgaria, especially for Bitcoin and for the crypto communities as a whole. Because, uh, there's a large crypto community in here in Bulgaria, not only with Bitcoin. So of course Bitcoin is the major focus, uh, don't understand me wrong, but, uh, the community is growing. I think that we are the maybe one of the few countries that have, uh, how do you say, exponential growth in interest, uh, in Bitcoin, in, uh, in the crypto as a whole. We have Many events that are focused in, in crypto that are, uh, realized in the past years. For example, the last year there was a big event called ETH 2025, which was a very known event in the community, and a lot of people participated. Even I have the opportunity to share my thoughts and my ideas on one of the, of the workshop. And I was surprised how many people are engaging, a lot of young people that, that want to explore, uh, the opportunities that the, the blockchain presents for them, not only as asset but the technology also. There are a lot of companies that are involved in Web3 development There are a lot of companies that are involved in the— that are presented there that are involved in designing trading technologies. So in Bulgaria, here I can most definitely say that the opportunities are here. There's a large community. Unfortunately, we need to consolidate ourselves in some sense because there are a lot of different approaches. But, uh, I think that it's very, very interesting that I'm very excited about the future of the crypto, Bitcoin, and crypto community here in Bulgaria.

Amazing. So now, uh, let's move on to J Labs. What, uh, what is the mission and what are you building?

Yeah, well, we started this company as a, as an adventure, uh, of course.

As I ask the question, I see you light up, so I, I I feel like this is really good.

Yeah, thank you. I'm very excited about our company. Of course, it's our child. You know, you need to be excited about what you're building and about your, you know, efforts taking realization. You see the efforts in different products that you design. Initially, we started the company as I said, It's more like— was more like an experiment. You know, we need to— we find the niche in the market for automated trading. So the company started there. Nowadays, we have successfully launched our first automated trading application, and we continue involving the company, involving our products in terms of presenting new technologies, new ideas. And a large part of our work is dedicated to innovation and actually creating, not only creating the ideas, but realizing these ideas. So some people may find this controversial, but I definitely think that there are a lot of we can discover in in the market, there are a lot of things that we need to take into account. So we are focused now on our, how to say it, newest adventure. It's a type of service where actually we have learned this the hard way when we started. In the beginning. We need to collect a lot of amount of information for a lot of different places. And this was very not only technological challenging, but it presents its own challenges in terms of data validation and so on. So we started the journey where we can actually have an idea and we start realizing this idea. To be able to, for any trader or any investment investor or any participant in the market, to find all the necessary information in one place, not to be able to stream, you know, from, from many places, but all in one place. We think that this is a good idea and this idea can drive many businesses to test their ideas, to test new technologies, to test some concepts that I have and don't need to worry about data collection, data validation, and so on. So the three major products that we are focusing are most definitely going to be able to be, how do you say it, good tools, very helpful tools for anyone who is involved in trading in crypto.

So I know we kind of dug into the details a little bit more in terms of the applications and some of the utility. And, you know, I think as I understand it, you were going through, you know, a number of information sources and getting information about specific tokens or directional moves in the market or news and incorporating that into your signals. Uh, so I'm curious kind of how it works on a subscription model. Is it clients executing on their own? How, how does it actually flow through to, uh, execution?

Yeah, it's a, it's a subscription, it's a subscription-based, uh, model where You need to think about it like, like a shopping cart. You know, what we have discovered that as many people we have in the market, there are a lot of different needs. They need different things. Someone wants to, for example, analyze regime changes. Others want to analyze the liquidity. And so we basically have discovered and we are in the process of implementing that. But basically, we're going to satisfy the needs of the end user and based on their actual requirements. And it's a type of subscription-based model where you can either get your information in API with API endpoints or via user interface, which, whichever is most suitable for you. But I have started that— I have mentioned that we are concentrating on innovation, and this is something that we really are serious about, you know. Uh, you mentioned the news. I have mentioned to you earlier the, the, the, the, the, this product that we're working on, on working on right now. And it's really fascinating for us. If you, you know, let's take, take, for example, a simple, a simple indicator like moving average. The basic principle of this, you know, mathematical expression is to filter the noise, to be able to find some distinct regime changes. But we need to ask ourselves the question, Is the noise carrying any additional information that can be helpful for us? So I definitely— we are working on this subject. We think that there is a lot of data that we are disregarding right now that can bring additional information. How the market reacts to, for example, to news feeds. There's challenges. You need to quantify them. You need to quantify the news, the news streams. And this is where the AI comes into place. And this is something that we think it's the future of this type of not only analysis, but in the, in our, in our, how do you say it, in our profession as a whole, because this new technology, relatively new technology, of course, it will help us to be able to find the solutions for tasks that were previously impossible to do on everyday basis. So this is our goal. Our goal is to provide helpful and innovative instruments, proven, of course, that many of us can find useful in their, on their daily basis.

No, it's really interesting. I know, like, from my old foreign exchange trading experience, the business, you know, moved from voice to electronic. I'm dating myself now, but from how we are, and, you know, it seemed like for a lot of high-frequency traders or signal traders, it kind of becomes an arms race in terms of technology, like who gets the information first and can act first and manage risk best, uh, is, is really well suited for those situations. And so, you know, I, I guess I'm curious, I mean, it's a constant battle, uh, to continue to refine these signals as the market changes and information and competition condition changes, I guess.

Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. You know, there is a very thin line between building, uh, how do you say it, uh, successful model and the model that can drive additional information from the market and take into account the historical data. Because let's look at another angle. There is a knowing in statistics that almost all the time you don't actually have the whole information. You don't actually have the whole population. So you need to work with the sample. And most of the models, if you're trying to, to, to, to train the model, most of the models will give contradictory results of new, new market data, right? Because the new market data is changing constantly over the period. Of time. So you need to be able to build models that can be calibrated based on the new approach, the new data that is— how do I say— the new data that is arrived. And this is something that is important nowadays. So basically, it's an iteration process where you You don't use constant model. You keep learning from the new data that is arriving. And this is the key from our perspective, from our point of view. This is the key. The people— and you need to take into account that it's a living organism. It's mostly driving— nowadays, it's mostly driven by people. The market behavioral patterns and any, how to say it, any type of, of structure in the market is based, is based on human psychology, how we react to the market based on the information, information that we, that we receive. And this is a key point. This is a key point. And we most definitely say that if we review the market, there are two periods. Before 2023 and after 2023. So you need to take— we need to take this also into consideration.

There's a lot, a lot changing. So maybe you can shed some light on some of the challenges you see operating, you know, if there's regulatory challenges in addition to the technology challenges or what you know, what the biggest challenge you face is.

Well, the biggest challenges we have faced is, you know, let's talk about what is actually the regulation. Regulation is a set of rules. Uh, we don't say that it's necessary, but it's needed rules. But, uh, there is a fine line between overregulating and regulating in the healthy sense. From— if I can put it in simple terms, if the market is a football match, you know, soccer, soccer match where, you know, all the players, participants in the market play and the referee is the regulatory frame. If you're overelaborating, you can easily turn this experience into a bad one. And you need to take into account the the, in the most cases in the crypto market, the ball is not round, it's more of a square. So the biggest challenge maybe was, uh, there's a lot of technical demand on the regulatory frame. Uh, there's a lot of, uh, you know, uh, restrictions in order how you, you, you, you use, you apply your, your how you evolve your technology. And not in the least is that basically you are, how do you say it, you are put in the games with the big ones where you could, we have to compete with companies which have dedicated teams, a lot of resources. Separated for compliance. And basically this was the most challenging for us, to be able to, how to say, to comply with every different, with all the different, you know, the regulatory threads.

Yeah, this is a consistent theme that I think all podcast guests kind of run into where regulatory is like, you know, top, top 3 concerns for sure. Uh, with that being said, what do you think is next in the space?

Well, I, I, I wish to be optimistic about it. Uh, I, I think that, uh, you know, yesterday— no, not yesterday, but a couple of weeks ago— I have heard because Bulgaria is part of European Union. I have heard the Von der Leyen statement that actually we are maybe in, how do you say, the period of overregulating things. Actually, I don't remember which is Von der Leyen or the French president, but there is a tendency of regulating things. I really hope, I really hope that We are not on this path. I really hope that, you know, the crypto community can stand up, can consolidate and transfer some of their ideas, some of their views about the future of the market to the people that make the decision and who abuse the regulatory— who are building the regulatory framework. The community needs to be heard about it and need to have a voice.

Yeah, I think, I mean, the community is incredible from my perspective. This, you know, people coming together with a shared purpose and, you know, I think everyone's helpful and constructive with everybody else.

I've never really seen anything different and You know, like, I definitely, I definitely agree. I definitely agree. We are, uh, we are all— it's, it's, it's, um, our community is very strong. This is the, the maybe the, how to say, the strongest part, and it's like the technology, but we are strong. Uh, we need to— maybe, maybe what I'm lacking here, or correct me if I'm wrong, but We need to, to, to discuss these issues, the issues we have on the, on the government level. We need to transfer ideas, our vision about the market we are in and how we envision this market to, to evolve in future. I think that this is the key. Not necessarily that we are not doing that, but I think that we can be a lot stronger about this. Stuff.

So what, you know, with a decade and a half or more of experience building in the space, what, what's your best advice for builders today?

My best advice is to not be afraid to explore different ideas, to not be afraid, you know. In— I guess this is This is valid in every case. In, you know, the fear of, the fear of not, not producing satisfactory results from your idea or not be able this idea to be further developed into realizing the products. And I think that the, the, the best advice that I can, can give them to, to not be afraid to explore different ideas. Even think out of the box when exploring different ideas.

Amazing. I, you know, I appreciate your time. I'll kind of open up the floor if there's any last thoughts, but I think I'm curious where people can find you, where they can connect, and how they can reach you going forward.

Yeah, thank you, thank you. It was very exciting to me. Well, Uh, they can find us on our website which is, uh, jmiddle-waps.com. Uh, this is our website. Of course they can reach us to, uh, our support mail. Uh, they can reach us, uh, with our trading application which has a contact form. Of course it's trader. But, uh, jingobot.com, and, uh, we can start from there.

Well, Drago, I really appreciate the time and look forward to reconnecting soon. All the best.

Kevin, thank you, thank you very much, thank you very much. All the best to you. Bye-bye.