Eugene Mutai’s Nairobi apartment is filled with the sound of money: That would be the hum of a phalanx of fans cooling the computers he’s programmed to mine cryptocurrencies around the clock.
The 28-year-old has given up a chunk of his living quarters to the enterprise. What’s more, he invests every spare cent in initial-coin offerings: fundraising tools some startups are using to crowdsource capital. He’s a proud citizen of a strange and controversial new world — and a rather rare breed, with just a high-school education and no formal training as a coder. That’s one thing he holds up as proof that cryptofinance isn’t the scam that a diversity of critics, from Jamie Dimon of JPMorgan Chase & Co. to Saudi Arabian Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, have suggested it is.
“The entire ecosystem could be the biggest wealth-distribution system ever,” Mr Mutai said as his 2-year old daughter, Xena, named after the warrior princess, played with a tablet, swiping from app to app. In the world of internet-based currencies traded without interference from banks or regulators, “big players can’t deny anyone from participating in the financial system.”
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Read more:
[ Cryptocurrencies' market cap hits record $200 billion ]
[ Bitcoin growing up as futures open floodgates to Wall Street ]
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For Mr Mutai, the appeal is simple: It levels the playing field in global markets that don’t give people like him many breaks.
An opposing view is that what this young man is doing is wrong or stupid, sucking up massive amounts of electricity to create a software-fabricated asset that’s traded anonymously in a lottery criminals find irresistible.
So Mr Mutai is either in the middle of a fraud, or a revolution. Whichever, the market has exploded — growing to Us$190 billion from just $17bn at the start of the year. Hundreds of new digital tokens have sprung up as entrepreneurs started projects based on blockchain, the public bookkeeping technology that supports digital currencies, raising millions and even hundreds of millions of dollars in minutes. The value of bitcoin, the biggest of them all, has increased six-fold. And it’s about to go mainstream, with CME Group in Chicago planning to introduce bitcoin-futures trading contracts by the end of the year.
Cryptocurrencies are especially attractive in economies where there are restrictions on taking cash abroad, or people don’t have bank accounts, or the local currency is being trampled by inflation. That’s the case in Zimbabwe, for example, which is facing a liquidity crisis as inflation spirals: Bitcoin in the local Golix exchange has soared to more than $10,000, a 75 pe rcent premium on global prices, as locals rush to it to protect savings.
In six of the largest African nations for which there is trading data in the online exchange Local Bitcoins, the average premium to the Bloomberg bitcoin index is 7 per cent; the gap in major bitcoin trading hubs such as China, South Korea, Germany and the UK doesn’t surpass 3 per cent. Mr Mutai said he sees cryptocurrencies as safe because “local political issues don’t affect them” — something of note in Kenya, where after two elections within three months there’s still a stalemate over who is the rightful leader.
Just last year, Mr Mutai hadn’t heard of bitcoin, which hardly makes him unusual. Neither does the fact that a decade ago he didn’t have access to a computer. He was interested in technology, though, and borrowed a friend’s Nokia Symbian S40, one of the first non-smartphones that could download apps. In between odd jobs in farming, herding sheep and ferrying people on his motorcycle, he taught himself the basics of HTML and CSS coding languages.
He was living at the time in his mother’s home village — they moved there from the city for his last year of high school, after his twin brother died and his mom lost her job — and was barely earning enough to survive. So he decided to move in with his uncle in Nairobi, who happened to have a desktop computer and a WiFi connection. “It was do or die,” he said.
Mr Mutai spent four months glued to the computer, worrying his uncle, who at one point took the machine away. After mastering the mysteries of code, he landed a job as a programmer. He also became a consultant for the technology incubator iHub and for the Nairobi County government. By 2016, he was named Kenya’s top-ranked software developer by Git Awards, which bases its rankings on data from GitHub, a site where coders store and share their work.
Now Mr Mutai works for Andela, which trains developers and engineers throughout Africa and connects them with companies including Microsoft. His current contract is with Restaurant Brands International, building an ordering app for Tim Hortons. He’s in the Kenyan middle class, a feat for a guy without a college degree.
But his opportunity for real wealth, MR Mutai figures, is in cryptocurrencies, which he can exchange for dollars or hold as an investment. His mining rig runs six 1080 Ti graphics cards. Maintenance is pretty low, as he wrote on his Facebook page: “It sits in my living room doing its thing all day every day with little or no supervision.”
