Gamers compete at the Gaming Arena area during the Bitcoin 2022 Conference at Miami Beach Convention … [+]
Brash, high-flying 26-year-olds working in private equity at legendary asset management firm BlackRock are decidedly a rare breed. Even more scarce are those who voluntarily walk away from Wall Street to plunge headfirst into a largely untested emerging market. Yet, that’s exactly the trajectory of Paul Taylor, chief strategy officer at Fancy Studios, who left the $10 trillion asset firm to focus on one of the latest and more exotic applications of crypto, NFTs (non-fungible tokens), and blockchain.
“I loved every moment of my work,” he recalls. “Being surrounded by the best in the business and the never-ending flow of projects was great. The work kept me on my toes every second and it was a fantastic learning experience. I really appreciated the exposure to world class companies, investors, and management teams.”
Yet, in hindsight, Taylor admits the allure of crypto began to gnaw away at him. As he watched an increasing flow of talent and capital migrate to the world of blockchain, he wondered whether he was missing out.
“I’d been following crypto since 2017, and funnily enough, I had a reputation as one of BlackRock’s biggest bears on the space,” he says. “I consider myself a logical person with a healthy degree of skepticism, and in the earlier days of crypto, there were just so many projects that didn’t have real use cases. Lots of buzzwords and vague roadmaps without a clear slight to real utility. I was interested, but not interested enough to seriously consider switching careers.”
Of course, the path carved by Wall Street insiders leaving their lucrative gigs in favor of crypto is one now well traveled. Several years after the early exuberance of investors in Bitcoin and other digital currencies and NFTs, a new application of blockchain is gaining momentum:…