At the moment, the rig churns out mainly digital coins called Zcash and LBRY Credits. Mr Mutai said he’d like to increase production by plugging in two more graphics cards, but that will have to wait until he can upgrade the power supply to his apartment. As it is, his monthly electric bill is about $200, steep for a residence in Nairobi.
His initial-coin offerings investing takes more personal energy. “I do a lot of research,” Mr Mutai said. “I feel like a small VC.”
Is he treading dangerous waters? Possibly, but he’s up for the gamble. “They say no-risk, no-return, and I’m willing to take the risk.”
RESULT
Los Angeles Galaxy 2 Manchester United 5
Galaxy: Dos Santos (79', 88')
United: Rashford (2', 20'), Fellaini (26'), Mkhitaryan (67'), Martial (72')
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
The biog
Family: Parents and four sisters
Education: Bachelor’s degree in business management and marketing at American University of Sharjah
A self-confessed foodie, she enjoys trying out new cuisines, her current favourite is the poke superfood bowls
Likes reading: autobiographies and fiction
Favourite holiday destination: Italy
Posts information about challenges, events, runs in other emirates on the group's Instagram account @Anagowrunning
Has created a database of Emirati and GCC sportspeople on Instagram @abeermk, highlight: Athletes
Apart from training, also talks to women about nutrition, healthy lifestyle, diabetes, cholesterol, blood pressure
SQUADS
Pakistan: Sarfraz Ahmed (capt), Azhar Ali, Shan Masood, Sami Aslam, Babar Azam, Asad Shafiq, Haris Sohail, Usman Salahuddin, Yasir Shah, Mohammad Asghar, Bilal Asif, Mir Hamza, Mohammad Amir, Hasan Ali, Mohammad Abbas, Wahab Riaz
Sri Lanka: Dinesh Chandimal (capt), Lahiru Thirimanne (vice-capt), Dimuth Karunaratne, Kaushal Silva, Kusal Mendis, Sadeera Samarawickrama, Roshen Silva, Niroshan Dickwella, Rangana Herath, Lakshan Sandakan, Dilruwan Perera, Suranga Lakmal, Nuwan Pradeep, Vishwa Fernando, Lahiru Gamage
Umpires: Ian Gould (ENG) and Nigel Llong (ENG)
TV umpire: Richard Kettleborough (ENG)
ICC match referee: Andy Pycroft (ZIM)
Company Profile
Company name: Hoopla
Date started: March 2023
Founder: Jacqueline Perrottet
Based: Dubai
Number of staff: 10
Investment stage: Pre-seed
Investment required: $500,000
How Tesla’s price correction has hit fund managers
Investing in disruptive technology can be a bumpy ride, as investors in Tesla were reminded on Friday, when its stock dropped 7.5 per cent in early trading to $575.
It recovered slightly but still ended the week 15 per cent lower and is down a third from its all-time high of $883 on January 26. The electric car maker’s market cap fell from $834 billion to about $567bn in that time, a drop of an astonishing $267bn, and a blow for those who bought Tesla stock late.
The collapse also hit fund managers that have gone big on Tesla, notably the UK-based Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust and Cathie Wood’s ARK Innovation ETF.
Tesla is the top holding in both funds, making up a hefty 10 per cent of total assets under management. Both funds have fallen by a quarter in the past month.
Matt Weller, global head of market research at GAIN Capital, recently warned that Tesla founder Elon Musk had “flown a bit too close to the sun”, after getting carried away by investing $1.5bn of the company’s money in Bitcoin.
He also predicted Tesla’s sales could struggle as traditional auto manufacturers ramp up electric car production, destroying its first mover advantage.
AJ Bell’s Russ Mould warns that many investors buy tech stocks when earnings forecasts are rising, almost regardless of valuation. “When it works, it really works. But when it goes wrong, elevated valuations leave little or no downside protection.”
A Tesla correction was probably baked in after last year’s astonishing share price surge, and many investors will see this as an opportunity to load up at a reduced price.
Dramatic swings are to be expected when investing in disruptive technology, as Ms Wood at ARK makes clear.
Every week, she sends subscribers a commentary listing “stocks in our strategies that have appreciated or dropped more than 15 per cent in a day” during the week.
Her latest commentary, issued on Friday, showed seven stocks displaying extreme volatility, led by ExOne, a leader in binder jetting 3D printing technology. It jumped 24 per cent, boosted by news that fellow 3D printing specialist Stratasys had beaten fourth-quarter revenues and earnings expectations, seen as good news for the sector.
By contrast, computational drug and material discovery company Schrödinger fell 27 per cent after quarterly and full-year results showed its core software sales and drug development pipeline slowing.
Despite that setback, Ms Wood remains positive, arguing that its “medicinal chemistry platform offers a powerful and unique view into chemical space”.
In her weekly video view, she remains bullish, stating that: “We are on the right side of change, and disruptive innovation is going to deliver exponential growth trajectories for many of our companies, in fact, most of them.”
Ms Wood remains committed to Tesla as she expects global electric car sales to compound at an average annual rate of 82 per cent for the next five years.
She said these are so “enormous that some people find them unbelievable”, and argues that this scepticism, especially among institutional investors, “festers” and creates a great opportunity for ARK.
Only you can decide whether you are a believer or a festering sceptic. If it’s the former, then buckle up.
How to help
Donate towards food and a flight by transferring money to this registered charity's account.
Account name: Dar Al Ber Society
Account Number: 11 530 734
IBAN: AE 9805 000 000 000 11 530 734
Bank Name: Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank
To ensure that your contribution reaches these people, please send the copy of deposit/transfer receipt to: juhi.khan@daralber.ae
How to help
Donate towards food and a flight by transferring money to this registered charity's account.
Account name: Dar Al Ber Society
Account Number: 11 530 734
IBAN: AE 9805 000 000 000 11 530 734
Bank Name: Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank
To ensure that your contribution reaches these people, please send the copy of deposit/transfer receipt to: juhi.khan@daralber.ae
Oppenheimer
Director: Christopher Nolan
Stars: Cillian Murphy, Emily Blunt, Robert Downey Jr, Florence Pugh, Matt Damon
Rating: 5/5
The years Ramadan fell in May
Teachers' pay - what you need to know
Pay varies significantly depending on the school, its rating and the curriculum. Here's a rough guide as of January 2021:
- top end schools tend to pay Dh16,000-17,000 a month - plus a monthly housing allowance of up to Dh6,000. These tend to be British curriculum schools rated 'outstanding' or 'very good', followed by American schools
- average salary across curriculums and skill levels is about Dh10,000, recruiters say
- it is becoming more common for schools to provide accommodation, sometimes in an apartment block with other teachers, rather than hand teachers a cash housing allowance
- some strong performing schools have cut back on salaries since the pandemic began, sometimes offering Dh16,000 including the housing allowance, which reflects the slump in rental costs, and sheer demand for jobs
- maths and science teachers are most in demand and some schools will pay up to Dh3,000 more than other teachers in recognition of their technical skills
- at the other end of the market, teachers in some Indian schools, where fees are lower and competition among applicants is intense, can be paid as low as Dh3,000 per month
- in Indian schools, it has also become common for teachers to share residential accommodation, living in a block with colleagues
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Tips from the expert
Dobromir Radichkov, chief data officer at dubizzle and Bayut, offers a few tips for UAE residents looking to earn some cash from pre-loved items.
- Sellers should focus on providing high-quality used goods at attractive prices to buyers.
- It’s important to use clear and appealing photos, with catchy titles and detailed descriptions to capture the attention of prospective buyers.
- Try to advertise a realistic price to attract buyers looking for good deals, especially in the current environment where consumers are significantly more price-sensitive.
- Be creative and look around your home for valuable items that you no longer need but might be useful to others.
The specs
Engine: 2.0-litre 4-cyl turbo
Power: 201hp at 5,200rpm
Torque: 320Nm at 1,750-4,000rpm
Transmission: 6-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 8.7L/100km
Price: Dh133,900
On sale: now
Safety 'top priority' for rival hyperloop company
The chief operating officer of Hyperloop Transportation Technologies, Andres de Leon, said his company's hyperloop technology is “ready” and safe.
He said the company prioritised safety throughout its development and, last year, Munich Re, one of the world's largest reinsurance companies, announced it was ready to insure their technology.
“Our levitation, propulsion, and vacuum technology have all been developed [...] over several decades and have been deployed and tested at full scale,” he said in a statement to The National.
“Only once the system has been certified and approved will it move people,” he said.
HyperloopTT has begun designing and engineering processes for its Abu Dhabi projects and hopes to break ground soon.
With no delivery date yet announced, Mr de Leon said timelines had to be considered carefully, as government approval, permits, and regulations could create necessary delays.
